15. Delphine
It was notthe Afterworld where Icarus took me.
I’d never seen the Afterworld, but I knew it was not the cruel landscape where I was to learn the full breath of my power. He brought me not to a place of rest, a place of lost souls, but rather to a place of nightmares.
I’d faced fiends before, but the fiends of Avarath were nothing like the creatures spawned in the realm where Icarus brought me.
The very air around us carried with it the stench of decay upon our return. It was indistinguishable from me, the scent of it clinging to me closer than a second skin. We’d spent so long immersed in the nightmare that the nightmare clung to us even as we left. It had sunk its claws into me, become a part of me.
When I emerged from the realm with Icarus by my side, neither of us could say we were the same fae who entered there. His body was not the only one blackened and bruised. Though my scars were the kind that could not be seen, though they did not leave my body as a blackened, wizened husk devoid of power, they ran deep. I was little more than a combination of scars, the tissue left between them stretched so thin that it was a small wonder any of the fae I’d left behind recognized me.
After all, to me, they’d been gone for nearly half a year.
One hundred and eighty days I’d survived without them.
To them, it had been only three.
Never once had they left my mind, not in all that darkness, all that death—and yet, when I saw them again, they were almost strangers to me, even though they looked the same.
It was I who had changed.
I’d mastered my powers. I’d mastered the shadows.
But the shadows, they’d mastered me too.
It was unavoidable, this. I’d learned one thing above all else in the realm where Icarus brought me.
I’d learned that you could stare into the void, but the void—it would stare back.
You could fight the void, but the void would fight back.
There was no winning against the void, because when I won against the void, the void won against me, too.
There was no great fanfare when Icarus and I arrived back in Luxia. We stumbled through the wall of realms when we left, but I marched through it on sure footing when we returned, with Icarus and his broken body slumped over mine for support. He’d followed through on his promise.
He’d taught me how to master my magic, not just the way of the Judge, but in all the ways it could be mastered. Six months of fighting for survival without a single moment’s rest, and I’d not only made it out alive—I’d made it out stronger than ever.
It was only six months, nothing compared to the span of time that my foes had to practice. But it didn’t feel like six months. It felt like a hundred years. A thousand.
It was exhilarating to feel my own power, but more than that, it was terrifying.
I’d learned more than I cared to know about my power.
More than I cared to know about myself.
As I stepped back into the Eastern Court, this strange fae land with its even stranger glamour, the shadows no longer held any secrets from me. But as much as I had a hold on them, they had a hold on me.
A girl waited for Icarus, ready to pull him from my arms and help him to his bed. She was a small human woman, somewhat to my surprise, who waited. She helped him like a daughter helps an aging father, her touch tender and caring, as if she’d dealt with him in this state before. She helped him onto the bed, and quickly drew the curtains around him, hiding his state from us—as if I hadn’t seen him this way before. As if I hadn’t been in her place, nurturing him back to health all the while fighting to stay alive.
But he was not my charge any longer, and neither was I his. We’d formed a bond, the dark fae and I, one that would last a lifetime—but we were back in our own realm. That companionship would never be forgotten, but it would never be the same.
We were allies no longer.
His own part of the deal was done, but now I owed him mine.
My own welcome party was waiting with trepidation.
Seren, Caldamir, Armene, and Nyx.
Seren stood the furthest back, a clouded white still lingering on the outer edges of his irises. He was exhausted, his magic the one most expelled in his efforts. Caldamir stumbled to a halt in the middle of pacing as soon as I appeared, and Armene rose to his feet but made no move towards me. Nyx was the only one who seemed unable to keep away. The moment my feet were planted on the solid ground of Icarus’ rooms, he was upon me.
I froze, unmoving as he threw his arms around me, pulling my body flush with his. His hands tangled in my hair and pulled my head to his chest, holding me so tight that I couldn’t help but hear his heart beating through the thin fabric of his shirt. I stood like a statue, stiff and still, unable to make myself move as he pressed his lips to the top of my head.
Suddenly, just as suddenly as he’d embraced me, he was letting me go. He stepped back as a flush of embarrassment colored his cheeks.
“Sorry, sorry,” he gasped, eyes widening for a second as one hand—the one that had been replaced with a clever wooden replica—slipped to hide behind his back. “I forgot myself for a moment.”
I looked from him to the others, scanning their faces as I reacquainted myself with them for the first time in months.
“I never did,” I said, quietly, my voice rasping. “I never forgot any one of you, not once.”
And I hadn’t. All the time I’d been focused on surviving, it was their faces that kept me going. Not my kingdom. Not my crown. Not faerie or Luxia or Alderia or any other realm. Not even Sol.
It was them.
Seren.
Armene.
Caldamir.
Tethys.
Nyx.
It was their faces that drove me forward. Their faces that made me fight. They’d brought me into this world of faerie, however they’d done it, and now it was my responsibility to save it. To save them.
At least now, after everything, I was ready to do just that.
I ached to fall into their arms, to reach for Seren next, for Armene, for Caldamir. I longed to just lay eyes on Tethys once more, to see that flash of his smile amidst the gold that had once adorned his hair. But even though four of the fae I’d fallen in love with stood just before me, just now within arm’s reach, I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I stood like a friend returned from battle, still covered in the gore of it, but I wasn’t ready to rest.
Not until the task was done.
My hands flexed at my side, as if itching to feel the magic that had been flowing through them for so long again. The air felt crisper here, clearer. When I drew breath, it was as if it was the first breath I’d truly drawn in months. I’d been fighting a battle for so long, too long. I was too used to it. I’d longed for so many months of my training for it to be over, but now that it was, all I ached for was the next one to begin.
“Are we ready?” I asked, looking between the four of them. “You’re rested. Prepared to fight?”
For a second, silence stretched between them, but it was Armene who answered.
“Delphine, you’re the one we should be asking. These last months, what’s happened? Did you…are you…”
Caldamir cut Armene off gently, one hand on his shoulder silencing him as he fixed me with a steady look before nodding.
“Our courts are ready.”
Seren nodded once, too, even just the bowing of his head seeming to exhaust him. “We’re ready.”
Nyx looked like he was struggling the most to hold himself back. I still felt the heat of him on my skin, felt the place where his lips had pressed against the top of my head. It was the first tender touch I’d felt since I left this place, the feeling that it left so foreign to me now that it burned like hot coals against my skin. A feeling scratched at the back of my mind, a memory of what it was to truly be fae, not just a high king preparing for war, to feel the warmth of touch, but I ignored it.
In all the time I’d been away, I’d not forgotten these fae. But I’d not forgotten all the rest, either. I’d not forgotten what sent me there, nor now what sent me back.
I had the realms to save. I’d bought myself time, but that time had now run out.
“We leave now,” I said, casting one last glance at the curtains now drawn at the other end of the room. “Time to face our fates.”