And then I’m running again.
Toward him. Through smoke, over debris, past a dying guard still clutching his stomach.
I don’t care.
I launch myself into his arms and he catches me with a snarl that’s almost a sob.
“You’re here,” I breathe, burying my face in his neck. “You’re really here.”
“I told you,” he growls, holding me so tightly it hurts. “You are mine. Always.”
His scent overwhelms me—ash and blood and Kallus. My arms wrap around him tighter, like if I let go I’ll wake up and find it was all a dream.
“I never stopped waiting,” I say.
“I never stopped coming.”
Then he sets me down gently, pushes me behind him with one powerful arm, and steps forward.
He raises his hands.
And the estate—my prison, my cage, the place where they tried to make me less than I am—erupts into flame.
The fire is unnatural.
It moves like a living thing, hungry and precise. Pillars crumble. Roofs collapse. The central tower splits down the middle as if cleaved by a god’s hand.
Guards scatter, screaming. Drones fall from the sky, their circuits sizzling. Even the reinforced security gates warp and melt as if the air itself rebels against their presence.
Kallus’s back is straight. His shoulders square.
His voice is thunder:
“No more cages.”
He extends his blade, and it ignites—not with fire, but with light pulled from the stars themselves. A firestorm rises around him, concentric rings of energy pulsing outward like a detonation.
I watch in awe as the estate—the symbol of everything they used to control me—collapses in upon itself.
He doesn’t look back.
Not until the last wall falls.
Only then does he turn to me.
Only then does he smile.
“Ayla,” he murmurs, voice softer now. “I’m taking you home.”
I can’t breathe. Can’t move. All I can do is nod.
Because I am already home.
I don’t look back. Not once. Not even when the estate—my cage—collapses into glowing rubble behind us.
Kallus guides the starfighter with practiced grace, one hand on the controls, the other braced near me, as if still half-expecting someone to try and snatch me away. The cockpit is quiet save for the hum of the engines and the soft crackle of atmospheric drag.
We don’t speak.
