She glances at me, then at Vael. Her lips quiver. “And I’m not broken.”
Silence.
The moderator’s lips part. The scientists’ pens hover. The diplomats hold their breath.
I feel a swell of pride, but also relief. Because she gave them nothing to argue. Nothing to dissect. Nothing to challenge. She simplystood.
The chairman clears his throat. “Thank you, child.”
Vael bows his head. I squeeze his hand. We stand as a unit, different halves of one whole. The chamber shifts. The skeptics no longer sneer—they listen. They record. They will decide. But the decision changed the moment she spoke.
Afterward, we leave the chamber. The stone halls echo our footsteps. Outside, the air is cool twilight, the scent of the sea heavier now, carrying rain from the low clouds. Nessa skips ahead and gathers luminous shells from the path. She holds them up like trophies. The world around doesn’t yet understand what she’s done, but she does. We do.
Vael walks beside me. He slides his arm around my waist. I lean into him, let the ocean hum in my ears.
“You good?” he asks.
I nod. “Best I’ve ever been.”
He smiles, gentle and full.
And for the first time in this tribunal, I believe that statement.
CHAPTER 32
VAEL
The forge’s entrance yawns open like a cavern of molten memory. I lead them in—Rynn on my left, Nessa scrabbling along the edge of the stone walkway on my right, eyes bright, grin wide, always wide. The air hits us before we even step in: heat like a living thing, the smell of iron, sulfur, and raw flame. My boots echo across the basalt floor, each step a reminder that this moment matters.
The ceremonial forge is rare in my culture when the union spans species—especially when one half is human—but ours is welcomed. The elders say this stone shall carry our names, carry our “yes,” and the fire shall seal it. Rynn knows the magnitude. I see it flicker in her eyes when she glances at the pale metal inscriptions already etched around the chamber—hundreds of names, couples bonded by vows and hope and blood-sweat forging together.
Children sit on the raised stone benches, silent watchers. Their feet dangle, sandals too big, shadows playing on their faces from the firelight. The usual quiet of the settlement feels muted here, as if the wind outside is holding its breath.
Rynn is quiet behind me. Her grip on my arm is tight. I glance down—her fingers curl into mine. I give them a gentlesqueeze. Her cheek brushes my gauntlet. I smell a little of sea-salt and the faint spice of her hair-oil.
“Ready?” I whisper.
She nods, barely. “Yeah.”
Nessa bounds ahead to stand before the giant rectangular stone slab, cold and darkened by soot and age, veins of molten gold flickered in by past unions. She reaches out and presses her small palm to the surface, leaving a smudge of sweat and sand. She giggles. “Now we’re official, right?”
I smile and watch Rynn’s lips curve. She steps forward and presses her palm beside Nessa’s. The stone is cooler than she expected—smooth, granite-fine, but the edges rough from centuries of ritual. Her hand trembles just slightly. I feel it through my gauntlet when I wrap my other hand over her’s.
“You actually feel something,” I say softly. “Doesn’t just look like it.”
She inhales, slow. “It’s heavier than I thought.”
“Good.”
Father-forge-masterSorvak stands before the fire pit, tall, unyielding, his face illuminated orange from the blaze. Sparks drift upward, curl like small phoenix-flames, vanish in the air. He nods to us, then raises a heavy hammer. It’s not for striking metal today. It’s for sealing. He dips the hammer’s face into the molten pool at his feet, draws it out glowing hot. Then he presses the glowing face to the stone slab just above where we placed our hands. The stone flares briefly, golden light cracking outward from our palms, then contracts back into its ashen surface, the names and our prints now fused.
I watch the light crawl across the slab. I smell burnt rock, the metallic edge of flame, the faint tang of sweat on Rynn’s forehead. The heat hums in my bones.
Sorvak lowers the hammer. “So it is done.” His voice is deep. “The bond is sealed. Not just by name, but by fire, by choice.”
Nessa bounces on her toes, claps her small hands. “It glowed!” she exclaims.
I crouch to wrap my arm around her. “Yes it did, kiddo. You did that.”
