He set her on Evander’s horse, told her they needed each other more than they knew.
The company rode in silence, every face hollowed by the day.
Evander kept the reins steady. Amerei pressed close behind him, her arms looped around his middle. She had not spoken since Viktor lifted her up—only leaned into another heartbeat, knowing she could not carry her own alone.
Storne led, shoulders rigid, cloak torn, his silence cutting deeper than command. Gabriel trailed behind, bruised and raw-eyed, the quiet between him and Evander heavy as ash.
And Viktor—burned, aching, chest bound and seared—kept his head high. He would not let them see him falter. Amerei’s gaze found him often, her hand brushing his across the narrow space between horses, each fleeting touch a healing balm.
They crested the hill at last.
Hooves struck wet stone. Lightning split the night.
Then the forest opened to reveal it:
Fyreglade.
Not a house. Not a manor.
A castle.
Its towers loomed out of the rain-slick cliffs, walls carved into the rock itself, lit by torches that flickered like stars against its ashen spine.
Amerei’s breath shuddered out, relief breaking through the ache. The gates groaned open, oak and iron yawning wide. For the first time since the forest, hope pressed back into her chest.
Viktor’s eyes found hers as they passed beneath, stormlight flickering through his hair.
“So this is home?”
She smiled—soft and shining.
“It is.”
The gates shut behind them with a thud that seemed to cleave the night in half.
The storm pressed in, but within Fyreglade’s walls the air felt lighter—lamplight glowed along stone paths, rain glittered across trimmed hedges, and warm smoke drifted from unseen chimneys.
The weight of blood and fire began, at last, to loosen.
Viktor caught himself staring. The curve of a balcony. The carved archways. Marble lions crouched at the foot of a fountain, their mouths spilling water bright as glass. He had marched through palaces, slept beneath the rafters of a hundred garrisons, but this—this he could hardly name.
Beside him, Gabriel’s mouth had gone slack. He muttered something in Elvish that made Amerei laugh for the first time since the forest.
“Careful, Captain,” she teased. “You stare any longer, and it’ll expect a proposal.”
“Forge the rings…” Gabriel murmured, half under breath.
Evander only smirked. “I did warn you. Not so bad, is it?”
They left their horses with the stablehands, then the great doors opened.
They stepped inside—and Viktor froze.
A glass dome arched above, vast and gleaming, the storm refracted through its panes into a hundred shards of lightning. Below it, a staircase swept down in two spirals of white marble, rails wrought in bronze and polished wood, like the wings of some great bird unfurling.
Viktor’s voice caught in his throat. Gabriel swore outright. Evander only shook his head, savoring their reactions.
Amerei moved past them, boots clicking across the floor she called home.
