Chapter 5 #2
Rezer shrugged, unbothered. “She makes good tea. And conversation. What more does a man need?”
“You’re a dark elf,” Oakley said bluntly. “My mom doesn’t need whatever this is.”
A flicker, not irritation, not amusement, crossed Rezer’s features. Something more dangerous. “You’re half dark elf, courtesy of your father, if you need reminding. And if I meant her harm, she’d already have been dealt with, Oakley.”
Syndra stepped forward before Oakley could respond. “Enough posturing. Rezer, what are you doing out here? Why hide? Why this place?”
“I like privacy,” he said with a shrug. “The human realm got loud. Here, it’s quiet. Mostly.”
Syndra watched him closely. Too closely.
There was something off in the way he held himself, like a flicker at the edges of his silhouette, a heaviness under his eyes, an invisible weight tugging at him.
She hadn’t noticed that when she’d seen him at Lisa’s.
Not shadow. Not sickness. But wrong. She didn’t ask about it. Not aloud.
Through her bond, Tamsin sent a quiet pulse of agreement. “You see it, too.”
“Yes,” she answered silently. “He’s frayed.”
Rezer tilted his head, watching them with unsettling perceptiveness. “If you’re here because of the trees, good luck. They’re restless. More than usual.”
Tamsin stepped forward. “Restless how?”
Rezer shrugged one shoulder. “You’re the Forest Lords’ favorites. You tell me.”
Before they could press further, he stepped back toward the door. “I’ve got somewhere to be. And Syndra, do try to give me and Lisa some quality alone time. How am I supposed to court her with you sticking your royal nose in every chance you get?”
“Maybe she doesn’t want any alone time with you,” she shot back.
“Her reaction to me proves otherwise,” he said, softer, his gaze intense. “It seems she hasn’t lost her taste for the dark side.”
Then the door shut behind him, silent, seamless, and the clearing felt abruptly, achingly empty.
For a moment they just stood there, the forest breathing around them.
Oakley exhaled hard. “I don’t like that guy.”
Syndra patted his arm. “Few do.”
“But he talks about my mom like,” Oakley grimaced. “Like she’s dessert.”
Tamsin coughed lightly. It was the closest he came to a laugh. “Dark elves do nothing subtly.”
Syndra didn’t smile. Not this time. That flicker she’d seen beneath Rezer’s calm still clawed at her thoughts.
Before she could dwell on it, the ground thrummed beneath them.
The trees shivered, leaves trembling as if stirred by a wind they couldn’t feel. Bark rippled faintly, and an ancient whisper rose through the roots, deep and resonant. “Queen and King, children of crown and soil. You walk the edge of imbalance.”
Syndra froze. It had been years since the trees last spoke in an audible way.
Tamsin stepped closer, protective instinct sharp. “What imbalance?”
The old ash bent slightly, leaves brushing toward them. “Magic strains. The land remembers what you have forgotten.”
Oakley swallowed, his voice trembling just a bit. “Okay, I got bits and pieces of that. Fill me in, please? What does it mean?”
“It means,” the tree murmured, voice old and tired, “that something long sealed stirs again. And its whisper reaches the ones between realms.”
“Thank you for letting me in on the full conversation that time,” Oakley said, his face slightly ashen.
Syndra’s stomach dropped. Rezer, she thought. But she didn’t dare say it. Not until she knew more.
The tree fell silent. The air chilled. And when the last tremor faded through the roots, Syndra straightened, breath steady.
“We keep going,” she said. “Maybe the forest will tell us more. We listen. And then we report to Trik.”
Tamsin nodded. Oakley followed, though unease simmered in his eyes.
As they left the clearing, Syndra looked back only once.
The house sat quiet against the hillside . . . but she swore the shadows under its eaves shifted, as if something inside was breathing in two worlds at once.
* * *
Night settled heavy over the palace like a held breath. Trik stood before the Book of the Elves, hands braced on the carved table, as its pages breathed slow pulses of gold-shot in the darkness. The room tasted metallic—like old magic waking after too long asleep. The air vibrated against his skin.
The book wasn’t humming anymore. It was growling.
He dragged a hand through his hair, exhaling sharply.
Every hour Syndra and Tamsin remained silent, it gnawed deeper into his nerves.
He could feel Cassie somewhere in the palace—hurt, angry, distant in a way that made his chest ache.
Their brief clash through the bond earlier had been sharp enough to rattle him.
Her rage had punched through all his defenses, startling him so badly the Book responded with a surge of shadow.
And now . . . the darkness inside it was feeding on that fracture.
He hadn’t gone to her. Coward, a part of him whispered.
Before he could answer the thought, the chamber’s sconces flickered. A chill swept the room, stirring the pages of the ancient book. The magic stilled, then twisted, as if recognizing someone approaching. Then, a figure materialized in the doorway.
Tall. White hair bound loosely at the nape. Robes the color of deep forest moss. Eyes like ancient starlight.
Trik straightened. “Myrin.”
The elder gave a small, knowing smile. “You look as though you expected a ghost.”
“You appear like one,” Trik muttered, but the tightness in his chest eased a fraction. “I thought you’d retreated to the northern forests.”
“I did,” Myrin said, stepping fully inside. “But when the land trembles, the old roots whisper. And they’ve been whispering your name.”
He approached the table, gaze settling on the Book with something between reverence and caution. “You’ve awakened what should have slept.”
“Whatever it is, it awakened itself,” Trik snapped before he could soften the words. “Or something else woke it.”
Myrin hummed. “Darkness rarely wakes without invitation.”
Trik stiffened, jaw tightening. “I am not inviting anything.”
“Not intentionally,” Myrin allowed. “Whatever first woke it seems to have latched onto you. That could be for several reasons. Your fear of the darkness, your worry over the possibility of peace being broken, and even your distance from your mate, which the forest feels, in case you were wondering. These things can invite darkness in.”
Trik’s voice dropped to a near-growl. The only thing he could focus on was the words about Cassie. They felt like a knife in his chest. “I am keeping her safe.”
Myrin lifted a brow. “By shutting her out? Your mating with her, and the restoration of your power, transformed the entire realm, Trik. You have to know that any negative energy from the bond between you two will affect the realm.”
Trik turned away. He’d felt the way things had changed when they’d defeated Lorsan, and the dark and light elves had agreed to no longer battle each other but exist under his rule as one race.
But he hadn’t considered that his and Cassie’s bonding would have further influence.
The silence pressed thick around them, the Book’s pages shifting as if listening.
Myrin continued, gentler now. “The last time we spoke you were asking whether Cassie’s soul matched yours. You knew the answer, though you feared what it meant. But then you embraced it. Became completely committed to it. What has changed?”
Trik closed his eyes. “The Book. The magic. It’s pulling at the parts of me I hoped to never deal with again.” He dragged a hand over his face. “I can feel the dark elf magic in me clawing for space. I won’t risk her. Not while this—” he gestured to the book, “—is leaking that blackness.”
Myrin studied him, expression softening. “Darkness is not a curse, Triktapic. Light cannot shine without it. It’s how you handle it that matters and defines you.”
“It defined me once,” Trik said quietly. “Hell, it was my entire purpose. What greater darkness is there than taking the lives of others? At the order of a tyrant, no less. ”
Myrin’s eyes warmed with memory. “I had hoped you would come to this realization on your own. That your memory would be restored when you relinquished your former choice and because of your proximity to the book. But it seems that the disruption in the link between you and Cassie is not just allowing the darkness to have too much influence over you, it is also keeping your memories from fully opening. So I will enlighten you.” He slipped his hands into the pockets of his robes as he looked at Trik.
“Before you petitioned the Forest Lords to let you abdicate the throne, when the light and dark elves were basically at war with constant skirmishes, growing into larger battles, something emerged because of those battles.
And that something was dangerous, or at least we believed it was.
“So we agreed they needed to be contained. We sealed them in a Chamber because you refused to let that darkness consume your people. It was the final act you made as king, and I think the thing that tipped the scales for you from light to dark.” He stepped closer.
“I think whatever darkness you sealed away, some of it clung to you. That is why you slipped away into the dark elf identity that you bore for so long. Trik, the famed assassin.”
Trik’s breath stilled. Images, blurred until now, stabbed behind his eyes: a vast cavern split between blinding radiance and living shadow, power clashing like storms, and trees whispering as knowledge flooded him. The Chamber of Light and Dark. His heart slammed once, hard.
“There it is.” Myrin said as he no doubt saw the recognition hit.
Trik swayed as the memory uncoiled fully, centuries of forgetting falling away in an instant. The magic in the Book surged, a dark tide rolling through the chamber.
Something in the bond flared—
Cassie.
A burst of her fear. Confusion. Pain.
She was close. Too close.
“Cass—”