“You could’ve been killed if I hadn’t come to rescue you,” Vi countered stubbornly.
“This streak of recklessness, you get it from your mother.” Despite his words, her father had a proud smile, as if he were silently taking credit for the fact.
She blurted out rough laughter. “Mother would say differently I think.”
“Exactly. She’s recklessandstubborn.” His eyes were glassy and tired. But still, no tears fell. This time it had nothing to do with the trappings of royalty, and everything to do with the fact that they were soaking in the relief of being finally,finallyreunited.
“I know about her,” Vi confessed. “I know why you left.”
“You do?”
“Yes. And I want you to know that I’ll save her, just like I saved you.” Vi stared out at the sky. The bloody dawn had turned into a pastel blue with spots of white in the distance. Not a cloud of red lightning in sight.
But Vi could still feel Raspian out there. She could feel him in her blood now—in the weight of the broken watch around her neck. Taavin was right: Raspian’s power was growing day by day, perhaps in part because of her. She had been the one to first sail through the storm of red lightning, to inspect the tears in the Twilight Forest, to throw herself into one of those tears, and then to use his words…
It was possible her actions were giving him footholds in the world. Vi’s jaw tightened. It didn’t matter; she’d be the one to undo him.
“Vi,” her father said painfully soft, “Sometimes, you can’t save everyone.”
Vi jerked her head toward him.
Aldrik Solaris had always been an imposing figure. Dark hair, taller than most. He wasn’t particularly broad, but he could command a room with little more than his presence and a look. Vi loved her father dearly, but he could be frightening to a young girl, especially when she’d done wrong. She had always seen him as an insurmountable force of nature.
But right now he looked like a tired old man.
“I will save our family,” she vowed. “First our family, then the world.” She’d saved him from the clutches of Adela; the rest suddenly seemed manageable.
“How did you even know to save me?” Her father shifted, bringing up a knee and resting his forearm on it. The skin of his shin was exposed through a long rip in his clothes. Everything he wore was in tatters—a shadow of former Imperial glory.
“I had a vision of the future, specifically of you on the Isle of Frost.”
“So you can see the future?” Vi made a noise of affirmation. “You share that much with your grandmother—my mother—then.”
“I thought so but… It’s a different sort of sight.” Vi tucked her head, running a hand through her hair with a sigh.
His father tapped her chin. “Do you not peer along the lines set out by the goddess?”
“I think so but—”
“Do you look into flames?”
“Well, yes, but that may just be because I—”
“Daughter, you are of her blood, as you are of mine, as you are of your mother’s. You don’t need proof in magic or tokens. You don’t need the world to validate it. It’s here.” He tapped her breastbone under her collarbone and above her heart. “It’s in the woman who’s sailed across the world and risked her life to reunite that family.”
Vi hung her head now. She would not allow the world to see the few stray tears fall. Her father’s arms wrapped tightly around her for a long moment, his chin on the top of her head. As if he understood, as if he knew that for one long minute she needed to hide from the world and give in to the overwhelming emotions before she drowned in them.
She straightened, finally, rubbing her face when her tears would no longer betray her.
“But this talk of saving the world,” her father finally continued. “You’ve risked enough, Vi. Come home.”
“Father… I can’t,” she protested weakly. It was a tempting prospect, even before he elaborated.
“You can. You are the crown princess of the Solaris Empire. Your home is on the Main Continent.”
Vi sniffed as a bitter smile crossed her lips. Her father still called it the Main Continent, and she had long since begun to refer to it as the Dark Isle. Vi could argue it was because that was how those on Meru knew it. But it was more than that.
She had called it the Dark Isle more because that was how she saw it. Her worldview had changed, and Vi didn’t know what it would take for it to change back… if it ever would.
