Chapter Twenty-Two – Elaria
The water crushes me. My limbs jerk in different directions. Something cold wraps around my legs. My chest tightens. I open my mouth—nothing but salt.
Then—The sound of the ocean vanishes. The pull on my body slips away like a coat falling from my shoulders. A blinding white, not from above, not from the sun. It pulses inside me like a dropped match in dry straw. The cold vanishes.
Grass brushes against my calves. It’s soft, bright. Green so vibrant it hums beneath the light. My clothes are dry—loose white linen sways around my legs, smooth against unburned skin.
I lift my hands. No blood. No bruises. The cuts on my palms are gone.
A breeze passes. It doesn’t sting.
Ahead of me, a hill slopes gently downward toward a grove of olive trees.
Two figures stand at the edge—hands clasped. They turn when they see me.
My father’s smile spreads. My mother’s curls catch the wind, her eyes soft with something I haven’t seen since I was a child. The ache that breaks in my chest isn’t pain. It’s longing.
A hand slips into mine.
I turn.
Giovanna stands beside me. Her white dress floats just above the grass, delicate and uncreased. Her skin is flawless, untouched by bruises or fear. The wind plays with the loose strands of her hair, and she lets it. Her eyes are brighter than I remember.
“They’re happy here,” she whispers
I turn toward her. Her face holds the same softness I saw in her paintings—the one she never showed when we were little. The sun kisses her skin. Her smile reaches her eyes.
“Elaria.”
My throat closes. My fingers curl around hers.
“Let me stay,” I whisper. “Please. I want to stay—with you. With Mom. With Dad.”
Her eyes glisten. She squeezes my hands, shoulders rising just slightly as she tries to hold something in.
“It’s not your time.” Her voice wavers. “You have a long, happy life ahead of you.”
“I don’t want to go back. I’ll be alone.”
She presses two fingers gently to the center of my chest. Her touch is warm.
“No,” she says. “I live here.”
I look down. Her hand rests above my heart. Her skin doesn’t flicker. Doesn’t fade. She’s steady.
My lip trembles. The tears fall without warning.
“I’m not strong enough,” I whisper.
She leans forward. Her arms wrap around me.
Her shoulder presses into mine. Her hand rests at the back of my head.
“I’ll be right there with you,” she says, voice low. “I promise.”
“You promise?”
Giovanna pulls back just enough to look at me. She nods once. Her thumb brushes a tear from my cheek.
She turns her head.
“Look.”
She points toward the sky.
A shimmer pulls open like a curtain of water folding back.
Through it, I see the ocean. A dock.
Cassian. He’s looking around desperately. He dives into the water and then comes up again, gasping.
Giovanna’s hand stays over mine.
“He loves you.”
My mouth opens. “I—”
“I’ll be right there with you. Every day. You won’t lose me.”
My fingers fist the fabric of her dress. My voice breaks. “You promise?”
Giovanna nods. Her chin trembles. Behind her, our parents step closer.
My mother’s arm slips around my father’s. His smile hasn’t faded. Hers is tired at the edges, but kind.
They stop in front of me and Giovanna steps back to let me have space. My mother stares at me.
“I asked Giovanna to forgive me,” she says softly, voice floating like a leaf on water. “I was cruel.”
My mother’s hand rests at the side of my face. Her thumb strokes the curve of my cheek, just like she used to when I’d cry too hard to breathe. Her eyes are glassy, lips pressed to keep from trembling.
“I want to ask that you forgive me,” she says. “For switching your destinies. I was selfish.”
Her fingers tighten slightly.
“I didn’t want to lose you,” she whispers. “So I gave away something that was never mine to choose.”
Behind her, my father shifts closer. The lines on his face are deeper, but softer. His voice is low.
“Forgive me,” he says, “for throwing my pain at you. I was a coward.”
His shoulders bow as he speaks. Like he’s finally laying something down after carrying it too long.
The tightness in my chest unravels all at once. My body folds forward and the tears come. My legs can’t hold me. I reach for them both, hands clutched at their sides, arms wrapping around their waists.
They gather me in.
My mother kisses the top of my head. My father’s arms close tight around my shoulders. Their bodies are warm, solid. No ghosts here. No memory.
Giovanna joins the circle, her arms folding around my back. Her cheek presses to mine. Her hand strokes between my shoulders.
I don’t know whose lips find my forehead first. My mother. My sister. My father. They come one after another. We stay like that for a minute, then my father’s palm moves to my jaw. He tilts my face gently upward.
His eyes hold no hesitation.
“It’s time to go.”
“I don’t want to.”
My voice is small. I’m already crying again, throat tight, breath stuttering in short, broken pulls.
My mother steps back, tears streaking down her cheeks. She holds onto my hand until the last moment. My father squeezes my shoulder once, then lets go.
They smile through it.
Giovanna steps beside me, fingers curling gently around my wrist.
She gives a soft tug.
“Let’s take you back.”
The world begins to shift. The sky folds in on itself. The grass dims beneath my feet.
The warmth recedes.
And just like that—
I’m back in the water.
****
The first thing that hits is cold. Then pressure. Then pain.
My chest convulses. I gasp and water pours into my lungs like fire—salted, heavy, burning all the way down. My eyes snap open but everything is blurred. Bubbles erupt past my face, light above me warping.
Cassian’s voice shatters through the water.
He’s calling my name.
Sound breaks over and over in waves as I flail, lungs screaming. Something clamps around my ankle.
A hand. Thick fingers.
Fausto.
His grip locks around the joint and yanks.
I twist hard, foot dragging through his hold. My leg kicks back, heel connecting with his face. He jerks. I kick again—harder. The hand slips. I shoot upward.
My arms tear through the water. Breaching the surface hits like being born again.
I cough so hard it feels like my ribs might split open. Salt and water pour out of my throat. I pull at the dock edge, fingers scraping wood. I climb—knees slamming, muscles shaking.
I drag myself up onto the boards. Behind me, water explodes.
Fausto splashes up, mouth open in a half-snarl, half-scream, soaked and bleeding. He drags himself onto the dock behind me. His hand slams down near my calf.
I spin, still coughing. His body crashes into me, driving my back against the wood. My head bounces off the planks. The world flashes white.
He straddles my chest, both knees pinning down my arms. One hand clamps over my throat.
He squeezes.
I choke, gagging—air nowhere. His face hangs over mine, blood dripping from his mouth, smeared across his teeth.
“You think you win?” he growls. “You don’t win. You never did.”
My vision narrows. Sound dims again.
I tap the boards, fingers searching, groping blindly.
Wood. Splinters. Nothing—Steel.
My hand curls around the knife hilt.
I lift it. Drive it upward.
The blade sinks into the soft meat of his eye.
His head jerks back with a strangled shriek. Blood sprays hot against my face. He thrashes, body bucking over me.
He clutches his face. I pull the blade free with a wet suck—then slam it into the other eye.
The steel punches through the socket with a sickening crunch. He screams.
He flails. His arms slap the dock. I shove his chest with both hands. He topples sideways.
His body rolls once—then over the edge. He hits the water hard. Limbs splash. Then go still.
I roll onto my side, spitting blood. I breathe. I breathe again. My throat burns. My vision swims. But I breathe.
I drop the knife. It clatters once, then rolls toward the edge.
The sound of the water shifts. A shape breaks the surface.
Cassian.
He swims hard—shoulders knifing through the current, face set with violent focus. The muscles in his arms tighten with each pull. He reaches the dock in seconds, hands gripping the boards, dragging his soaked body up without pause.
He rises to his knees beside me.
His eyes—when they find mine—don’t search. They know. They hold every answer I didn’t ask aloud.
His hands cradle my face. Fingers trace the swollen curve of my mouth, the split in my bottom lip, the raw skin at my jaw.
He kisses me. His mouth presses to mine like he’s trying to erase what came before. His breath is hot against my torn lips, and I feel it—the tremble in his fingertips, the heat of his palms cupping my cheeks, the way his chest pulls tight against mine as he leans in further.
A tear slips down the line of his nose, catching in the corner of my mouth.
He kisses me again. My hands lift—shaky, unsure. They slide up his chest. Across his soaked shirt. Over the strap of his shoulder holster. My fingers find the space between his shoulder blades. I pull him closer.
I close my eyes.
The warmth grows around us. The scent of blood fades.
The sun breaks over the horizon stretching across the dock, painting the sea in light.
I stay wrapped in him as the first rays fall over us.