She’s right. I know Elyssara is facing nightmares asleep and awake—for her, there is no difference. But I need to stop her from descending any further into the darkness.
Seren looks to me then, eyes wide, boring into me. “You need to reach her, Kael. She’s spiraling. You need to start setting things right,” she pleads, her desperation palpable.
I loose a sigh, because I knew this was coming. I need to find a way for her to come back to me.Fast.
“I broke her heart, Seren,” I exhale. “She can’t even look at me.”
“You have tomakeher, Kael. Because every continent in the known realms is depending on it. And she doesn’t know it yet, but so is she.”
Seren folds back into Therion, and the others simply stand there, silent, empty.
I nod, understanding what I need to do.
“I’ll find her,” I announce, and turn on my heel to find my Starbound.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
KAEL
My hollow thudon Rubi’s door anchors me to the present moment. Her quarters are tucked into the trees on Thornewood’s edge—a calm contrast to the chaos in my mind. But the reek of brask and voidroot travels on the air, giving them away—I know this is where Elyssara is.
No one answers the door, but I hear the rustle of clothes and the scuff of feet. I know she doesn’t want to see me, but Seren’s right—I need to help her, even if it means her hating me. Even if it means pushing her.Better hate than indifference.
“Open the door, Rubi. I know she’s in there—I need to talk to her,” I bellow through the thick oak.
Rubi swings the door open, her disheveled hair and crumpled skirts blocking my view into the room. “She doesn’t want to see you, Kael. Just let the woman grieve, get a little wild, numb the pain. I’ve seen you do it, you know?” she sighs in exasperation, and she’s right. I’ve numbed the ache of lost family and friends more times than I can count. I’ve escaped the pain through drink, elixir, and touch, but that was beforeher. Before Elyssara ruined me for anything and anyone else. Before the only place I could escape into washer.
“I’m not in the fucking mood, Rubes. I’m coming in—get out of my way,” I command in a tone that I reserve for Council Hollow.
She exhales, shrugging her shoulders in indifference, and waving her hand to let me in. She blows a ring of smoke in my face, “Don’t say I didn’t warn ya, Your Majesty.”
The door swings closed behind me, and through the haze of smoke, dirty clothes, and half-concocted potions, Elyssara is draped across Rubi’s bed in nothing but a white tunic that barely covers her ass. The dark peaks of her nipples are visible under the tunic, and my mouth goes dry at the sight. I know she hates me, but my love for her has never wavered. Neither has the way I crave to touch her.
“Elyssara,” I begin, and her eyes drift to me, glazed and only half here.
She takes a swig of brask from Rubi’s flask. “Come to grovel?” she croaks, voice strained from the smoke.
Fuck. I don’t know what’s worse—her numbness or contempt.
“I’ve come to help, Elyssara. We’re all here to help,” I venture, knowing that my words are coming out empty and lacking.
She barks a loud, humorless laugh. “In the same way you helped me through Maldrak’s Gateway of Threads? Or have you got something different in mind this time?” she snipes, tone twisted by cruelty. “Perhaps torture? Starvation? Or something else equally as fun?”
I suck in a deep breath, clenching my jaw at the bitterness coating her words. I knew it would get worse before it got better.
“Duskae, no. The plan to swap you existed before I knew you—I made the only choice I could that allowed both you and Nalya to live.”
Her fierce gaze remains, but it wavers. I see the way she draws back, confused, perhaps even shocked.
“We were played. What we had, Duskae, it was real. All of it,” I breathe, and I hope she can feel the truth. I won’t tell her everything. Not while she’s like this.
She pauses for a heartbeat, eyes analyzing, deciding if her curiosity or her hurt will win.
“Yeah, well, forgive me, but I’ve lost trust in what’s real, Kael,” she says, the words hollow, broken and sinister. As if she’s lost trust altogether.I suppose hurt wins over curiosity.But something in her body changes—loosens, gives up, hurts too much to hold on to the loathing.
So, I do the only thing I know to do when I get an edge: I push.
“What does that mean, Duskae? What exactly did they do to you?” I demand, catching sight of the scars that peek out from under her tunic and cleave through her Lightborne mark.
