Chapter 22 #2
“They’re doing it for his own good,” she says with a knowing look, crossing her arms. “To keep him out of Gygarth’s reach. But it won’t work forever. Soon, it won’t matter at all.”
“Then I’ll pull him back to me, like I’ve done before,” I reply firmly.
“For the rest of your life?” Zyphoro’s eyebrow arches, her tone skeptical. “Seems like a waste of a human lifespan.”
“Do you have a better idea?” I ask, matching her tone. “One that doesn’t involve cutting off my husband’s head?”
Her expression flickers with disappointment. “In the end, it must be one or the other. For Daedalus to be truly free of him, Gygarth must die.”
I scoff, the idea ludicrous. “You can’t kill a god.”
Zyphoro taps her chin thoughtfully. “That’s only because no one’s tried.”
“Perhaps we let Princess Amara recover from childbirth before we discuss killing gods, Zyphoro?” Reon interjects, his tone light but enough to shift the conversation.
I'm grateful for the distraction.
“Are you hungry?” he asks. “We’ve got some cheese, I think, a few other bits and pieces. It’s no feast, I’m afraid.”
“No, I’m fine,” I reply, giving a small shake of my head. “It’s just... nice to walk around without feeling that collar around my neck.”
“Collar?” He raises an eyebrow.
I nod, a faint bitterness lacing my words. “They put one on me to numb my powers. Ashen too.”
The Fae exchange knowing, silent glances.
“Such tools are forbidden,” Reon mutters.
“I’ll be sure to mention that next time,” I say.
“Anethesis truly had gone rogue,” Zyphoro muses. “What did he want from you, Amara?”
Too many questions, and I have too few answers. But maybe, just maybe, they can make sense of all this.
Before I can speak, the cabin door creaks open on its hinges.
Daed steps onto the deck, the wind immediately tugging at the loose fabric of his shirt as he slides his arms through the sleeves with a quiet wince.
His gaze sweeps over the deck until it snags on me, those silver eyes narrowing, gleaming like storm light.
“You’re out of bed… again.”
“Our daughter sleeps, and I am restless,” I reply.
A slow grin spreads across his face. “I would expect nothing less.”
Sea air threads through his hair, salt clinging to his skin that is far bronzer than I’ve ever known it to be.
He’s nothing like the pale prince I left behind.
The sun has kissed away his polish, leaving behind something rougher, more untamed.
Every muscle is leaner, every sinew taut.
My heart stumbles, my stomach tightens in a slow, curling heat.
Souls, he is as beautiful as I remember, but this version of him, this hardened, wilder Daed, stirs something even deeper.
He closes the distance between us in a few long strides. His arm slips around my waist, pulling me flush against him, and his fingers comb through my hair before settling at the nape of my neck.
“I still can’t believe you’re here,” he murmurs. The rasp of his voice, the weight of his stare. It knocks the air from my lungs. “I need you to myself. Now.”
The words send a shiver through me, my mind momentarily blanking. His voice is all I hear, the shape of his mouth all I see. I forget, just for a moment, that we are not alone.
Then the cabin door opens again, and Solena steps onto the deck.
Her fingers are smudged black with ink. She’s changed, too.
Her skin bronzed from the sun, her once-waifish frame stronger.
Her hair is longer now, left loose in a way she never allowed before, save for a few thin braids framing her sharp features.
She has always been stunning, but suddenly I notice it far more than I once did.
She inclines her head. “Hello, Amara.”
“Solena,” I say, nodding in return, though the air between us feels strange. Tense. Like speaking to a ghost of someone I used to know.
Before I can dwell on it, Daed’s fingers tighten in my hair, his lips brushing my temple as he leans close.
“Shall we go below?” he asks, voice dark with promise.
Reon chuckles. “Give the lass a moment to breathe, will you?”
“Besides,” Zyphoro adds, arms crossed. “She was just about to tell us what happened in Driftspire.”
Daed’s hold on me eases, but his attention sharpens. “Is that true?” His voice is softer now, careful. “Are you sure you want to talk about it?”
I nod. “I must tell you everything. I don’t fully understand what happened, but I fear it is far from over.”
Daed exhales slowly. “Very well.”
He keeps his arm draped around me as he guides me across the deck, back toward the door he came through. The others fall in behind us. When we reach it, he holds it open for me, but hesitates, his eyes flicking to the floor where the wet hem of my nightgown trails across the wooden boards.
His brow knits, gaze lifting to meet mine. He doesn’t speak, though I can tell he wants to. He knows just as well as I do why my nightgown is in such a state. Instead, he tilts his head toward the cabin, wordless in his urging, and waits until I step inside before following.
The cabin is dimly lit, the scent of salt and rum thick in the air.
Chairs scrape against the wooden floor as they pull them up around the same table where Daed had been lying only moments ago, Solena carving sigils into his skin.
Reon strides forward, dropping two bottles of rum onto the table with a satisfying thud before sliding glasses toward each of us.
I take a moment, letting myself linger on the edges, watching the way they move around each other.
Reon kicks his boots onto the table as he pours himself a drink.
Across from him, Zyphoro twirls a strand of raven-dark hair around her finger, gaze flicking between Orios and Solena.
Solena pulls out a chair, but before she can sit, Orios catches her by the waist and pulls her onto his lap instead, holding her there with a firm, claiming grip.
I wonder how many times they’ve sat around this table. How many bottles of rum they’ve emptied while I was caged in the sky.
The talks they must have had. The battles. The adventures. The misfortunes.
I have never felt at home among the Fae, never truly belonged. But watching them now, the ease of their movements, the unspoken language between them, I feel it even more acutely.
I am an outsider here.
Daed’s touch draws me from my thoughts as his fingers weave through mine, warm and steady. There is something in his smile, a quiet reassurance. A reminder that I am wanted.
“Go on then, wife,” he says, his voice low. “Tell us everything.”
I exhale, slow and measured, trying to find where to begin.
“We sailed for days. I slept through most of it. They put a collar around my neck. Invisible, but I could feel it and when I tried to summon my power, it burned. It was bound to a chain, anchored deep in the floor. I spent every day and night locked in a tower high above Driftspire. Ashen…” my throat tightens, “they kept in a cage on the other side of the city.”
Daed’s expression darkens. His canines lengthen. “Anethesis.” He says the name like a curse. “Did he hurt you?”
“Not at first.” The words barely leave my lips before his grip tightens around my hand, his body tensing. “At first, he was kind. Then the trials began.”
Zyphoro leans forward, her gaze sharp. “Trials? For what?”
“He said they were tests,” I murmur. “And that if I passed, he would set me free. As soon as I opened the portal.”
Daed stiffens. “A portal to where?”
I hesitate. The name feels dangerous, even here. “Meranor.”
The silence that follows is absolute. Tension snaps through the room.
“Meranor?” Reon repeats, his voice eerily quiet. “You’re certain he said Meranor?”
I nod.
“That’s impossible.” Daed shakes his head. “There is no going back to Meranor.”
Zyphoro’s lips curve into something resembling a smile. “Unless the legends are true. That an Awakened can tear the fabric of worlds and lead the way home.”
“That’s all they are,” Daed snaps. “Legends.”
Reon scoffs. “Only because they killed the last Awakened before she had the chance to prove them true.”
Daed’s head whips toward him, his glare so blistering the room seems to darken under the weight of his fury.
Reon clears his throat, shifting in his seat. “Apologies, friend. My words weren’t well chosen.”
But I cannot unhear them. My pulse pounds in my throat. “There was another Awakened? You… you knew her?”
Daed’s storm-gray eyes meet mine. “Yes. But she wasn’t human. She was Fae.”
My chest tightens. “And she was killed? For being Awakened?”
Zyphoro answers before he can. “It is considered unnatural,” she says, her voice lilting.
“Strange, isn’t it? That something so natural could be called unnatural?
But the Fae believe that no one among them should possess power greater than a king or queen.
” Her gaze flickers to Daed. “Or even a prince. For all his cursed gifts, Daedalus can only void-walk. Even he cannot open a portal, or see through magic, or unravel the secrets of time and fate. The Fae fear what they cannot control.” Her smirk fades, and her voice lowers.
“And so they destroy it. As a human, you should know this better than anyone.”
“I think you know it as well as I do, Zyphoro,” I say, meeting her gaze.
Something shifts in her expression. “I suppose I do.”
“The tests,” Daed presses. “What were they?”
I draw a breath, steadying myself. It all feels like a nightmare now, but speaking of it brings it back. The panic, the pain, the suffocating dread. But I must endure. I always must endure.
“There was one where I had to mend a shattered mirror with only my mind. Another where I had to choose the correct door from many.” My throat tightens. I try to steady the tremble in my voice. “They all had penalties if I wasn’t fast enough.”
Daed drags my chair closer with a sharp scrape. His hand cups my face, his touch warm despite the fire in his eyes. “Penalties?”
“Pain,” I whisper.
The sound of Daed’s fist slamming into the table is deafening. Wood cracks beneath his rage, splintering under his knuckles.
“And you passed the tests?” Zyphoro asks. When I nod, she exhales sharply, as if in disbelief. “The cost to open a portal is blood. Lots and lots of blood. You know that?”
“I didn’t at first,” I murmur. “Not until Ronin told me.”
Zyphoro frowns. “Who is Ronin?”
“The Golden Son,” Daed growls, the title heavy with disdain.
Solena shifts in Orios’ lap. “So The Golden Son betrayed Anethesis to save you?”
I exhale. “I sort of saved him in the end.”
Daed growls again, even lower, his teeth grinding so hard I expect them to chip.
Solena’s brows knit together. “But why? Why would he do that?”
A silence stretches between us until Zyphoro lets out a wicked, knowing laugh.
“Oh, dear. Did someone get sweet on you?”
“Enough, Zyphoro,” Daed snaps.
She only smirks. “I’ll take that as a yes.”
Daed ignores her, turning his attention back to me. “Where is Anethesis now?”
I let a slow smile creep across my lips. “I left most of him in Ashen’s cage.”
Reon’s brow lifts. “Most of him?”
“Well, his hands are in Ashen’s belly.”
That earns me a round of approving grins. Fae humor is what it is.
“I should have just flown from Driftspire on Ashen’s back,” I admit, my voice dropping to a quiet murmur. “Instead, I told him to take us home. I never imagined his instincts would lead us to the void.”
“He is a creature of that place. It is written into his bones,” Daed answers, pausing as his boot taps once against the wooden floor.
His jaw tightens, the muscle ticking as he weighs his next words.
“Amara,” he says slowly, “when I found you in the void, when I saw Emranth reaching for you… was it you who opened the portal to An’kel? ”
A shiver creeps across my skin. I remember that wasteland. I remember the cold. I remember how close I came to releasing something I couldn’t hope to control.
“I didn’t mean to. I was thinking of the Grove, but that place appeared instead. An’kel.”
“You used blood?” Zyphoro asks, her voice quieter now.
I nod. “Just a little.”
Daed turns his head toward his sister. “Then the portal was too small. That’s why Emranth couldn’t get through.”
“This Emranth,” I repeat the name, its shape heavy on my tongue. “You know him?”
Daed’s nod is reluctant. “He serves Gygarth. He is an envoy, a lieutenant, capable of walking between realms where the Father Below cannot.”
“He’s a lapdog,” Zyphoro adds, her tone dry. “He scours the ground for his master’s scraps.”
“No,” Daed says, shaking his head. “He is far more dangerous than that.” His attention sharpens on me. “What did he say to you, wife?”
The memory rises, and with it comes the chill of that place. Endless dark. A silence that screamed.
“He wanted our daughter,” I say, the words falling from my lips in a tremble.
Daed’s shoulders sag. His grip on my hand grows fierce. “We must return to Baev’kalath. With the Blades and the thrall houses behind us, perhaps it will be enough. Perhaps we can protect you both.”
Zyphoro hums, unbothered. “It will never be enough.”
Daed moves before she finishes speaking. He is on his feet, shadows carved deep into his face.
“I tolerate your jabs because I owe you a century of debt. Because I failed to save you from that prison. But do not test me. Not on this. Not when it comes to my family.”
The room goes quiet. Reon hides behind his cup, pretending to drink, while Solena and Orios suddenly find great interest in the walls and floor, unwilling to meet anyone’s gaze.
Zyphoro reclines in her chair, arms folded. “Very well, brother,” she says with a faint smile. “We will return to Baev’kalath.” Her gaze finds mine, and for once, there is no mockery in her eyes. “To protect our family.”