A Moment To Breathe
Ifollowed them through the palace in silence, my footsteps echoing softly across the polished stone floors as soldiers and servants hurried aside to clear a path.
Their expressions shifted between confusion, relief, and disbelief as they caught sight of the three figures ahead of me.
Atlas and Aster supported Lazaros between them, half carrying him through the corridors as though the weight of everything that had happened had finally settled upon his shoulders.
Lazaros barely seemed aware of his surroundings.
His head remained bowed, his movements sluggish and unsteady as he stumbled forward.
Whatever strength had sustained him until now appeared to have deserted him completely, leaving behind only the crushing burden of everything he believed he had done.
Whether those deaths truly belonged to him or not, no longer seemed to matter. The guilt had already taken root.
Ahead of me, Atlas murmured something quietly to Aster before slowing his pace. Aster shifted his grip, taking more of Lazaros’s weight onto himself, and continued towards the far side of the throne room while Atlas came to an abrupt stop. A heartbeat later, he turned.
The moment his eyes found me, something in his expression softened.
Not completely.
No, the tension remained etched into every line of his face, exhaustion and grief still lingering behind his eyes.
But for the first time since I had arrived in The?kós, I caught a glimpse of the man beneath it all.
The man who had spent months searching for me.
The man who had nearly lost his brother.
The man who looked as though he was holding himself together through sheer force of will.
Crossing the distance between us in only a few strides, he reached for me before I could say a word, his hands rising to cradle either side of my face.
His touch was warm, grounding, and for a moment neither of us spoke.
We just stood there, staring at one another as though trying to make sense of the impossible reality that we had somehow survived long enough to find our way back to each other.
“We have much to talk about.”
A weak laugh escaped me despite everything.
“That might be the understatement of the century.”
For the briefest moment, the corner of his mouth twitched, but the smile never quite materialized.
“Perhaps.”
The word settled between us, alongside a thousand unanswered questions. There was so much he still didn’t know. So much I needed to explain. The Labyrinth. The Badlands. Theron. Demetrios. The dagger. Everything. Yet neither of us seemed quite ready to begin unraveling it.
Eventually, his gaze drifted past me before returning to my face.
“I need to take care of Lazaros.” The sadness in his voice made my chest ache.
“Go.”
His jaw tightened immediately.
“I don’t want to leave you.”
The honesty of the admission stole the breath from my lungs.
Beyond the castle walls, an entire kingdom was trying to recover from war.
His brother was falling apart somewhere down the corridor.
There were soldiers to command, survivors to help, and a thousand impossible decisions waiting for him.
Yet somehow his greatest concern remained standing right in front of him.
“I’ll be fine,” I promised, my voice barely above a whisper.
His eyes searched mine as though trying to determine whether he believed me or not. Then his gaze dropped to my throat.
His hand slid from my cheek, his thumb brushing gently across the cut left behind by Lazaros’s blade. The storm that darkened his expression told me exactly what he thought about my definition of being fine.
“You’re hurt.”
Instinctively, my fingers rose to touch the wound.
“It’s only a scratch.” The look he gave me suggested he disagreed entirely.
“A scratch that came far too close.”
I couldn’t argue with that.
His hand remained against my neck, his thumb tracing the edge of the injury with infuriating gentleness before he finally released a slow breath.
“I’ll have a maid sent to you. She’ll show you to a room where you can clean up.”
Before I could answer, the distant sound of Lazaros’s voice echoed through the corridor beyond the throne room. The broken cry that followed seemed to strike Atlas like a physical blow, his eyes closing briefly as pain flickered across his face.
“Go,” I breathed. “I’ll still be here when you’re done.”
When his eyes opened again, they settled on mine and remained there for several long seconds. Then his hand slid to the back of my neck, and he gently drew me closer until our foreheads touched.
The gesture was achingly familiar.
Comforting… like home.
“I won’t be gone long.”
“I know.”
Neither of us moved. Not at first. Then, eventually, he pressed a kiss against my forehead, lingering there for a moment before pulling away. It wasn’t the desperate reunion either of us probably wanted. It wasn’t enough. Not after everything we had endured to get here.
But it was a promise.
Then he stepped back, and I watched him cross the room before disappearing through the doorway after Aster and Lazaros. It was only once he was gone that I realized how much of my strength had been provided by his presence.
A few moments later, a soft voice spoke from behind me.
“My lady?”
Turning around, I found a young woman standing several feet away.
She looked no older than her early twenties, with pale golden skin and long chestnut hair braided neatly over one shoulder.
Large, kind hazel eyes watched me with obvious nervousness beneath long, dark lashes, and when she offered a small curtsy, a few loose strands escaped to frame her face.
She was breathtakingly beautiful, with thick lips and light freckles across her nose.
She wore what I assumed were the palace colors.
A fitted gown of deep sapphire blue trimmed with silver embroidery that caught the light whenever she moved.
A crisp white apron was tied neatly around her waist, while silver stitching climbed the sleeves in delicate patterns that resembled twisting vines and leaves.
Her hands remained clasped tightly in front of her, betraying the nerves hidden beneath her professional composure.
“His Highness sent me to attend to you.”
Not surprised that she had appeared so quickly, I nodded, and the young woman led me away from the throne room, her head slightly bowed.
Every few steps, I caught her stealing careful glances in my direction as though she expected me to do something strange at any moment.
I didn’t know whether to feel offended or amused by it, but after the day I had endured, I wasn’t sure I had the energy for either.
So instead, I followed quietly as she guided me through the palace, past towering archways and long corridors lined with pale stone columns that glittered faintly beneath the light of silver lanterns suspended from the walls.
The castle was beautiful in a way that felt almost unreal, as though it had been lifted from the pages of some ancient fairytale and left to gather sorrow in its corners.
High windows stretched towards vaulted ceilings, their glass stained in shades of blue, gold, and violet, casting fractured pools of color across the floor.
Tapestries hung between them, depicting kings, battles, winged beasts, and cities I didn’t recognize, though several were faded from age and dust. There was grandeur everywhere I looked, but it was quiet grandeur, the kind that had been left alone for too long.
“I’m Alex,” I said after the silence between us became too heavy to ignore.
The maid glanced back at me quickly, her cheeks flushing.
“I know, my lady.”
“You don’t have to call me that, you know, I’m far from a noble lady.” Her eyes widened slightly, as though I had suggested she set fire to the curtains.
“I mean,” I added quickly, “I guess you can if you want to. I’m just not really used to it, and I certainly don’t expect it.”
She gave a nervous, brief nod and turned her attention back to the corridor ahead, though her shoulders remained tense.
I watched her for a moment, noting the way her slender fingers kept twisting together whenever she thought I wasn’t looking.
“Are you alright?” I asked gently. “Is something wrong?”
“No,” she said at once, before hesitating. “I mean, no, my lady. Nothing is wrong. It’s only…” She glanced back at me again, then looked away as fresh color touched her cheeks. “Well, I’ve never met a human before.”
For some reason, that made more sense than anything else had all day.
“Oh,” I said, and despite everything, a small smile tugged at my mouth. “Well, I suppose we’re not that different from you. Just with a much shorter lifespan and a significantly higher chance of making terrible decisions.”
Her lips parted before she gave a startled laugh, soft and quickly swallowed, as though she wasn’t entirely sure she was allowed to make the sound.
But some of the tension eased from her shoulders after that, and the corridor between us felt a little less formal as she led me up a sweeping staircase with a carved silver banister shaped like curling vines.
“My name is Thalia, but please call me Lia,” she said after a moment, her voice still quiet, but warmer than before.
“Nice to meet you, Lia.”
She smiled shyly, then stopped outside a set of tall double doors near the end of the hall. The handles were shaped like twisting leaves, and the wood was so pale it almost looked silver beneath the lantern light. She pushed one door open with visible effort, then stepped inside ahead of me.
The room beyond was stunning, even beneath its layer of neglect.
Several pieces of furniture had been covered with large white dust sheets, their shapes rising like ghosts in the dim light.
Thalia hurried forward, looking mortified as she began pulling them away one by one, sending clouds of dust into the air.
She coughed, waving a hand in front of her face as she gathered the fabric into her arms.