Chapter 44 #2
“Don’t, Amara!” he roars. The sound cracks the air… and then falters. His voice shatters into something small, broken. “Leave me,” he pleads, the words trembling. “For fuck’s sake, just leave me to die.”
My hand stills above him.
He drags in a ragged breath, eyes glinting in the dim light.
“I have nothing left. My army turned on me…my brother’s army and of all the punishments they could’ve chosen…
they chose fire.” His throat works, the words scraping out raw.
“I deserve this. I earned this. I’m glad you live, Amara.
What we fought for wasn’t in vain. But please… let me go.”
“I cannot,” I say quietly, and his chest rises hard with another breath. “I need you, Ronin.”
He shakes his head weakly. “You need someone better.”
“Estra needs you,” I whisper, and his jaw trembles.
“This isn’t over,” I continue, voice steady now, the truth thrumming through me like a heartbeat. “It won’t be over until Gygarth is dead and my daughter is cradled in my arms. I need you to stand beside me.”
I place my hand upon his chest. His skin is searing to the touch. He flinches, but I do not pull away. The Souls hum in my blood, the glow rising beneath my skin like a dawn waiting to break.
“But first,” I whisper, “I need you whole.”
The glow builds between us, an emerald light blooming from my palm, spreading in delicate threads across his ruined flesh.
His body trembles as the fire’s legacy peels away: the cracked skin knitting, the blackened edges softening to pink, new life unfurling where death had claimed its hold.
His breath catches, and though he tries to hide it, a single tear slips down the side of his face.
My power moves through me like a current, washing him clean, mending him piece by piece.
But when my hand reaches the old scars, the ones carved deep across his chest from the flames of Rethmar long ago, his fingers, renewed, snap up, closing around my wrist.
“Stop,” he says. The look in his eyes is something I’ve never seen before, defiance, yes, but also pride.
The fire of a boy who survived what should have killed him.
“Not these.” He draws my hand away from the ridged skin.
“These belong to me. They’re what’s left of the boy I was…
the boy who learned what it means to live through fire. They’re mine to keep.”
For a long moment, I say nothing. The light at my fingertips flickers, then fades.
I nod softly and withdraw my hand. “Then keep them.”
Ronin sits up, rolling his shoulders, testing his limbs. He rakes a hand through a head of thick blond hair, then he stands, and the sheet slips away, leaving him utterly bare. He doesn’t seem to care, turning his attention to his healed body, flexing muscle and pinching skin in disbelief.
I turn away, though if I’m honest, not as fast as I should have.
“Do you have a blacksmith in this place?” he asks.
I nod, continuing to look the other way. “The Tenders are fine crafters. Metal, wood, stone, they shape them all.”
He nods once, more to himself than to me. “Good.” His fingers curl into a fist, testing its strength. “I am in need of a new mask.”
I clear my throat. “Well… perhaps put some pants on first.”
He glances down, finally noticing. His hand flies to cover himself… not very successfully.
A laugh cracks the silence. We both turn. Reon is peeking out from behind his curtain.
“Not bad, human,” he says, nodding in approval. “Not bad.”
When we step out into the fading afternoon light, the murmurs ripple through the village like wind through reeds. The Tenders stop what they’re doing. Their eyes widen, flicking between me and the man who walks beside me.
Ronin’s transformation steals their breath. Whispers follow in our wake. The Jewel has healed him… the Golden Son lives… Their reverence presses like a tide, warm and suffocating all at once.
We move toward the great tree at the village’s heart, its spiraling trunk hollowed into a staircase that winds upward, lined with glittering lanterns. Reon and Ronin climb behind me. The air grows cooler as we rise, the murmurs below fading into a hum.
At the top, the Fae await. What remains of the Blades.
Daed, Orios, Solena and Zyphoro huddled together in hushed discussion, but when Zyphoro sets eyes on Ronin, she breaks away in an instant.
For a heartbeat they simply look at each other, a silent exchange of something none of us will ever quite understand.
A bond forged not by words, but by survival and the impossible things they must have endured together.
Then Zyphoro reaches for him, her arm sliding around his neck as she draws him in.
Her cheek rests against his shoulder, and for the first time since I’ve known him, Ronin allows himself to lean back into someone’s touch.
His mouth twitches, the faintest ghost of a smile crossing it, and his hand comes to rest against the small of her back.
The tension in the room breaks like a wave. Shoulders ease. Eyes soften. The others look between one another, surprise first, then relief, and the tight circle loosens, opening as though granting Ronin space to stand among them.
Zyphoro’s acceptance is enough.
If she, fiercest of the Blades, can stand beside the Golden Son, then the rest of them can too.
And thank the Souls for that, because the battles we have already fought will mean nothing if we turn on one another now.
Daed steps forward. “Do you wish to speak, wife?” he asks.
I shake my head. “I may be many things now,” I answer, “but I am no tactician. War is your art, husband, and in that, you are unmatched. Lead us as you always have.”
“I will not paint you a pretty picture,” he begins, voice deep, echoing through the hollow trunk of the great tree.
“An’kel is a place of nightmares. Its soil soaked in the blood of every soul who’s dared trespass there.
Its demons are ancient, their power boundless and upon his throne, within the temple of his making, sits Gygarth.
We will be taking the fight to him, into his own dominion, where he holds every advantage. ”
Zyphoro exhales sharply, folding her arms. “Your pep talks are as bleak as ever, brother.”
Daed’s jaw tightens. “Would you rather I lied to you? We owe our people honesty. And the truth is, some of us will not make it back.”
Silence settles like dust.
“But I would not ask any of you to face what I am unwilling to face myself.”
Daed’s gaze sweeps the room and finds mine, and the air between us tightens.
“I will risk my life to bring back my daughter,” he continues, voice low but certain.
“Because I cannot imagine a world where she is gone. Where I must live knowing the sound of her laughter has faded. That I will never feel her in my arms, never hear her call me father.”
Something inside him fractures then, so subtle I doubt anyone else sees it, but I do.
I feel it, the sharp twist of grief and longing, the desperate hope holding him together by threads.
My chest aches with the urge to go to him, to take his face in my hands and tell him that he will not face that pain alone.
But he straightens before I can move, shoulders squaring, armor of command snapping back into place.
Daedalus the warrior. Daedalus the prince. The male who does not break.
He draws a long breath. “But we are not without our strengths. We have Amara, Jewel of the Tenders, the Awakened. She will open the portal we need to cross into An’kel, and with the power she wields over the earth, with the green fire that burns in her veins, she will make even the horrors that await us tremble. ”
I bow my head slightly at his words, but my stomach knots. His faith in me is unwavering and that terrifies me more than any demon ever could.
Daed lifts his hand, thick tendrils of smoke twisting between his fingers. “And I,” he says, his voice deepening, “now wield the void freely without fear of Gygarth’s gaze. The smoke and shadow obey me.”
The air ripples around him. His jaw tightens, his body seizes. The temperature in the room drops. Then, before anyone can react, a second head splits into being over his shoulder, shrouded in black, its eyes white and empty, its mouth a writhing pit of teeth and tentacles.
A collective gasp fills the room. Solena grips Orios’ arm. Reon presses his back against the wall. Even Zyphoro’s hand goes to her blade.
The demon head snarls, a wet, guttural growl, but as quickly as it appeared, it vanishes with a rush of smoke, making me wonder if it was ever there. Daed staggers, bracing himself on the table, chest heaving.
“And I have a passenger now,” he says, his voice almost conversational. “Another weapon against Gygarth.”
Zyphoro’s voice cuts through the uneasy silence. “Are you sure you can control Emranth?” she demands. “How is he any different from Gygarth?”
It’s the question lodged in all our throats.
Daed straightens, his expression cold as stone.
“Because his soul belongs to me. I am the master now.” His eyes blaze white, smoke coiling off his skin, and for a terrible heartbeat, I can’t tell where Daed ends and the demon begins.
“I will do the same to Gygarth. I will consume him, devour him, and end him forever.”
The silence that follows is taut, until Zyphoro lets out a short, unexpected laugh. “He is death, brother,” she says, shaking her head. “You cannot kill death.”
Daed smiles faintly. “Perhaps you’re right, sister. But I will try, and I will keep trying until Estra is home.”
Daed’s gaze sweeps over the room, lingering on each of his warriors.
“You are the finest, bravest, and noblest Fae I have ever had the honor of fighting beside,” he says, each word steady as stone. “There is no one else I would trust at my side. No one else I would trust to fight for my daughter as fiercely as I will.”
They do not speak, but they don’t need to. The silence that follows is a sacred one, a wordless acknowledgment of the bond that has just been forged.
Then Daed turns his attention to Ronin.
“Never,” Daed says at last, “in a thousand lifetimes, did I imagine I would stand beside you in battle… Ronin.” His mouth hesitates around the name, as though it tastes strange, bitter and hard to swallow.
“But you have proven more than once that you are a man of honor. A warrior who will fight to his last breath for what he believes in. And if we survive what comes, I would count you not only as an ally, but as a friend.”
For a heartbeat, no one moves.
Then Ronin steps forward, meeting Daed in the center of the room. Their eyes lock, chests rising and falling, two creatures of immeasurable power, and inescapable rage. In another world, I have no doubt they would’ve been as close as brothers, had one not been born Fae and the other human.
But this world gives them something else. The chance to stand side by side and destroy something far worse than either of them could ever be.
Ronin offers his forearm, and the room falls still.
Daed exhales, lifts his chin, and clasps Ronin’s arm in his own.
A pact sealed. A hatred buried… for now.