But he didn’t. We all know that now.
“I didn’t,” he continues. “Because someone found me.”
Aelith’s voice drops, rough around the edges. “Your fated mate.”
“Yes.”
Something shifts in the bond beside me—Varek’s attention locks onto every word.
“I remained there,” the king says, “far longer than I intended. Long enough to understand that what I had created was not merely unstable. It was incomplete.”
Shanae folds her arms. “Incomplete how?”
“The tears were not random,” he replies. “They were… drawn. Pulled along lines I had not yet learned to control. The system had begun to select, but without precision.”
That lines up. Everything we’ve seen. Everything Sonny’s pieced together.
Aelith’s face has gone dangerously still. “If you had a mate,” he says, each word clipped, “why did you not return?”
The king closes his eyes briefly, like the answer isn’t simple. “It was not possible,” he says.
Aelith’s jaw sets. “That is not an answer.”
“It is the truth,” the king replies. “The tears did not open on command. They didn’t remain. And when they did—” He pauses. “For many years, they did not reach me.”
Heavy silence stretches.
“And then,” he continues, “weeks ago, something changed.”
That gets everyone’s attention.
“The rift behaviour altered. A surge…. It was unstable and violent.”
My stomach drops again, as we know that moment.
That was?—
Dawson.
Jack.
Jamie.
“I was pulled again in the next anomaly,” the king says. “Not alone.”
Aelith’s breath catches. “Your mate?”
“Yes.”
“She is here?” Kael asks, surprise evident.
The king doesn’t answer. “Theryn,” he says instead. “He found a way to reach me. To stabilise the tear long enough to pull me back.”
Aelith’s eyes narrow. “He’s alive?”
“Yes.”
“And where is he now?”
