“I…” Closing my eyes, I inhale, willing the courage to say the words. “I’m not sure I am anymore.”
My whole body tightens, bracing for impact. He reaches for me, confusion and concern knitting together—and I realize how unclear my words have been. Another deep breath. I begin to tremble.
“Mortal?”
Did I mean for it to be a question? Perhaps. Honestly, I don’t know anymore.
I look down at my hands, one cradled in the other. I shake my head; everything in me feels at war. And yet the one truth I hold tighter than any other in this moment is this: Vale loves me. Truly, deeply, loves me. Together, I know we can face whatever comes.
My voice barely rises above a whisper as I speak into the night. “I don’t think I’m the same anymore. And not just the change of coming to court, of becoming your wife, becoming… queen.” Each word feels heavy. Everything I have endured is more than most would face in a lifetime. Still, I know there is more. More that has happened. More that has changed.
I look into Vale’s eyes, and I can see he carries the same questiondeep in his heart. He lifts himself higher in the bed, leaning toward me, taking my hands in his own.
“The day of the wedding…” I continue, my hands trembling despite the warmth of his around them. I feel the sting of tears at the corners of my eyes. My shoulders knot across my spine. The pit in my stomach churns so fiercely I fear it might swallow me whole.
But I have to say it. I have to speak the words that have been burning inside me since I first dared to think them.
Vale’s concern grows; I can tell he’s afraid. Saying it won’t ease that fear. Through the tightness in my chest, I take the leap.
“…I think I died.”
Chapter Thirty-Eight
“Ithink you may be right.”
The words are shockingly stoic, even for the man who seems to break from his brooding nature only for me. “Mira, you are remarkable. You always have been. But…” His thumb brushes slow circles across my wrist, the only thing keeping me anchored in this moment. “So many things.” Each word is heavy beyond his strength to carry. “The attack at the wedding. The cut on your hand. The flowers…” He shakes his head, fighting to reconcile it all in his mind.
“The flowers?” Even as I ask the question, I feel something cut through the fog of my memory.
He leans in close, the weight between us bearable only because we are in it together. A crack in his voice shatters the same way this confession broke free of me. “When I returned at the solstice,” each word strained as he walks through the memory, “and I found you in the conservatory… I don’t even know if I registered it at the time. But when we were back there later, and the scent of the flowers filled my lungs—it was too much. It was…unnatural.” He doesn’t carry disdain as he says the word.
Unnatural.
I think I sensed it too.
My brow furrows, lips pressing together before I speak. “I don’t think they were in bloom before… before that night. The fever—it’s still so hard to remember.”
He wraps his arms around me, solid and grounding. We are both uneasy, but we are together.
“Asters.” The sudden word startles him, releasing his hold just enough to look at me. Recognition sets in—and he goes pale. The sight rattles me. Yes. I remember now. The unseasonable, unnatural bloom. The entire garden transformed overnight, far beyond expectation. Star-shaped petals blooming too early. Too bright.
“Mira,” Vale’s voice reaches for me, pleading. “What happened that night?”
I freeze. I am not afraid to tell him. I am only unsure I have looked back clearly enough myself.
“Mira, I felt you.”
I see the look again—the one from the wedding attack, from our most vulnerable moments, from the edge of losing everything. I press my palm to his cheek, and he leans into it.
“I was here in the manor,” he says. “I came for my mother’s ring.” His thumb grazes the gem. “The storm was the worst we had seen. I couldn’t ask my men to go out in it. But then…” He shudders, and the sound of it unravels something in me. “I felt you cry out to me. I felt… despair.”
Tears run freely down my cheeks as I push past the wreckage in my memory—past the wedding, the attack, the fever—back to that night.
“The Sanctum.”
My voice is small. “The call.”
He understands.
