The door opened. My mother stood there, her hair streaked with gray, her hands pressed to her mouth. Her eyes were wide, shining with the year I had missed.
And then, before she could move, another figure pushed past her?—
Amara.
She ran to me barefoot, her linen tunic brushing the ground, the morning light catching in her dark hair. For a moment, I thought she was a vision—the kind that haunted soldiers after too many sleepless nights—but then she collided with me, warm, real, breathing.
I caught her, the force of it stealing the air from my lungs. She fit against me the same way she always had, as if the gods had carved her from the hollow beneath my ribs.
“Lazarus,” she whispered, voice shaking.
I lowered my forehead to hers and kissed her.
It wasn’t polished or soft. It was the kind of kiss born of waiting too long, of bleeding and surviving and refusing to die before feeling this again. Her lips quivered against mine, tasting of salt and morning air, of something achingly human after so much death.
Her hands slid up my neck, threading into my hair, and I felt the tremor in her fingers—the fear that I might still vanish. I drew her closer, my palms pressing to the curve of her back through the thin linen. The smell of her—smoke, barley, and a trace of honey—flooded me, dizzying and familiar.
When I finally pulled back, I cupped her face in both hands. Her cheeks were flushed, her lips kiss-bruised. And her eyes shone with tears she’d held until now, and time hadn’t dulled her. It had sharpened her, made her fierce, made her real.
“You’re here,” she whispered, voice trembling. “Lazarus… I thought I’d lost you. I thought I’d never see you again.”
“You’ll never lose me,” I said, brushing my thumb along her bottom lip. “Not in this life. Not in the next. Salvatore and I led our soldiers to victory—and I came back. Foryou.”
She smiled through the tears and kissed me again—slower now, deeper like she was pouring all her love, her sorrow, her survival into me. Into this moment.
And I let it consume me.
When we parted, she leaned her forehead to mine, breathless.
“I’m so happy you’re back.”
“And I’m grateful to be home,” I murmured, reaching beneath my tunic. “And I brought something for us.”
I pulled the gold pouch free, the coins clinking as I held it out.
“I’ve earned the real prize—here’s the promised gold.”
She glanced at it—just for a heartbeat—before her gaze found mine again, soft and steady.
“I don’t need riches, Lazarus.You’reall I need.”
“You are the reason I fight, the reason I return, the reason I breathe,” I whispered, brushing a loose strand of hair behind her ear. “If I could, I’d give you a kingdom. But this—this will feed us. Fix the roof. Buy time. Enough to keep us warm. Enough to keep you smiling.”
I slipped my arm around Amara’s shoulders, and together we turned toward the cottage.
For a heartbeat, everything felt right again—the smell of barley thick in the air, the warmth of her against me, the sound of the sea wind moving through the fields.
But beneath it all, something cold had taken root.
Turtanu’s words hadn’t stayed behind on the road; they followed me like ghosts.
Your father was no war hero. Your mother lied.
I had fought a war to bring honor to a name that might not even be mine. And now, with gold in my hands and blood still on my skin, all I wanted was the truth.
My mother stood in the doorway, shawl draped loosely around her shoulders. Morning light poured through the open shutters, soft and golden. Her eyes were wet as she reached for me.
“My son,” she whispered. “The gods have brought you home.”
