Chapter 37
Chapter thirty-seven
The bedchamber was too quiet.
Briar lay on top of the covers beside Eliam, watching the steady rise and fall of his chest. Three days. Three days since they'd returned from the seal, since Malus had died, since Arion had...
She pressed her hand to her chest where the warmth used to live, finding only hollow absence. Not painful, just empty. Like a tooth missing from her mouth that her tongue kept searching for.
Eliam looked peaceful in sleep. Younger. The harsh lines around his mouth had softened, and his white hair spread across the pillow in a way that made her fingers itch to touch it. But she kept her hands to herself, afraid that if she touched him, he'd disappear entirely.
The healers couldn't explain it. His body was whole, healthy. No injuries remained from the fight. The reunification had worked perfectly—too perfectly, one of them had muttered when they thought she wasn't listening. He should have woken by now.
Outside, the Forest Court continued without its king. Thaine held things together through sheer will and the threat of violence against anyone who suggested maybe they didn't need to wait for Eliam's return. The forest itself seemed to be holding its breath, waiting.
She'd woken in this same bed two days ago, her body screaming from what the magic had done to her.
Thaine had been there, had explained how they'd carried both her and Eliam back from the seal.
How the corruption was receding now that Malus was dead.
How the seal itself remained cracked but stable, for now.
Karse had returned to his homeland, whatever debts he felt he owed now settled. Sian had taken temporary stewardship of the Star Court in Arion's absence—a difficult position, managing a court that had lost its lord in a way no one quite understood how to explain.
He hadn't mentioned Arion. Hadn't needed to.
The door opened quietly, and Thaine entered with a tray. The smell of food made her stomach turn.
"You need to eat," he said, setting it on the bedside table.
"I'm not hungry."
"I didn't ask if you were hungry." His tone was gentle despite the words. "You haven't eaten properly in days."
"He hasn't woken up."
"He will." Thaine moved to check Eliam's pulse, a ritual he'd performed every few hours. "His body just needs time to adjust. The reunification was traumatic."
"What if he doesn't—"
"He will."
The certainty in Thaine's voice should have been comforting. Instead, it just highlighted how uncertain everything else felt. The court without Malus's supporters—scattered or dead. The seal, cracked and weeping corruption. Arion, gone but not gone, existing now only as part of Eliam.
A sound from the bed made them both freeze.
Eliam's breathing had changed. His fingers twitched against the covers. His brow furrowed, and he made a soft sound of confusion or discomfort.
Relief flooded through Briar so intensely her knees went weak. She leaned forward, reaching for his hand. "Eliam?"
His eyes opened slowly, unfocused. He blinked several times, and his gaze found Thaine first.
"Thaine?" His voice was rough from disuse. "What are you doing here? Why are you in my chambers?"
"My lord," Thaine's relief was audible. "You've been unconscious for three days. How do you feel?"
"My head is pounding." Eliam started to sit up, wincing. "Three days? That's not—" His eyes landed on Briar for the first time.
She smiled, tears of relief already gathering. "You're awake."
His expression went cold. Not the controlled coldness she knew, the kind he used as armor. This was the flat disinterest of looking at a stranger. He looked from her to Thaine, confusion clear on his face.
"Who is this?" His tone was sharp, annoyed. "Can someone explain why there's a human in my bed?"
The words hit her like physical blows. She stared at him, waiting for the cruel joke to end, for his expression to crack into that smirk she knew so well.
It didn't.
"You don't..." Her voice came out small. "Eliam, it's me."
"I don't know you." He said it with such matter-of-fact certainty that her chest caved in. "Thaine, why is there a strange woman in my private chambers?"
This wasn't happening. This couldn't be happening. She reached for him, needing to touch him, to make him remember.
His hand shot out, slapping hers away with enough force to sting. He immediately shifted away from her on the bed, putting distance between them. The movement was instinctive, the way someone recoils from an unwanted stranger's touch.
"Don't touch me," he said coldly.
Her hand stayed suspended in the air where he'd struck it, her mind unable to process what was happening. Her heart hammered against her ribs, screaming denials her mouth couldn't form.
"My lord," Thaine said carefully, his huntsman's instincts recognizing something was very wrong. "What's the last thing you remember?"
Eliam's brow furrowed. "I was in the forest. Near the western border. There was..." He paused, concentrating. "Something about a disturbance. Report of an accident involving humans near the veil." His frown deepened. "Why can't I remember what happened next?"
Thaine's expression grew grim. "The night you went to investigate the humans. That was over two centuries ago."
"That's absurd." But uncertainty flickered across Eliam's face. He looked around his chambers, and Briar saw him notice small differences. Things that had changed. Her clothes draped over a chair. A glass of water on her side of the bed.
"You made a bargain," Briar said, her voice shaking. "With my mother, I was payment. Then you made a bargain with me for my sister’s life."
He looked at her with complete incomprehension before grabbing hold of her wrist and holding it up, his grip so tight she had to bite her lip to keep from crying out. "If we’d made such a bargain, where are the marks? Where is the proof?”
Briar looked down at her arm, now devoid of the twisting vines that had once decorated it.
They’d begun fading gradually, she had presumed it was because Malus had died, but now she wondered if perhaps it was because Eliam had simply forgotten making the bargain between Briar and the Forest King null and void.
When she could offer no explanation he released her and turned away. “Thaine, remove her."
"My lord—"
"My head feels like it's splitting open, and there's a strange woman in my bed making ridiculous claims." His voice rose, sharp with pain and irritation. "Remove her. Now."
Thaine's hand settled on Briar's shoulder, gentle but insistent. "Come on."
She couldn't move. Her body had locked up, every muscle rigid with shock. This wasn't real. Couldn't be real. After everything, after all they had been through, he didn't remember any of it.
He didn't remember her.
"Briar," Thaine said quietly. "We need to go. We'll figure this out."
She let him guide her from the bed, her movements mechanical. As they reached the door, she looked back. Eliam had already dismissed her, his hand pressed to his temple, eyes closed against the pain.
To him, she was nobody. A strange human who'd somehow ended up in his bed.
The door closed between them, and her legs gave out.
Thaine caught her before she hit the floor, his arms steady around her shoulders.
"Easy," he said quietly. "I've got you."
She couldn't stop shaking. Her teeth chattered despite the warmth of the corridor. Everything felt wrong, disconnected, like she was watching someone else's body fail.
"He doesn't know me." The words came out broken. "He looked right through me like I was nothing."
"Memory loss happens sometimes with magical trauma," Thaine said, but his voice lacked conviction. "The reunification was unprecedented. We don't know what effects—"
"He slapped my hand away." Her voice cracked. "Like I was some stranger trying to touch him. Like I disgusted him."
Thaine's jaw tightened. He bent and scooped her into his arms, carrying her toward her chambers. She didn't protest. Her body felt too heavy, too hollow, like all her bones had been replaced with glass that might shatter if she moved.
Her room was exactly as she'd left it days ago. The bed still unmade from when she'd rushed to Eliam's side after they'd returned. Her clothes scattered on the chair. Everything waiting for a person who no longer existed—the person who belonged to the Forest King.
Thaine set her gently on the bed. "Rest. I'll speak with the healers, see what can be done."
"What if nothing can be done?" The question escaped before she could stop it.
He paused at the door. "Then we figure out another way. You're still here. Still part of this court."
"I'm nobody to him."
"That's not true—"
"You saw his face." The tears finally came, hot and sudden. "I'm just some human who was in his bed. Less than nobody. An annoyance."
Thaine's expression was grim. "Rest. We'll figure this out."
The door closed with a soft click.
Briar curled onto her side, pulling her knees to her chest. Through the wall, she could hear movement—Eliam's footsteps as he moved around his chambers. So close. Close enough that if she pressed her hand to the wall, only stone and wood would separate them.
But the real distance was insurmountable. Six months erased. Every touch, every word, every moment gone like they'd never existed.
The tears came harder. She pressed her face into the pillow to muffle the sobs, but they tore from her chest anyway. Raw, ugly sounds that hurt her throat. Her body shook with the force of them until her ribs ached, until her head pounded, until she had nothing left.
Then she just lay there, hollow and spent, watching the light change.
The sun crept across the floor, marking hours she couldn't feel. Orange to red to purple to gone. The room fell into darkness, and she didn't move to light a candle. The dark felt appropriate.