“Finally.A prophecy fulfilled,” he whispered with his last breath. Then he was gone.
Val-Theris did not look at his brother’s body.
He had seen this end a thousand times. This wasn’t how it was meant to happen. He had always known his death was coming. He had prepared for it, accepted it, planned for it, even welcomed it.
But nowhere—nowherein all the futures the Light had whispered into his mind had he seen this.
Val-Theris lowered his head slowly, his pale feathers stirring faintly around them as his jaw clenched, his breath uneven and sharp against the cold night air.
Something ancient and divine in his chest broke.
The Angel of Foresight, blessed and cursed with prophecy, had been blind where it mattered most.
THIRTY-TWO
Rohannes approached the room,but hesitated at the threshold, unsure whether to enter. The silence inside was suffocating. And there, on the floor beside the bed, was the king.
Val-Theris was kneeling, his wings spread wide around him like a broken canopy of gold and white. They trembled with each uneven breath. His hands clutched the edge of the bed where Jesenia lay, his forehead pressed against the cold sheets, his body shaking with sobs so deep they sounded like something being torn from his chest.
Rohannes had never seen him weep before.
Val-Theris didn’t acknowledge him with words. He simply lifted his head just enough for Rohannes to see his face, and the sight nearly broke him. The Angel-King’s eyes, once radiant, were bloodshot and hollow, his cheeks streaked with golden tears that glimmered faintly in the dim light.
“She’s really gone,” Val-Theris whispered. His voice cracked. “And our child—” He choked on the words, unable to finish.
Rohannes knelt beside him, the motion slow, reverent. “I know,” he said. “I know, my king.”
Val-Theris shook his head, hands trembling as he gripped the sheets again. “I saw every death but hers. What use is foresightif it cannot save the only life that mattered?” He bent forward again, his body wracked with sobs. “The Light made me to preserve life. To protect it. And all I do is destroy.”
He wrapped an arm around Val-Theris’s shoulders, steadying him, grounding him. “You didn’t destroy her,” he said softly. “You loved her.”
Val-Theris turned his face toward him, a broken laugh escaping between sobs. “Then love is the cruelest thing the Light ever made.”
Val-Theris satat her side for hours, motionless, hands clasped so tightly around her fingers that her nails had cut crescents into his skin. Her hand was cold now, light as silk. He couldn’t bring himself to let go.
There had been no prophecy this time. No vision to prepare him.
No, that’s not true. He had been shown it all, but had been blind to its meaning.
He bowed his head, his breath trembling as it left him. “You were supposed to live,” he whispered. “You were supposed to outlast me.”
A tremor worked its way through his body—too human for a god, too fragile for a king. His wings hung heavy, feathers dull with soot and ash, the radiant gold dimmed to the color of dying light.
He reached toward her stomach, the stillness there cutting deeper than any blade. “And you, little one…” His voice broke. “You never even took your first breath.”
He pressed his forehead to her abdomen, shaking. “I would have given you the world,” he murmured. “You would have had her kindness. Her laughter. The way she believed in mercy even when it hurt.” He paused, his voice cracking. “You would have been everything I could never be.”
He lifted his head, tears streaking down his face—sparkling with a golden sheen, glinting faintly in the dim light. For the first time in his long life, his foresight offered no threads of fate, no whispers of the divine. Only the unbearable clarity of the present moment.
He brushed his thumb along Jesenia’s lips. “You once told me you wanted as many children as your body would carry,” he said softly. “And I told you I would give you as many as I could.”
A small, strangled laugh escaped him. “You always did have a way of keeping all of your promises before I could keep any of mine.” His hand slipped to her still fingers again, lacing through them. “I thought I was the one cursed by prophecy,” he whispered. “But it was you who paid for it.”
He leaned down one last time, pressing his lips to Jesenia’s forehead, then to the place where their child had been.
“I will see you both again,” he murmured. “In the place where even Light cannot reach. I will come for you, I promise.”
EPILOGUE
