Chapter 29 #2
My pulse stutters. I had asked before—more than once—but no one understood. They thought it was the head injury, the fog. But I wasn’t confused. I had only been asking the wrong question.
My breath shudders. “My mother said that this language was lost. She told me no one else could speak it. But then you all could, and…” My voice trails off, breaking beneath the weight of it.
Elaris steps forward, her expression grave.
“They could not see your confusion, child. To them, Thraeian is as natural as breathing. But you are right—this tongue does not exist in the mortal realm. Your mother spoke true. She carried it with her when she fled, so that you would know it if you ever returned.”
Nausea rolls through me, my world tilting. All this time, I thought my mother had forced me to learn some forgotten tongue, useless knowledge. But it was heritage—a birthright.
Lowan gathers me close, his arms steady around me, his breath warm against my hair.
“I’m sorry, Metra, that we couldn’t give you answers when you needed them.
My mother searched endlessly, trying to piece it together for you.
And I…” His voice falters. “I was torn between helping her so I could know you and never finding the answer so you would stay. It was selfish. Even so, another part of me whispered to send you away.”
His grip tightens, guilt carving through his words as he pulls me closer. I bury my face in his chest, breathing him in until the world steadies, until something feels real again.
When I pull back, his silver eyes scan my face with a fierceness that makes my throat ache. “You have nothing to apologize for anymore. I love you,” I whisper.
“Love feels the same in any language,” he murmurs, just for me. “My love for you knows no limits.”
I hear the words, but now I focus on the way they sound. Soft. Lilting. Foreign and familiar all at once. The lost language question I’d carried with me slips into place at last. This isn’t foreign at all. This is mine. The Thraeian tongue feels like my first tongue, my native tongue.
“Do you two need a moment?” Arden cuts in, voice dripping with mischief. “Because I’d love a moment with Remli if so…”
Remli smacks his arm, though the curve of her lips betrays her.
“I’m fine,” I say, though the word tastes strange. “This is just…a surprise. My mother—” My breath catches, sudden realization choking me. “Did my mother have this ability as well?”
Elaris nods. “She did. It was one reason she rose to reign. Only the strongest of the Donovans were destined for the throne. It was never automatic by bloodline alone.”
Arden leans his elbow on the table, dragging his finger along the tome’s edge in a way that makes Remli glare. “So. Catch me up. She’s a Donovan with wicked power—fine. But who’s her mother, and where is she now?”
We spend the next hour telling him. Piece by piece, we unravel the story of how we came to find him. My time in captivity. Sirona’s death. The battles, the betrayals, the choices that led us here.
When we finish, Arden’s smirk is gone. His face is sharp now, sober, like a man recalling fragments of himself he thought lost forever.
“I feel as if I had forgotten something vital, and it has only now been given back to me. I was too young to remember—but I feel the truth in your words. And the Queen? She lives? In another realm?”
“Yes,” I breathe. “I’m sure of it, but I need Nova Donovan to bring her back.”
Arden’s eyes flick to Elaris, then back to me. “You’ll bring her here. And will you stay as well?”
The question stops me cold. Every face turns toward me, waiting. My stomach lurches as the truth crashes in—I’ve not given this real thought. I had a life. A scholarship. Friends. A future I had mapped out in careful lines.
But then I look at Zillah and Selene, at Remli, even Arden with his crooked grin. And especially at Lowan—my anchor, my Thread pulling taut.
“Yes,” I say. The word echoes inside me, firming into truth. “This is where I belong now.”
Lowan studies me in silence. There are words on his lips he chooses not to speak—but they’re written plain in his eyes. Words that make my heart pound with both longing and fear.
Arden is the one to break the silence. “And exactly how do I fit into any of this? At first, I thought you were collecting rare powers, but now…” He exhales, running a hand through his hair. “Now I think I’m outside my element.”
Every jaw drops. For a heartbeat, no one even breathes. Zillah recovers first, eyes narrowing. “I never thought I’d hear such words from your overly confident mouth.”
Arden grins, shrugging. “Every once in a while, I’ve been known to show some humility.”
“Like last night when you were the one moaning for me?” Remli blurts, then slaps a hand over her mouth, horrified. The cavern echoes with laughter. Arden looks positively delighted. “I’ll gladly moan your name again right here on this table—”
“Okay, okay,” Selene cuts in, exasperated. “As much as I enjoy your constant sexual tension, this is a sacred space.”
Arden only leans closer to whisper something in Remli’s ear. Her spine stiffens, but the quick flick of her tongue across her lips betrays her interest.
And then Elaris speaks, her voice slicing clean through the laughter.
“To explain your importance in this endeavor, Arden Navarre, you must first be prepared to hear the truth of your lineage—or what we suspect of it. But there is still more. A story that begins long before your births, and one that explains why Tobias Veynar was entangled in these events at all.”
The air stills. I feel Lowan and Zillah sharpen beside me, their focus like drawn blades at the mention of their father. Across the table, Arden diverts his gaze, but Remli threads her fingers through his and squeezes.
Elaris raises her hand. From the piles of tomes and scrolls, one lifts free, gliding through the air until it unfurls before us on the table. Ink lines shimmer faintly, as though time itself still remembers their stroke.
Lowan gasps. “That’s my father’s handwriting.”
“Indeed.” Elaris’s lips curve with solemn pride. “For it was he who foresaw these events.”
The scroll unfurls with a snap, parchment rolling wide across the table. At once, words etch themselves in dark ink across the page. And then—
Lowan stumbles back, clutching at me as a voice echoes through the cavernous Atheneum. Not just any voice. Tobias’s voice.
“Father,” Zillah breathes, her knees buckling as Selene catches her.
I tighten my hold on Lowan’s arm as his father’s words reverberate off stone and shelves, low and steady like thunder. His free hand flies to his mouth, as if holding back a cry.
Selene wraps her arms around Zillah, tears spilling down her face, her grief laid bare at hearing their father again.
The air hums, heavy and alive with the vision:
“I saw a great shadow split by flame. Blood born of two realms, joined and channeling immense power. Destruction. A black void. It makes little sense, but this is all Fate has given me to See.”
The scroll glows until the last word fades, Tobias’s voice lingering in the vaulted chamber like a ghost. The echo of it clings to the shelves, the stone, the air itself, as if the Atheneum does not wish to let him go.
No one dares breathe. Lowan’s hand is still clamped over his mouth, Zillah is still pressed into Selene’s arms, and tears continue to streak her cheeks. I hold myself still against Lowan’s arm, the burn of his father’s words settling into my bones.
Then, as if a spell breaks—the chamber erupts.
“What does it mean?” Zillah gasps.
“Who is the child?” Selene demands, her voice cracking.
“Is it Metra?” Arden’s voice is sharp, urgent.
“Why now? Why us?” Remli presses.
The questions strike like arrows, one after the other, all aimed at Elaris.
She raises her hand. At once, the noise stills.
Her gaze settles firmly on me. “First,” she says, her voice calm but unyielding, “you must understand this: even I do not fully know the breadth of your power, Metra. In all my years of walking this realm, I have never seen one like yours. And that makes it dangerous. It is not wise to gather it for its own sake.”
“I don’t want to,” I admit quickly. My hand curls into a fist at my side. “The one time I tried it was… visceral. Overwhelming.”
Elaris tilts her head. “Explain.”
I glance at Lowan, then back to her. “It was him. When I touched his power—before we knew about the Thread between us—it wasn’t painful, but it was everything. I saw things. Memories that weren’t mine. I felt sensations—his sensations. It was like being in his skin but also my own for a breath.”
Lowan’s hand finds mine, silver eyes steady, but I can see the flicker of memory in them.
I swallow. “And later, when I tried to take the King’s power in the dungeon to save myself…
I couldn’t. There was nothing there—a void.
My magic recoiled, as though it recognized something unnatural.
Despite that, I saw things. Horrible things.
And he realized I could see them—so he forced me to see more. ”
The tattoos across my shoulders burn faintly at the memory, the sting as real as the echo of his cruelty.
Elaris’s face darkens. “A void,” she repeats, her voice taut. “That is not… natural.”
“What does that mean?” Selene asks softly, her arms tightening around herself.
“I do not know,” Elaris admits, and for the first time, I hear genuine unease in her voice.
My throat tightens. “When I tried to take Sirona’s power to save her, I couldn’t. It wasn’t available—she hadn’t Manifested yet. But I still saw flashes. Memories.”
The words hang between us like ghosts. Lowan and Zillah both stiffen, grief etched raw across their faces.
The silence after my confession hangs heavy. Lowan’s hand is still around mine, warm and steady, but the burn across my shoulders makes me want to curl in on myself.
Arden snaps his fingers suddenly, eyes widening. “That’s it.”