“Then where,” I asked carefully, “would the Aelyth for Zapharos, Dravok. and the others from the Hall of Seven have come from?”
I looked between them. “Or Thyros.”
"Well," Zapharos cleared his throat, "when a male and female really like each other?—"
Ella, elbowing him, stopped him before he could finish the sentence. "No really. How did you guys reproduce?"
Zapharos rubbed his side, pretending Ella had actually hurt him. "What I was going to say was, a bonded male and female will produce a fitting Aelyth over time."
"When the universe declares the male mature enough to find their Aelyth," Dravok added.
"So then, one of the bonded couples would have had a baby girl for Zapharos?" Ella asked with a slight nod of jealousy in her tone.
"Not a baby, no," Zapharos shook his head. "We don't reproduce the way mortals do. It's just… there."
I closed my eyes, even with the history and information I had received during the Reconstitution, my mind was still way too wrapped aroundmortal reproduction, as Zapharos had so eloquently called it, to even comprehend how this was possible.
"So, what? Poof, there just would have been amature," Nadine made quotation marks around the word and arched one of her eyebrows, "woman there for you? While you had to mature over many millennia?"
"It's more complicated, but in essence, yes." Dravok agreed. Grinning at his mate. "I wonder if she would have been as prickly as you."
Nadine rolled her eyes.
"Okay, all jokes aside," I interrupted, "since the women were gone and several men survived the initial attack on the Harrowed One, the one where Caelor was taken, none of you would have ever had an Aelyth?"
The men looked at each other, and I could feel the incredible sadness coming off them.
Thyros mumbled, "Essentially."
By the sacred Tomb, how sad was that? These men had lived millions of years, thinking they were doomed to be alone?
"We did venture out of Nox Eternum to relieve some… pressure, every now and again," Zapharos stated with a grin at Ella.
Still, that wasn't the same as having his Aelyth, and we all knew it.
Suddenly, Nadine let out a small, “Oh.”
Ella frowned. “Oh, what?”
Nadine turned slowly toward us, her expression pale with astonishment. “Ashera didn’t just scatter herself randomly through humanity. She split intentionally,” Nadine continued softly. “Into aspects.”
Understanding detonated inside me. Mind, soul, heart.
I looked at Ella.
Then at Nadine.
Then at myself.
“No,” Ella breathed.
“Yes.” Dravok's eyes remained fixed on Nadine like he was seeing the universe rearrange itself in front of him.
“The original Aelyth died,” he continued slowly. “There were no surviving bonds left for us, the younger Arkhevari.”
“So Ashera…” Zapharos murmured.
“She compensated,” Nadine finished.
