Chapter Twenty-Three
Daxton Aegaeon
My chest ached like a blade through the center of my heart.
Throughout the long-shadowed hours locked away in my cell, I couldn’t shake this feeling, this grief. I turned on my side in the darkened stone prison buried under Aelius’s keep, unaware if it was the Mother or Father hovering in the sky.
“You’ve seen better days; I’ll give you that.”
I knew that voice.
“Are you still in there, Daxton?”
Zola.
I groaned against the aches and pains of my broken body.
“Ahh, there he is,” Zola said with as much kindness as she could manage. “The stench indicated differently. Glad to see you’re still alive. I was worried Castor would have to reign in your place.”
“Going soft on me?” I whispered. My throat splintered as I forced the words from my cracked lips.
“Just checking in to see if we are at that place again.”
Cloaked in shadows, I couldn’t see her.
“I’m not,” I said in a thundering voice, leaving nothing to question. “I won’t allow myself to disappear like that again.”
“Good,” Zola said. “I won’t break the vow I made to your mother to watch over you and Castor. Besides, I’m not the one who would be able to bring you back.”
“Skylar—” As soon as I spoke her name aloud, I felt the fissure in my chest crack open.
Twenty years ago, I’d reached a breaking point. The constant pressure of Minaeve’s hovering presence, the wilt, the death… everything. I was in a dark place. The thought of ending it all was an all-too-welcoming release.
Existing, that’s all it was. I was living a life that wasn’t truly worth living.
My people had become accustomed to living in a cage of fear for so long that it felt normal, even though it was far from it. I remembered what it was like before the wilt. I remembered peace and happiness and, most of all, hope.
But one night, twenty years ago, I forgot.
Zola recognized my withdrawal, lack of sleep, and extreme mood swings for months. Thankfully, that night, she refused to leave my side. She didn’t breathe a word of what happened when she jumped into the shadows of my room. No one aside from her knew how close I had come to ending it all.
And as fate would have it, it was that very night when I finally closed my eyes that I dreamed of the green sand beach.
“Daxton?” Zola asked. I heard her footsteps echoing against the stone floor.
“I’m fine,” I said. “My body is healing between sessions with a salve, and my mind remains unbroken. It’s been days. Not years, Zola.”
“My presence is not all about you today,” she replied.
I glanced sideways and watched as her hand slid over the stone bricks near the bars of my cell. Her fingers wedged between a crack I hadn’t noticed, pulling at the rock to reveal a secret alcove with a parchment tucked safely inside.
“Your informant?” I whispered. “You exchange your correspondence in this place?”
“Always have,” Zola said, her face cloaked in shadow. “Wouldn’t dare change the rendezvous point now. Besides, it helps me keep tabs on you.”
Humph, I grunted. “How thoughtful.”
Zola tucked the parchment into her fighting leathers and disappeared once more in shadow.
“There’s no word from her yet.”
“I didn’t imagine there would be,” I answered. “I never told her about this plan.”
“Idiotic choice,” Zola sneered.
“I couldn’t tell her,” I argued, still careful to keep my voice low. “If I had told her, she would’ve intervened.”
“And I would’ve helped her do it, if she asked.”
I leaned my head against the wall, chuckling softly to myself. “I know.”
“None of us. And I mean none of us, Daxton, ever wanted to see you in here again.”
“Good thing I have loyal subjects and friends who wouldn’t dare disobey my commands.”
“Stubborn—”
“I heard that,” I said with a laugh that was worth the sting of pain from a cracked rib.
“I meant you to,” Zola snapped.
“And here I thought you checking in on me meant you were going soft.”
“Don’t press your luck, High Prince.”
A faint sound echoed from the underground hallway. I could hear Zola slide her hands to her weapons, but I remained where I was.
“It’s just the rats,” I told her. “After a while, you begin to recognize the difference. Besides, the guards are not due for a session with me today. They had their fill only a few hours ago.”
“I know,” she answered with a trace of unease that only those she kept in her inner circle would recognize.
“I exchange communications when you are elsewhere,” Zola said, trying to disguise the pain in her voice.
“Our informant shares the whispers from the Aelius court. The people know you’re here. ”
“And?”
“And, due to their oaths to Seamus, they are forced to follow him as their high king consort, but there are sections that are beginning to doubt the queen.”
“Good.” I groaned, absently rubbing my chest.
“What is it?” Zola asked as her eyes carefully scanned my movements.
“I—” I didn’t know for certain what this was, but I did have a theory.
“It’s Skylar.” Zola remained deathly still, anxiously waiting for me to continue.
“Last night, I felt this aching pain fill my chest. Something is happening or has happened to her. She is drowning in grief, a deep sorrow that is threatening to swallow her whole.”
“Is it regret?”
“No, I don’t believe so. This stems from a deeper loss.”
“Your bond,” Zola muttered, shaking her head. “It’s not yet sealed, and somehow, you’re able to feel her emotions like this? Even through the veil?”
“How did I dream of her beach? And she of my meadow?” I asked with a half-smile. “I don’t believe she’s challenged Gilen yet.”
“The trial of the soul will test her more than the others.”
“She’ll return,” I said with absolute certainty.
“Like you,” Zola said, raising her brows, “she’s too stubborn to quit.”
“Very true,” I said with a light laugh. “I dreamed of her before she crossed the veil… Touched her. Held her one last time before she crossed.”
Zola clicked her tongue. “I’m surprised she didn’t punch you in the face for lying to her.”
I shook my head with a forced laugh on a pained exhale. “That very well might still be coming.”
“You told me in Crimson City that you were able to visit Skylar in her dreams when the hunters captured her.”
“Yes.”
Zola emerged from the shadows and knelt by my side. “It’s logical that she comes to you while you’re locked in this place. Sleep while you can, my high prince. You are both warring in your own battles, but you are never alone in your fight. Remember that.”
I gazed at Zola, appreciating her more than words could say. She was a shadow jumper, my spymaster, and, most of all, a trusted friend. “I remember.”
“I need to go,” Zola said.
“I know.”
“You remember what you must do?” Zola asked.
“Yes.”
“You still believe they’ll call for a celebration and bring you up to gloat about a victory?”
“Without a shadow of a doubt.” I could practically hear Zola’s eyes roll.
“Very well. Then I’ll remain hidden in Aelius and await the cheers of victory. I’ll jump us out of here when you’re in possession of the scroll.”
“Good,” I said. “The final inscription won’t be filled in until Skylar acquires the dagger and returns to the scroll, but the star begins to fill in the closer she is to achieving the task.”
“The court will be in uproar when that final star is inked,” Zola said. “I imagine the whole of Aelius will be drunk with glee when Rhett announces the final trial is complete.”
“That’s the plan,” I said.
“I never said it was a poor one.”
This time, footsteps echoed along the halls. Thankfully, not the marching tune of my torturers, but of the servants carrying a meal, if one could call it that.
Before I could warn Zola to leave, she was gone.
Good, I told myself, knowing she was never far and that she wanted to get me out of here almost as much as I did.