Her breath was a softer metronome than the river, but steadier. Against his will, his own chest fell into its rhythm. His eyes half-shut.
The jolt came fast.
Auryn sat bolt upright with a sharp, panicked breath. He reached for the sword that wasn’t there—remembering he no longer brought it to bed.
“Auryn.”
Kenaz flared, granting him vision in the night. Dark bled into clarity. She was half-awake, eyes wide but not seeing.
“It will tear,” she whispered hoarsely. “It will tear, it will tear—”
He caught her forearm, not to restrain but to anchor. “Auryn. Look at me.”
Her gaze slid past him. Not here. Not yet.
“It was only a dream,” he murmured, voice low and steady. “You’re here. With me.”
Her fingers found his shirt. “Kail—” Her voice broke, and she tipped forward into his chest.
He wrapped an arm around her back, palm spread between her shoulders, the other bracing her knees. Holding her steady while she trembled.
“Breathe,” he whispered.
Her heartbeat thundered against his ribs. His own kept time until hers slowed. He thumbed a strand of hair from her temple.
“Does the Resh’Agar dream?” she asked against his throat, voice still thick.
“I don’t sleep.”
“Not ever?”
“Rarely.” A faint, wry exhale. “Only with someone to watch my back.”
Her breath hitched. “Are you afraid to close your eyes?”
“Not for myself.”
She pressed her face harder against him, small and stubborn. He pulled the blanket higher over her shoulders, arms wrapping around her. For a long while, neither of them moved. Her eyes closed, and she drifted back to sleep. Resh told himself he imagined it when her heartbeat slowed to match his own, as though his led a march to dreams, and hers synched to match it.
8
In Reverence
Iam Auryn’reh Solah, and when I wake, the skies call to me. They tell me of their sorrows, but not the past that molded them. And so, I help the world remember its shape, though I do not yet know my own.
I see dreams. I learn to fear the dark. Emotion is something unintended. A thing not meant for me. And yet, it lingers in the sound ofhisbreath. The Resh’Agar. Kailorien. The man who found me in the ice and shaped me into this thing called “Auryn”.
If a man is what he is. Men do not have shadows that dance beneath their feet. Men are not made of light the way he is. Men do not have his blazing azure eyes or his endless mana.
But he does.
And he intrigues me.
Today, dawn arrives with silent steps. I sit up, blinking into the misty morning light spilling through the canvas seams of the Commander’s tent. I touch the empty bed beside me. Kailorien’s absence is like an aching wound beneath my ribs. Empty. Hollow.
His warmth has long faded from the blankets. Off to tend to the camp. Off to keep his silent vigil. A mountain, never sleeping, never resting—his presence alone so powerful, so massive, that the world itself whispers his name.
Resh’Agar.
