The wound on his temple had healed, but the ache beneath his ribs hadn’t. It wasn’t pain, not exactly, more like pressure. Like his heartbeat was no longer entirely his own.
He could still feel her. Every breath Thaelyn took pulled at him like a thread through the dark. The connection was faint, but alive, a pulse between storm and flame. He didn’t understand it, didn’t want to. He had enough ghosts without adding her name to them.
A shadow fell across the moonlight. Vornokh descended from the sky, wings folding as he landed behind him. The black dragon’s presence filled the air like gravity, bending it, warping it. His scales shimmered with the faint reflection of starlight and embers.
You are not resting,Vornokh’s voice rumbled through Thorne’s mind, more thought than sound.You burn even in stillness.
Thorne didn’t turn. “I can’t. Every time I close my eyes, I see the dome break. Thaelyn—breaking it.”
The dragon’s eyes narrowed.She is not the first to shatter what was meant to hold.
“That’s not what I’m worried about.” He clenched his fists. The heat flared beneath his palms, his fire answering his temper. “It’s what’s inside her. What it’s doing to both of us.”
Vornokh tilted his massive head, smoke curling from his nostrils.You feel her magic because the dragon bond remembers hers. Nyxariel stirs, and so do I.
“Then make it stop,” Thorne snapped, rising to his feet. “If there’s a way, sever it?—”
You cannot cut the echo of what was destined.The dragon’s voice deepened, resonant enough to make the grass shiver.
You are the flame, and she is the storm. Together you are balance, or ruin.
Thorne exhaled sharply, pacing. “You sound like Vaelen.”
He speaks truths you refuse to hear.
“I’m not some philosophical prophecy.” His voice cracked, low and dangerous. “And she’s not mine to fix.”
And yet you try.
Thorne’s head snapped up, anger flaring hot. “She almost died because of what happened with me. You expect me to ignore that?”
No.Vornokh’s tone softened, like embers dimming under ash.I expect you to remember that you both lived. There is purpose in survival.
Thorne’s breath trembled in the cold air. His hands ached to strike something, to burn the edges of this truth until it stopped feeling like a chain. But, beneath the anger was something else. Guilt. Under that, something far worse. Longing.
Every time Thorne tried to close himself off, the bond pushed back, a whisper of Thaelyn’s heartbeat, a flicker of her breath. He could almosthearher when his guard slipped. When she faltered in training, the ache in his chest pulsed sharply enough to draw blood.
He hated it. Hated how her storm seemed to know him better than he wanted to know himself.
Vornokh shifted his weight, massive wings stirring.You should know, the wind carries news from the south. The border fires burn again. Something moves beyond the Vale.
Thorne stiffened. “Kaen?”
The dragon’s silence was answer enough.
“Of course,” Thorne muttered. “While the Academy repairs its walls, he fans the flames of war.”
He calls it order,Vornokh said.But the wind whispers of corruption. Of darkness that breathes his name.
Thorne looked toward the horizon where the southern mountains split the sky. Faint orange glows pulsed there, distant and rhythmic like a beacon of warnings. He cursed under his breath. “If he’s touching what I think he is?—”
Then the realm burns. Thaelyn’s power will be drawn to it. The Aether remembers where it was broken last.
Thorne’s jaw tightened. The thought of Thaelyn anywhere near that border, near Kaen, clawed at something deep inside him. He told himself it was duty, but he knew better. He ran a hand down his face, exhaling.
“My uncle’s going to send riders soon. I’ll volunteer.”
Vornokh’s eyes flared brighter.Would you leave her unguarded?
