Kaelen rumbled something that might’ve been laughter.

  “They really did split it evenly,” I muttered, which earned me actual laughter from both of them.

  The sound eased something in my chest. Made the world feel slightly less like it was actively collapsing around me.

  “Have either of you—” I hesitated, then pushed forward because there was no point in pretending I wasn’t terrified. “Have either of you met him? Ashterion?”

  Brynelle shook her head immediately. “Thank the gods, no. I’ve managed to avoid that particular nightmare for my entire existence and I’d like to keep it that way.”

  “Helpful,” I said dryly.

  “I have.” Shaelith’s voice went quieter. “A few centuries ago now. But yes.”

  I leaned forward, hands gripping the rough bark of the log beneath me. “What’s he like?”

  Shaelith exchanged a glance with Brynelle, who’d gone still in her lap.

  “Dangerous,” Shaelith said finally. “But you already knew that.”

  “I knew that about Varyth too. And he’s not what I expected.” I sighed, already resigned to the inevitable. “So what kind of dangerous are we talking about? The ‘will murder you for looking at him wrong’ kind, or the ‘plays games with people’s lives for entertainment’ kind?”

  “Both,” Shaelith interrupted gently. “And worse.”

  Fantastic.

  “Ashterion isn’t like Varyth,” she continued. “Varyth’s ruthless when he needs to be, but there’s lines he won’t cross. A core of something almost decent buried under all that calculated control.” Her mouth curled into something that wasn’t quite a smile. “Ashterion has no such lines.”

  “Comforting.”

  “I’m not trying to comfort you.” Her tone was apologetic but firm. “I’m trying to prepare you. Because walking in there thinking you can predict him, or charm him, or outmanoeuvre him the way you’re learning to navigate Varyth’s court?” She shook her head. “That will get you killed.”

  The black fire under my skin stirred, responding to the spike of fear in my chest. I shoved it down with effort, focusing on Shaelith’s face instead of the panic trying to crawl up my throat.

  “What does he look like?” I asked, because somehow knowing felt important. Like if I could picture him, he’d be less terrifying. Less abstract.

  Shaelith tilted her head, considering. “Beautiful,” she said slowly. “In the way a blade is beautiful right before it cuts you open. Dark hair. Eyes like winter night, all shadows and starlight and absolutely nothing warm in them.” She paused. “He’s tall. Elegant. Moves like violence wrapped in silk.”

  “Sounds delightful.”

  “He’s everything they say about Nyxaria made flesh,” Brynelle added quietly, her usual humour gone. “Cold. Cruel. The kind of power that doesn’t just kill you, it makes you wish you were dead first.”

  “Well.” Kaelen’s voice was dry as ash in my mind. “This is going splendidly.”

  “Shut up.”

  “And Varyth wants me to sit across from this nightmare and—what, exactly?” I looked between them, trying to keep my tone steady. “Smile? Look threatening? Not spontaneously combust from sheer terror?”

  “Be yourself,” Shaelith said simply. “That’s what Varyth’s counting on.”

  I laughed, the sound slightly unhinged. “Myself. Right. Because ‘disaster wrapped in trauma with a side of uncontrolled fire magic’ is exactly the diplomatic presence we’re going for.”

  “Isara.” Shaelith’s voice was gentle but unyielding. “You survived your husband’s murder. You crossed realms. You bonded with a dragon. You’ve faced Varyth at his most dangerous and came out standing.” She held my gaze. “Ashterion is terrifying, yes. But so are you.”

  “I really don’t feel terrifying right now,” I muttered, but something in my chest loosened slightly at her words. At the absolute certainty in them.

  “That’s because you haven’t weaponised it yet,” Brynelle said, her grin returning with feral edges. “But you will. Fenric and Cindrissian will make sure of it.”

  I blinked. “What?”

  “You think Varyth’s going to send you into that meeting unprepared?” Shaelith’s eyebrows rose. “He’ll have Fenric drilling you on court protocol until you could navigate a diplomatic dinner in your sleep.” Her smile turned knowing. “And Cindrissian will teach you how to read people. How to spot the lies before they’re fully formed.”

  “They’ll arm you with everything you need,” Brynelle added. “And then some. By the time that meeting happens, you’ll walk in there looking like you belong at Varyth’s side.”

  “Even if I’m internally screaming the entire time?”

  “Especially then.” Brynelle’s grin was wicked. “Half of court politics is looking composed while everything inside you is on fire. You’ll fit right in.”

  “See?” Kaelen’s satisfaction rippled through the bond. “I told you you’d be fine.”

  “You told me I was emotionally unstable.”

  “That too. The two aren’t mutually exclusive.”

  “We should head back,” Shaelith said, already starting to rise with Brynelle in her arms. “Before Varyth realises you left the castle without telling anyone and loses his mind.”

  My stomach dropped. “Oh gods. I didn’t think. I just needed to get out, I wasn’t thinking about⁠—”

  “He’s going to be furious,” Brynelle said cheerfully, untangling herself from Shaelith. “In that very controlled, very terrifying way he does.”

  “Wonderful. That’s exactly what I need right now.”

  “You did flee his chambers at dawn without a word,” Kaelen pointed out helpfully. “After spending the night in his bed. Again. While he’s already on edge about you spontaneously manifesting an uncontrollable power.”

  “I hate that you’re right.”

  “You say that a lot. Have you considered that perhaps you simply hate being wrong?”

  I hauled myself up onto Kaelen, my legs protesting the movement. Everything protested, actually. My body was very insistent that I’d had approximately three hours of sleep and had spent most of those tangled up with a High Lord who’d had his hands all over me.

  Don’t think about his hands, I told myself firmly.

  “You’re thinking about his hands,” Kaelen supplied.

  “I’m going to let Brynelle’s dragon eat you.”

  “You love me too much.”

  He wasn’t wrong about that either, damn him.

  33

  Ipressed my palms against the balcony rail, feeling the cool stone seep through my skin as I watched the courtyard far below come alive with evening activity. Guards changing shifts. Servants hurrying through their final tasks. Children’s laughter floating up from somewhere deeper in the castle grounds.

  Dinner had been... manageable. Conversations flowing around me, the familiar rhythm of Fenric’s dry observations and Eilrys’ wicked commentary. But even surrounded by what was becoming my family, I felt like I was watching from behind glass. Present but not quite there. Still processing the weight of Brynelle’s words about love not being finite, about honouring the past by choosing to live.

  I was due at Fenric’s chambers. Learn about this meeting with Nyxaria. But I just needed a moment to myself first.

  The stars glittered overhead, a tapestry of light against the velvet darkness.

  I took slow, steadying breaths, trying to release the weight in my chest. But it lingered, heavy and aching. I leaned forward against the balcony railing, my hands pressing into the stone until my knuckles whitened.

  That was when I heard it.

  The singing.

  Out here—beneath the stars, surrounded by nothing but air and space—it was louder. Clearer. As though the sky itself had leaned down to hum against my bones.

  I didn’t hesitate this time. I sang to it.

  Softly. Gently. A melody I hadn’t sung in so long.

  One of my favourites, the one Navaire used to hum under his breath during court dances, when he’d spin me too quickly just to make me laugh. The one we danced to at our wedding, the two of us in the candlelit garden behind the palace. Our hands clasped, our feet moving in time to a single Vihuela played by a friend too dear to refuse. No pomp. No spectacle. Just us, and the music, and a promise sealed in joy.

  The memory washed over me as I closed my eyes, and for a moment… I was there again. His hands at my waist, his smile, his touch light but sure as he turned me in time with the rhythm. The scent of night-blooming flowers in the air. Laughter in my throat.

  And the shadows, they didn’t intrude.

  They listened.

  Echoed the tune back to me, note for note, until it wrapped around me. A familiar embrace. A silent chorus humming along with a truth they couldn’t possibly understand and yet somehow did.

  But slowly, the melody began to change.

  Woven with threads I couldn’t name, with echoes of an older magic. The cadence lifted into a new shape—achingly beautiful—like the song I’d sung had taken root in them, and this was their gift back to me. A harmony born of shadows and starlight. A tribute to memory. And mourning. And magic.

  I could hear the words woven within the notes.

  You don’t have to let go. You just have to let it live beside you.

  I opened my eyes, the stars above blurred by tears I hadn’t realised had gathered. I held them there, caught on the edge of the impossible and the sacred. Because somewhere in the weave of that new melody, in the way the shadows shaped the song into something not mine, yet undeniably meant for me.

  I understood.

  Maybe the others had been right.

  Maybe I didn’t have to keep carrying grief like a stone in my chest. I didn’t have to fold myself around the ache. It would always be there. Navaire’s laughter, his warmth, the weight of everything we’d shared.

  Nothing could take that from me. Nothing would.

  The thought didn’t come with clarity or peace. It didn’t come with lightness. It came with pain, raw and tender, but not unbearable. Not anymore. Because I didn’t have to erase what came before. I could make space for something new.

  I stayed there longer than I should have, letting the song fade into the night air until only the echo of it remained, a ghost of sound, a tremor in my chest. The shadows had gone quiet again, but not in the way they had before. This wasn’t silence. It was... rest. Like they’d said what they needed to say and were content to wait.

  I wiped at my eyes with the heel of my hand, half-laughing at myself. Crying on balconies. Very elegant. Very composed.

  “You know,” a voice drawled from behind me, low and edged with something I couldn’t quite name. “Most people use balconies for brooding in silence. You’re out here serenading the stars.”

  I didn’t jump. Didn’t spin around. I’d felt him before I heard him—the shift in the air, the way the shadows seemed to pull tighter around themselves, like they were making room.

  Varyth.

  I turned slowly, finding him leaning against the archway that led back into the castle, arms crossed, his expression unreadable in the dim light.

  “I didn’t know I had an audience.”

  “You didn’t.” He pushed off the stone and moved closer, his steps soundless. “I wasn’t planning to intrude. But then you started singing, and...” He trailed off, his gaze flicking past me to the stars. “I couldn’t not listen.”

  Heat crept up my neck. “I didn’t mean to⁠—”

  “Don’t.” His voice was firm, but not unkind. “Don’t apologise for that. It was...” He hesitated, something vulnerable flickering across his face.

  “Beautiful.”

  I blinked, caught off guard by the simplicity of the word.

  “I was just... remembering,” I said quietly, turning back to the balcony rail. The words came easier when I wasn’t looking at him. “A song. A dance. A life that feels so far away now.”

  Varyth moved to stand beside me, close enough that I could feel the warmth of him, but not touching.

  “Navaire,” I said finally, the name easier to speak now than it had been even a day ago. “My husband. We danced to that song at our wedding. Just the two of us, a friend with a Vihuela, and the stars.” I smiled, small and bittersweet. “He always said I sang like I was trying to drag the heavens down to earth.”

  “Accurate,” Varyth murmured.

  I huffed a laugh, surprised. “You didn’t even know me then.”

  “I know you now.” He glanced at me, his expression softening in a way I wasn’t prepared for. “And I’ve heard you sing. Trust me. He was right.”

  The ache in my chest tightened, but it wasn’t unbearable. It was just... there. A bruise I’d learned to carry.

  “I loved him,” I said, the words spilling out before I could stop them. “I loved him so much it felt like my ribs were too small to hold it all. And when he died, I thought—” My voice cracked. “I thought that was it. That I’d used up all the love I had to give. That there wasn’t anything left.”

  Varyth was silent for a long moment, his gaze fixed on the courtyard below.

  “Love isn’t limited,” he said quietly. “It doesn’t run out. It just... changes shape.”

  I turned to look at him, and found him already watching me, his expression open in a way I’d never seen before.

  “I lost someone too,” he continued, his jaw tightening. “A long time ago. And for years, I thought caring for anyone else would be a betrayal. That if I let myself feel anything, I’d be erasing what we had.” He exhaled slowly. “But that’s not how it works. You don’t replace the people you’ve loved. You just... make room.”

  “Brynelle said something similar,” I admitted, barely above a whisper.

  “She’s smarter than she looks.”

  I laughed, and Varyth’s mouth twitched into what might’ve been a smile.

  “I don’t know how to do it,” I confessed. “Make room. I don’t know how to stop feeling like I’m betraying him every time I—” I stopped, the words catching in my throat.

  “Every time you what?” Varyth’s question was careful.

  “Every time I feel something for someone else,” I said, the admission raw and trembling. “Every time I think about moving forward. About being happy again.”

  Varyth turned fully toward me. “He wouldn’t want you to stop living, Isara. If he loved you the way you loved him, he’d want you to live. Even if it hurt. Even if it meant loving someone new.”

  Tears pricked at my eyes again, and I looked away. “How do you know?”

  “Because that’s what love is,” he said simply. “It’s wanting the other person to be whole. Even if you’re not there to see it.”

  I let the words settle over me, heavy and aching and true. And for the first time, I didn’t push them away.

  We stood there in silence, the night air cool against my skin, the stars bright overhead.

  A flicker of light caught my attention.

  I blinked, startled, as a tiny glow drifted past my face. Then another. And another.

  Fireflies.

  I gasped, wonder blooming in my chest as they began to circle me. Dozens of them, their golden light weaving through the air like living stars. One landed on my hand, its glow pulsing gently, and I laughed, the sound bright and unbidden.

  “Fireflies.” I held my hand up, delighted, as more settled on my shoulders, my hair, my arms. “I’ve never—we didn’t have these in Braerlith. But my mother told me about them. She said they guide lost souls home.”

  Varyth stared, his expression caught somewhere between awe and confusion. “They don’t usually do this.” His gaze dragged over where the fireflies had landed on me. “Fireflies don’t land on people. They keep their distance. Always just out of reach”

  I grinned, giddy and reckless, as the fireflies danced around me in lazy spirals. “Maybe they made an exception.”

  “Maybe,” he said quietly, “they know something the rest of us don’t.”

  And as I stood there, bathed in golden light and laughter, surrounded by the hum of wings and the weight of a grief that no longer crushed me.

  I thought maybe, just maybe, he was right.

  The fireflies lingered for another heartbeat, their golden glow painting the darkness in soft strokes, before they began to drift away. One by one, they lifted from my skin like wishes released into the night, spiralling upward until they disappeared into the stars.

  I watched them go, something warm and fragile settling in my chest.

  When I finally looked back at Varyth, I found him staring at me with an intensity that stole the breath from my lungs.

  His eyes were dark and burning, fixed on me like he was trying to memorise every detail. The curve of my face in the starlight, the way my hair had come loose from its pins, the flush I could feel creeping across my cheeks under the weight of that stare.

  It was too much.

  My heart kicked hard against my ribs, and I had to look away before I did something reckless.

  “I should—” My voice came out rough, unsteady. I cleared my throat and tried again. “I should go. I’m supposed to meet Fenric. And Cindrissian. About... about Nyxaria.”

  Varyth blinked, the intensity fracturing just enough for him to pull back. To remember where we were.

  “Right,” he said. “The meeting.”

  “Yes. The meeting.” I took a step back, then another, putting space between us before I lost my nerve entirely. “I’m already late. Fenric’s probably pacing a hole in his floor by now.”

  “Isara.”

  I stopped, my hand on the archway, but I didn’t turn around. Couldn’t. Not when his voice sounded like that—rough and wanting and threaded with something I wasn’t ready to name.

  “Thank you,” I said. “For... for what you said. About love. About making room.”

  “Anytime.”

  I walked away, my heart pounding, my skin tingling where the fireflies had landed, the echo of Varyth’s gaze burning into my back like a brand.