Seren’s not sure if her heart breaks or mends. She’s the one he loves, and the one he can’t choose.
“But I can’t,” Teddy admits. “Not until we’ve won. Not until I see my people safe.”
Her heart chooses—it breaks.
Seren nods.
Because despite herself, she understands that loving Teddy means loving the parts of him forged by loss, too.
“Then go get your sister, Teddy. We need to prepare for the conclave,” Seren says coolly. Not unkindly, just with the kind of efficiency that comes with certainty. The kind of efficiency that comes with belonging only to herself.
She knows what they are now: a moment. Not a future.They will never be.And somehow, that doesn’t undo what this was. It only makes it sharper. More real. More devastating. And that truth lodges in her chest like a splinter.
She pushes herself up to sit, and moves to gather her discarded leathers.
“I’ll meet you back here when the sun is setting. I’ll gather all of our allies, and take us to The Perils. And when I leave this room, the door on us is closed. I won’t wait for you, Teddy. This is the end for us,” she says, strength finding its way back into her voice.
“Okay,” he acknowledges, like a soldier receiving orders.
So Seren says the only thing that can justify love unlived. “I belong to myself.”
And it feels like enough.
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
The sharpest teeth are not the worst
Beware the one who bites first
Seren’s bodystill remembers the feel of his skin on hers when she steps into the cold air of The Perils. Heat still clings to her, stubborn and unwelcome against the biting cold.
The world does not care that something sacred just ended.And neither should she.
She shoves down thoughts of him, burying them deep. She cannot think of him—cannot afford to. Not with the realms at stake.
No one greets her at the mouth. This is her home now. Somewhere she can come and go as she pleases.
The oceans do not respond to her—The Widow has accepted her. The place does not resist her. That, more than anything, unsettles her.
“Come,” Seren commands, her voice all steel and certainty.
No one speaks. No one dares to murmur a word in this place the world has forgotten.
Seren’s boots pound against the earth in a heavy, commanding thud. Everyone falls into line behind her, no one questioning how this place, this hierarchy, these people operate. No one is foolish enough to.
But swift steps approach, and she already knows who it is.
“Well,” Ronyn mutters at her shoulder, “this place is… unsettling.”
Seren can’t help but huff a laugh, a smirk lifting the corners of her mouth.
“I was really hoping the end of the world would have… less bones,” he mutters under his breath, eyes taking in the bone walls.
A surprised snort escapes her. But Ronyn doesn’t stop the irreverence.
“Next time you say ‘I’ll gather everyone,’ maybe lead with ‘into a cave full of skeletons.’”
Seren rolls her eyes. “Yes, but you see, Ronie, I actuallywantedyou to come, so I opted for omission.”
