I squeezed her hand, pulling her back into the shadows of a limestone overhang. "Quiet," I breathed.
I closed my eyes, extending my senses into the rock. I felt the vibration of footsteps. Many of them. Clumsy, hurried strides that had no respect for the stone. They were above us and to the left, moving through a parallel tunnel.
The Order,I realized. Or perhaps the traitor Keepers. It mattered little; they both tasted of poison.
"They are close," I murmured, opening my eyes. In the dark, the gold flecks in her amethyst eyes seemed to search for mine. "To the left. We must go right. It will be steeper, harder, but they will not find us."
"Can you sense them?" She asked, pressing closer to my side. Her body heat seeped through the rough wool of my tunic, a beacon in the cold.
"I can feel their disturbance," I explained, keeping my voice to the lowest rumble. "They walk on the earth like conquerors. They break whatever they touch. It echoes."
I led her away from the junction, carving a fresh path through a vein of softer sandstone. This route was narrow, a chimney meant for smoke and bats, not people. I had to widen it as we went, my magic constantly smoothing the edges so they wouldn't snag her skin or clothes.
"You're careful," she said softly after I had dissolved a particularly sharp stalactite that would have scraped her shoulder.
"You are fragile," I said, then immediately regretted the word. It sounded like an insult. "Not in spirit," I corrected quickly. "Your spirit is iron. But your body, well, it has been through much. I do not wish to add to the bruises."
"Kaelen calls me fireheart," she mused, her breath coming a little harder as the incline increased. "Flynn calls me Little Pup. Elias calls me the Key, or the Door, or whatever metaphor fits the apocalypse of the hour."
She paused, looking up at me. "You just call me Little One."
"You are small," I stated, confused. "To me."
"It's not just size," she said, managing a weak smile. "With you I feel like I don't have to be big. I don't have to be the child of prophecy or wear a crown I never asked for. I can just be here."
My heart gave a slow, heavy thud against my ribs.
It was the pressure. That was what she was running from. The crushing weight of Kaelen’s intensity, Flynn’s manic energy, Elias’s cosmic dread. They all needed her to be something. Kaelen needed a mate to match his fire. Flynn needed a pack alpha. Elias needed a savior.
And me?
I just wanted her to be safe.
"You do not have to be anything with me," I told her, shaping a handhold into the wall so she could pull herself up a ledge. "You can just be Aria. The girl who presses flowers."
She froze, her hand in the groove I had made. "You really know about that."
"We tasted your life for years," I reminded her gently. "The bitterness of the rituals. The fear of the High Keeper. But also the sweet moments. The quiet ones, like the satisfaction of finding a purple aster in the frost, or the comfort of old paper in the archives."
I pulled her up onto the ledge, lifting her until she stood beside me. The tunnel here was a vertical shaft, a vent leading to the surface. Above us, far above, I could see a pinprick of velvet darkness that wasn't stone. The night sky.
"Pandora..." I started, the name tasting of dust on my tongue. "She was magnificent. She burned so brightly that looking at her hurt. She was Kaelen’s sun. He revolved around her, and she basked in it."
I looked at Aria. She was leaning against the wall, listening, her eyes fixed on my face.
"But when the sun shines that bright," I continued, "it casts long shadows. Kaelen was first. He was always first. We loved her, and she loved us, truly, but we were moons. We were the entourage."
"That sounds lonely," Aria whispered.
"It was accepted," I said. "It was the nature of things. But you..."
I reached out, my large hand hovered near her face, but I didn't touch her, didn't want to overwhelm her.
"You are not like her," I said. "Through the bond I feel you trying. I know you stretch yourself thin, Aria. You try toencompass Kaelen’s rage, Flynn’s hunger, Elias’s vision. You try to give us all rooms in your heart."
Her eyes filled with sudden tears. "It’s hard," she admitted, her voice cracking. "It’s so loud. Just being near you all it’s like standing in the eye of a storm."
"I know," I said. "And I worry. Your body... it is mortal. It’s not designed to house storms."
