He takes my hands in both of his, staring at where our skin met—as if the truth were easier to speak into my palms than into my eyes.
When he finally looks up, the words cost him.
“I must leave.”
Quiet.
Reluctant.
Unyielding.
Breath catches in my throat. He sees the question forming before I can speak it. “Will I be coming with you?” I ask softly, trying to still the dread curling low in my belly.
“Not this time, little flame.” He shakes his head—gentle, but no less devastating. “It’s a difficult journey in numbers—but one I need to make.”
The last time he left Caerhollan, he bled out on the floor of my cottage. The memory splits through me.
My fingers tighten around his. “I need you safe,” I whisper, voice fraying.
“I will be.” His tone is wrapped iron in warmth, a promise hammered true. “There is nothing to fear, my love. I will be gone little more than a fortnight.”
A fortnight.
I count days against the life I’ve lived here—how brief, how full.
“The solstice,” I murmur. “It’s always been important to me.”
The rhythm of the moon and season—the very thing that once made me an outcast—has always felt sacred. Here, within ancient walls, I finally feel safe speaking it aloud.
“Then I shall return before that night.” He presses a kiss to my hands—sealing the promise in flesh.
I believe him.
Yet somewhere beneath the warmth of his words, the mountain hums—steady, waiting—its own promise to keep.
He keeps his vow to make the day ours.
He will leave at first light. I tell myself to savorevery moment, bittersweet though it may be. We cling to each other more consciously now. These are not the fleeting touches that once gave me butterflies. This is deeper, threaded with ache.
We ride the mountainside, pine-sharp air filling my lungs, sunlight slipping warm across my skin. Spring pressing toward summer, yet I cannot be warmed entirely.
When dawn comes, he is gone. The scent of him lingering on the sheets. How cold it is now, knowing it will fade and ultimately be washed away long before his return.
The days feel hollow without him.
Ace’s usual charm isn’t enough to banish the ache of returning to an empty chamber.
Even Soria’s efforts to ready me feel muted, their purpose suddenly unclear.
Two weeks.
In any other life, a fortnight would pass swiftly. But here, after loving him in a blaze that remade me, it feels like eternity.
I think about how small it must all be to him, to all those who would watch an eternity unfold long after my time had expired.
I try to keep busy.
Afternoons in the library.
