"The pair would have sacrificed themselves in no other way," she said, glancing to him. "The grandest exit. Audacious and dangerous, just like the two of them together."
"Why do you call her Drae?" he asked.
She started to frown. The nickname came so naturally to her by then that she never thought anything of it. But the memory made her smile nonetheless. "I didn't speak very well as a child—one more reason my mother decided I would always make a poor Queen. I couldn't say Aydra or Zoria. So Aydra became Drae, and Zoria became Zozi. Drae just sort of stuck, and after a while, it was all Dorian called her as well. Sometimes Rhaif."
"Do you remember much about Zoria and Vasilis?"
"Not much," she answered, trying her hardest to pull for any memories. "I remember Drae sort of shielding us from them. She never let Dorian and I alone in the room with either. And Rhaif did the same. Neither of us realized why at the time, but now..." She paused to stifle the emotion in her chest, and Nadir squeezed her hand reassuringly. "You know, I'm just glad she found Draven. Even with what happened to them. It was nice seeing her truly smile."
"It still feels unreal," Nadir said. "Pulling aground the last two times at his home... I still expected him to be there. Talking shit to me about the goods I'd brought. Felt almost as though he was simply at Magnice for a meeting, or I'd missed him going off on a hunt."
"I feel the same," she said. "That she has dropped me off here and gone on an adventure with him."
"Maybe that's how we can think of them," he suggested. "Off on one of their adventures."
The thought hurt her heart, but it did make her feel a little better. "I'd like that."
A soft smile spread on his lips, and he leaned down to kiss her again. Delicately, almost as a silent promise that they were okay and together, they would help one another through this.
"Come on. We're almost there," Nadir said when they pulled apart.
They continued walking in silence then, and Nyssa hugged his arm as he led her through. How easy it was to talk to him continued to surprise her. She wanted to sit with him and learn it all. Every whisper of his past. Every story. Hear his words and his laugh. She ached to tell him everything too. To talk about her family and her castle and hear him make fun of her and every suitor to have ever graced her room.
She started to speak, feeling so much lighter with the feeling of that weight off her chest, but the forest opened up around them, and she forgot everything she was about to say.
Fruiting trees of all kinds, some of which grew blooms and greening leaves, others bare, but all of them reached up toward the dark lavender sky. Pale moons' light poured in around them.
It was the sight of the fireflies dancing around them that brought a smile to her lips.
Magnice had only ever had them in the summer. She delighted in seeing them as it brought back the memories of her and Dorian catching and letting them light up their rooms as they played.
Nyssa stepped away from Nadir to see beyond the yellow glow and touch some of the barked trees she'd never seen before. She'd honestly never seen how the food she ate was grown.
It was a connection to the land she wished she'd known about earlier. To be at one with the surroundings that gave her life. She reached out to one of the trees, its bark peeling back from the limb. Rough and jagged beneath her fingertips, she allowed her body to sink into its vibrance.
Traveling to the Forest with Aydra and Lex had been the first time she'd ever seen trees other than the few scattered along the cliff sides. She'd felt a small comfort there, but not as much of a comfort as she felt at Nadir's reef. Here in this forest, with the ocean still in her ears.
This felt like home.
"I lied earlier," Nadir said then, and the words brought her back to him.
She turned, finding him simply staring at her. "What do you mean?"
"When I said I wanted to memorize that moment back on the beach." The space between them closed, and her heart warmed at the look on his face and the light from the fireflies dancing on his skin. He took both her hands and lifted them up at their sides, elbows bent, and then he sank their palms and forearms together. His long fingers lined up against her petite ones and then curled to entwine their hands together. Such a slight movement shouldn't have sent a chill over her skin, but it did, and her chest caved at the stare in his eyes.
"I want to memorize every moment," he said softly. "I want every moment that we can just be... Us."
That warmth spread through her entire body as the tug in her stomach reached out for him.
"Just us," she whispered, the words once more coming so easily from her that she didn't know how to stop herself.
His lip quirked a fraction upwards, and it made her head tilt.
"What?" she asked.
"I like the way you say, 'us.'"
His hand pressed to her cheek, and the smile on her lips widened as he bent to kiss her.
