Aelith doesn’t answer. He doesn’t have to.
“So, what?” I snap, unable to keep it contained. “She actually wants Jamie to imprison him until he’s twenty-four? Just in case he turns out to be hers?”
The words land hard, and Aelith has the decency to look guilty. “She believes the outcome would justify the method,” he says.
“She will never get close enough to Jamie to test this,” Solan practically growls.
“Complete bonds increase capability,” Aelith adds, quieter now. “She has observed the results. She understands the value.”
“Why does she even think it’s a possibility?” I ask. My stomach turns. Because again, she’s not wrong. She’s just using it in the worst possible way.
Aelith shakes his head. “I do not know for sure. As far as I’m aware, she didn’t ‘feel’ her bonded come through the Rift. But she knows there is a human child, so I can only assume she believes that she will know for certain when he is older.”
Silence pulls taut, thick and heavy.
Then Aelith moves. Slowly, deliberately, he lifts his hand to his throat, fingers curling around the chain resting there. “That is not all,” he says. He pulls a chain free.
A medallion swings into view, catching the light in a way that feels… off. Not reflective. Not passive. The surface shifts subtly,patterns moving across it in a way that makes it hard to focus on directly.
A faint pressure builds in the air, like in the moment before lightning splits the sky.
“This belonged to my father,” Aelith says.
No one interrupts.
“I found it in a sealed chamber beneath the palace,” he continues. “Hidden. Preserved. Referenced in the older texts.”
“What does it do?” Kael asks.
Aelith exhales slowly. “I do not fully understand it.”
“Comforting,” Sonny mutters.
“But it reacts,” Aelith adds.
“To what?” I ask.
His gaze flicks to me.
“To the rifts.”
The word settles cleanly.
“Or at least it does according to the information we discovered. I believe it is part of whatever allows them to be opened,” he says. “Whether alone or in conjunction with something else, I do not yet know.”
Something else.The thought flickers through my mind uninvited.
Jamie.
Storms.
Timing.
Jack leans forward slightly, eyes fixed on the medallion. “So that could get Jamie home?”
The question hits me like a punch.
Home.
