He sighed. “No. Not yet. But I’d like to be one day.”
I tilted my head. “How will you know?”
He looked back at the canyon. “When I choose them over purpose. Over duty. In every life. That’s how I’ll know.”
“What if love makes me lose control? What if I’m dangerous?” I whispered. I wasn’t sure I wanted to say the thought aloud until I already had.
Alaric stepped even closer and pulled me into a gentle yet firm embrace. He kissed the top of my forehead. “You’re not dangerous, Wyn. You’re the only one of us brave enough to feel everything fully.”
The light thinned as we walked back to camp together. When we arrived, Alaric glanced at the group huddled around the fire and smiled sideways at me.
“Do you want me to play you something? Like when we were little?”
My eyes widened. “You still remember the lullabies?”
He gave a mock gasp of offense. “Wynnie. Please. I’m a man of many talents.” He grinned, putting his hand across his chest.
He pulled out his lute and strummed softly. The moment the tune started, everyone groaned.
“Oh no, not this again,” Jasira muttered.
Gideon groaned dramatically, flinging himself backward. “Have mercy!”
Then he lobbed a small stick at Alaric’s head.
Alaric ducked and pointed the lute at him like a weapon. “Ungrateful! All of you!”
I burst out laughing, warm and genuine.
Erindor, sharpening his blade a short distance from the others, let out a long breath through his nose. He didn’t look up, but the movement of his hand slowed for a moment.
“Of course,” he muttered to himself. “The lute.”
But when Alaric struck a softer note, the kind that lingered in the air like a memory, Erindor’s sharpening resumed, rhythmic and steady. As if he were pretending he wasn’t listening to every note.
The windwhisperedandsighed through the canyon, winding between stone teeth and hollow chimes. The song that rose was soft, haunting, and somehow familiar. I felt it in my ribs, in my spine, like a memory I hadn’t lived yet. My voice seemed to echo inside the hum.
One must give it freely.
One must believe it.
I curled tighter in my blankets, the warmth in my palm pulsing once more before fading. In my dreams, the golden fire returned, not to burn but to bloom. Like a promise. Like a choice.
And for the first time, I wasn’t running from it. I was walking toward it, even if I stumbled.
Chapter Twenty
Erindor
Suddenly, we stepped forward and the forest changed.
One moment, the trees still bore the last bruises of winter. Next, we entered a silence so profound, it seemed to actively swallow the air, leaving a strange pressure in its wake. Even our boots seemed hesitant to disturb the moss-padded ground.
The trees here were different; stripped of bark and color, trunks as pale as old ash and smooth as bone. Their branches twisted skyward like brittle fingers. Light filtered through them in a sickly, washed-out haze. The air felt thinner. Pressed.
Gideon slowed his pace, muttering something under his breath.
“What is this place?” Jasira asked quietly, eyes scanning the skeletal canopy.
