“Who let you two in?” Storne barked.
Evander’s eyes locked on Viktor’s chest. “Storm take me—canwedo that?”
Saecily strode forward, hands behind her back.
“No. Not like this,” she said.
“With discipline, you may heal others, but the wind will never move through you as it does through him.”
Gabriel lingered by the table, his voice clipped but steady.
“You’re standing, Viktor. That’s what matters.”
He gave him a curt nod before slipping out with Evander close behind.
Saecily busied herself at a side table, but did not leave. Her quiet presence felt deliberate—near enough to hear, distant enough to pretend she wasn’t watching.
Storne stepped forward, studying Viktor as though weighing both man and wounds. He exhaled through his nose, fingers flexing once before he spoke.
“I regret not getting you here sooner. I’m sorry for what you had to endure.”
Viktor’s voice came rough. “It’s done.”
Storne shook his head.
“No,” he breathed. “You’re still someone’s son.”
His voice broke, fragile, rare.
“I hope never again to watch a man’s boy suffer as you did last night.”
For a moment, quiet held between them. Then Storne gripped Viktor’s shoulder, pulling him into a brief, fierce embrace. The hold lingered just long enough for Viktor to feel its weight—then it was gone.
The rest blurred.
Viktor found his way up the stairs to the north wing, the last door at the end of a long hall. The silence followed him like a second shadow, soft but inescapable.
The chamber inside staggered him.
A bed large enough to swallow a company’s worth of blankets. Windows stretching floor to arch, glass catching what little moonlight bled through the storm. And beyond, a narrow chamber where water spilled from a spigot of carved stone.
He tore his clothes off, stepped beneath it—cold at first, then warm, sluicing away smoke and blood and the ache of too many hours on the road.
He braced his palms to the wall, head bowed as the water ran over scarred shoulders and calloused skin. For a heartbeat, he could almost believe he wasn’t broken.
When at last he dragged himself back into the main room, he wore only his smallclothes, tugging a linen shirt over damp skin. The bed loomed, impossible, and he sank to its edge, too weary to marvel at softness.
A knock came at the door.
He groaned under his breath. “We’ll talk in the morning, Gabriel…”
Another knock, more insistent.
Viktor pushed to his feet, padded across the room, and wrenched the door open. Light spilled across the threshold, gilding the curve of her braid before she stepped into view.
Amerei.
Chapter Forty-Nine
