Chapter 23
TWENTY-THREE
CYAN
The Old World Forest wrapped tight around him, black branches creaking overhead. Seventeen years old, and Cyan thought he knew these woods. He’d grown up climbing their ancient trees, racing Faera through clearings choked with ferns. The forest had been his escape when his father’s brief visits home filled the house with that familiar tension—his mother’s tight smiles, the careful dance of two people who’d forgotten how to exist in the same space.
That morning had been especially bad. His father, home for three sols between trading missions, had tried to discuss Cyan’s acceptance to the Martian Academy over breakfast. Mother's fork had clinked against her plate with each mention of space travel, her eyes drifting to some distant point. They all still carried the image of Kern’s ship exploding in the night sky the year before, how it had lit up Gaia like a second sun. His cousin had been accepted to the academy too. A once in a lifetime chance. He’d chosen to go, eager not to miss his shot at the universe, despite rumors of the ship’s warp drive malfunction.
“You have a choice to make,” his father had said gruffly, but his eyes were already far away, like he was halfway back to the stars. Always choosing anywhere but home.
Mother’s fingertips whitened around her glass. Twenty years of similar choices lined her eyes. Some choices, once made, carved permanent paths. The Martian Academy’s acceptance felt like lead in Cyan’s pocket now. They all pretended not to notice how his hands shook whenever anyone mentioned space travel.
A gust of wind stirred the canopy, sending dappled shadows dancing across the forest floor. Something glinted among the roots of a massive oak—a flash of something that shouldn’t be there. Cyan approached carefully. The tree’s roots had grown around whatever lay buried, creating a natural cradle of twisted wood.
He squatted low on his haunches, brushing away layers of dead leaves. His young, delicate fingers met cool steel.
The sword’s hilt emerged first, then the broad blade as he carefully extracted it from its earthen bed. It was unlike any blade he’d seen in the settlement's museum of pre-Rejuvenation artifacts. The metal was a dark ash, almost black, with a jagged vein of gold running its length. It hummed in his grip, a subtle vibration that seeped into his bones.
“What are you?” he whispered.
The sword’s weight settled into his palms like it belonged there. Like it had been waiting. A certainty washed over Cyan—this wasn’t just some relic. This was so much more. Destiny perhaps, reaching out to him through centuries of soil and roots, offering something greater than the paralysis of choice, something stronger than his father’s wavering commitment or his cousin’s fatal decision.
Cyan’s mind quieted. The endless churn of what-ifs fell away. He rose, the blade steady in his grip. The forest around him seemed to hold its breath. Countless paths stretched before him through the ancient trees, but for the first time in his life, he knew exactly where to go. The acceptance letter in his pocket didn't feel quite so heavy anymore.
The sword would guide him. All he had to do was trust in its pull, let it lead him where he needed to be. No more uncertainty. No more watching people choose to leave.
Cyan turned toward home. The trees whispered around him, speaking to him like they always had, but he was already learning not to listen. His fate—the only thing he had to listen to—was gripped tightly in his hands.
“When the sword claimed me I was not yet fully ready for everything it had wanted me to see,” Cyan said after telling her the story of his discovery in the Northern wilds.
He’d said more than he had intended. She’d been skeptical about the concept of fate before. What would she think of him now?
He had watched Elaina’s face intently for the skepticism he was so sure would come.
Instead, she asked, “What did it want you to see?”
Something unwound in Cyan’s chest at Elaina’s unfazed acceptance of his story—a pit that had been there, tying his tongue to stay grounded to objective reality. Cyan realized it only when it began to ease, but that pit was older than this conversation.
“You’re amazing.” The words were blurted out before he thought them through.
There was that smile again, nearly so disarming as to make him miss the fact that she had shifted closer to him, just a finger now separating their thighs. The air between them was charged with unspoken affection. Her fingers moved slightly, tracing circles in the fabric of her leggings. Cyan’s hand moved almost on its own to cover hers, feeling the warmth of her smooth skin beneath his rough fingers. They were no longer delicate like the ones that had picked up the blade in those woods.