Lykor’s grip broke, his hand numb as it dropped back to his side. Heat flared to his cheeks, the rejection knifing through his chest, tightening in his throat. He retreated a step to give Jassyn space.
But guilt was the blade that cleaved through him.
He was the cause of this. Of Jassyn’s distress. Of the scar carved into his face. The torment that chased him even now, catching him in the dark.
The thought twisted around Lykor’s ribs. He knew what it was like to wake choking on nightmares, dragged into the suffocating grip of memories he couldn’t escape. The king’s hands. The pain. How many nights had he clawed at his own flesh, certain he’d never break free?
And the thought that Jassyn might feel the same—that his own presence had provoked it—was unbearable.
Lykor’s gaze lingered on Jassyn’s profile, tracing the tension in his jaw, noticing the way he avoided looking at him—as though even eye contact would cut too deep.
The question anchored in his chest, pressing heavier with each beat of silence. He didn’t want to ask, but he had to know. Needed to. Craved the punishment of the truth. It was no less than he deserved.
Lykor’s voice was barely a whisper, the question carried by the wind. “Did I do this to you?”
Slowly, torturously slowly, Jassyn met his eyes.
White as the snow, the scar Lykor had crafted sliced stark across Jassyn’s face, a glaring testament of the brutal strike. Rage had driven him, but cowardice had delivered the punch.
“I’m sorry,” Lykor breathed, his gauntlet curling at his side. An insignificant offering of words. But he meant it now.
“If you’re forced to relive the pain I caused…” The thought was a cruel irony. He couldn’t take it back. Monsters like him were only capable of destruction. Of ruining beautiful things.
Jassyn blinked, almost startled. “You didn’t do this to me,” he said quietly. He traced the jagged seam that magic hadn’t erased. “This is nothing. A reminder if anything.” His hand fell away and his curls tumbled forward to shield whatever war waswaging behind his eyes. “The scars that haunt me are ones you can’t see.”
The words were a retreat, echoed in the steps Jassyn took backward. As if distance could bury the conversation and keep it from returning.
Lykor held his breath, uncertain if he’d heard right. If it wasn’t his actions plaguing Jassyn, then what was?
“We should get back,” Jassyn said, not meeting his gaze. “Vesryn is probably worried.”
Lykor nodded, his throat too constricted to offer more than a mumbled explanation about Aesar regenerating during the night. Thankfully, Jassyn didn’t press him about why they hadn’t returned sooner. Lykor summoned his power, opening a portal back to the jungle.
But before they stepped through, an impulse seized him, a need he didn’t fully understand—the desire to reach out.
“I have dreams that torment me too.”
His voice was so quiet he that almost doubted Jassyn had heard. Witless words for someone who’d already seen the ruins of his mind, the raw wounds the king had left behind. Yet Jassyn’s spine stiffened before he glanced back over his shoulder.
The sun caught the amber flecks in his eyes, softening his expression with something that could have been understanding. Jassyn’s lips parted slightly as though he might speak, but he didn’t. Instead, he dipped his head in the faintest acknowledgment before stepping through the rift.
Lykor stared at the empty space left behind, his chest tight yet strangely lighter. The quiet hung heavy, but it wasn’t empty. It carried a frail connection, burdens neither had spoken aloud. Invisible scars that needed no explanation.
And for the first time, Lykor didn’t feel so alone.
CHAPTER 30
LYKOR
Lykor nearly collided with Jassyn’s back as he halted on the other side of the portal. Sunlight speared through the canopy in fractured beams of greens and golds, illuminating a scene that immediately curdled his mood.
The trio—whose very existence seemed designed to plague him—was already up with the dawn. Lurking too close to the portaling grounds, they were clearly lying in wait for him and Jassyn to return.
Fenn lounged back on his heels, brandishing a stick like a scepter as he thrust it at their campfire. He waved it theatrically while instructing the prince, as if stoking the embers was some sacred art. Perched on a log just beyond them, Serenna watched as a fiery orb flickered above her palm.
Lykor banished the rift, and three heads swiveled toward him and Jassyn.
“Good morning,” Fenn drawled, each syllable dragging like the slow curve of his smirk. His piercings glinted in the firelight as he nudged the prince with an elbow in some unspoken joke.
