The emerald flames swallow Amara whole, and I turn my face away from the blistering heat. A low growl rumbles in my chest as I spring to my feet, my muscles burning with urgency. I dash across the deck, hurling myself overboard just as the fire erupts in a violent burst, sending a scorching wave across the ship before the flames recoil into themselves.
I crash into the water with a brutal splash, the heat of the flames searing my back just before I’m submerged. When I break the surface, I gasp for air, floating there for a moment, stunned and disoriented, trying to make sense of what just happened. Then I see him bobbing beside me, the Golden Son, water dripping from his blond hair, coursing down the ridges of his scarred face.
“How did you know that would happen?” I snarl.
He meets my glare with unsettling calm. “I’ve seen it before,” he replies. “She killed a room full of Fae with that fire. It cleanses her, heals her, but…” He shrugs, as if indifferent to the lives burned in its wake. “Unfortunately, anyone nearby gets reduced to ash.”
We float in tense silence, neither of us yielding an inch. Then, I hear a soft murmur carried on the wind. Amara’s voice, fragile yet unmistakable.
Without hesitation, I swim back to the ship, grabbing hold of the mooring rope and hauling myself up. As I reach the railing, a hand suddenly clasps over mine. I look up to find Reon waiting.
He grips my forearm and pulls me aboard effortlessly. “Sorry about that, old friend. I forgot your wing situation.”
I glare at him but don’t waste time on words. There’s no room for anything but action now. I rush to Amara’s side, dropping to my knees and sliding across the floorboards to her.
“Wife,” I say, the word barely escaping my lips. “Are you alright?”
My gaze scans over her, dreading the sight of a body shattered by childbirth, scarred by the fire. But my Amara... she is untouched. Perfect. The green flames have left no trace upon her. No burn, no mark, not even a singed hair. Even the ship has borne the brunt of her fire with only a few smoldering remnants, quickly extinguished by Reon and Orios.
She manages a smile, a soft curve of her lips, as I take her hand in mine, pressing a gentle kiss to her knuckles.
“I will survive,” she whispers, her voice soft, her eyes half-closed in exhaustion. “Is it truly you?”
I nod, pressing her hand to my cheek, letting her feel the steady beat of my pulse beneath her fingers. “It is, wife. It is.”
Her smile deepens, her flawless, warm brown eyes shimmering with the first true spark of life I’ve seen in what feels like forever. But then, suddenly, they widen with alarm.
“Our baby,” she gasps.
Before I can respond, Solena’s boots touch down softly on the deck, her wings folding neatly behind her. She approaches slowly, reverence in her every step, and kneels beside Amara. With a careful motion, she unfurls her arms to reveal our child.
Our perfect, tiny girl.
Her face is flushed with the heat of birth, her tiny hands clenched as if already grasping for the world, her cries soft but determined. The only sound that exists in the vastness of this moment.
Solena gently places the baby in Amara’s arms, and I watch as my wife, still trembling with weakness, looks down at our daughter. Her gaze softens, and for the first time, I see a peace I thought lost forever.
A part of me wants to believe that this is it. That we’ve conquered the darkness. I want to believe that this child, this precious little girl, will be the light in a world fractured by shadows. But I know better. The void is still out there, watching, waiting. Emranth has caught our scent, and the Father Below demands his due. This child, so pure, so innocent, has entered a world twisted by smoke and vine. She is not human, not Fae, but something else entirely.
Still, I can’t stop the smile that tugs at my lips, a surge of love and relief washing over me in a flood too overwhelming to resist. The world is broken, but in this moment, with my wife and daughter by my side, I find hope where I thought none could exist.
Chapter 21
Daed
Before her.I watch from the ruined heights of House Maledannan as the Sundered Kingdoms burn. Villages smolder in the distance. Forests, once sacred, crackle with flame. This Legion of Saints, these rebels, these ungrateful humans, have summoned their own doom. Did they truly believe the Mordorin would show mercy? That we would share our power like beggars at a feast?
Fools. This blood is on their hands, not mine. And we will fight until only the Mordorin stand.
I walk the cold, silent halls of this once-proud house, and even here, high above the chaos, I hear the wails of the dying and the wind-fed roar of fire. House Maledannan’s green banners lie torn and filthy, trampled under boot and soaked in blood. Shattered windows gape like wounds. The tapestries have been ripped from the walls. The Fae who guarded this place lie slumped in corners, blades still lodged in their bodies, their blood now dark and tacky on the stones.
The doors to the throne room, battered and barely on their hinges, groan as I push them open, the sound low and feral like a beast disturbed from sleep. A painting topples from the wall as I enter, ancient and priceless, and crashes to the floor in pieces. The twin thrones of Lord Eryndor and Lady Elyss lie overturned, discarded like the corpses of their house. The banners of the white lotus have been torn from their moorings, and near one toppled throne, a child’s toy, a small doll, lies smeared with blood.
I move to the wall veiled in heavy vines. I cannot command them as Lord Eryndor once did. So I summon Death Singer. Smoke curls from my fingers as the blade takes shape in my palm, silver glinting as it settles into being. I strike the vines with a single cut. They fall away, revealing… nothing.
The scrying mirror is gone, stripped away like everything else in this place. Death Singer vanishes from my grasp, and for a moment, I sag beneath the weight of what isn’t here.
I would be lying if I said I hadn’t come to this devastated castle hoping to see her again in the mirror’s glass. Even with war tearing the world apart, she haunts my every thought.
