Malin – Checklist #4
Wanting to change the subject to a lighter topic, she asked, “Ellie, your birthday is in two weeks. Have you thought about anything you would like to do?”
“I’m thinking of a few ideas. Mostly, I want Nanna back,” Ellie responded.
Malin’s throat tightened. She pulled her daughter into a fierce hug, pressing a kiss to the top of her head. “We’re going to bring her back, sweetie. I promise.” Before she could say anything else, the heavy oak door chimed, and Will stepped into the suite.
At the sight of him, Malin’s heart didn’t just skip; it performed a frantic, joyful somersault. As upset as her brain was with him, her heart was tied to him.
He had traded his formal gear for rugged travel leathers, looking every bit the warrior-protector she loved. The tension that had nearly broken them the night before had been replaced by a quiet, hummed understanding.
“Dad!” Zee shouted, abandoning Malin to run to Will.
Will caught him with a laugh, his eyes finding Malin’s over the boy’s head. There was a warmth there. They’d reclaimed a private, glowing spark of the intimacy that made her feel, for a fleeting moment, like they were back in their small kitchen in Media, safe from crowns and curses.
She pulled him aside and whispered what Ellie told her. Will’s jaw tightened. “He doesn’t get unsupervised access,” Will dictated, his hazel eyes flashing. “I’ll double the guard on their door. If Caelum wants to see them, a Mellyrn soldier is in the room.”
His assumption of absolute authority made her bristle, but at least they were on the same page.
For the next hour, the palace politics and the looming darkness of Fellspire were barred from the room. They lost themselves in the simple, sacred chaos of their family.
Will stood near the hearth, quietly teaching a fiercely focused Zee the delicate sleight of hand required to lift a coin purse unnoticed.
Nearby, Ellie demonstrated her newest levitation tricks, her bright laughter ringing off the vaulted ceiling. Malin watched from her chair, committing every smile and every messy strand of hair to memory.
She let the sound of Will’s deep, rumbling praised anchor her, finding his warmth a stark, comforting contrast to the cold metal door Ellie had described in Caelum’s mind.
With Will, everything was honest; she was still working on open, but she knew he would tell her if she asked.
But the shadows in the room lengthened as the sun began its descent. Will eventually stood, dusting sand from his leathers, his expression shifting into something more somber.
“It’s time, Sparks,” he said softly.
The bubble burst. The cold weight of the mission settled back onto Malin’s shoulders.
She pulled both children into her arms, hugging them with a desperate, crushing intensity.
She breathed in the scent of Zee’s hair and the citrusy soap Ellie used, trying to etch the physical sensation of their arms wrapping around her into her soul.
She needed this feeling to stay with her.
She needed it to be the light she followed when the mission got dark.
“Be brave,” she whispered against Ellie’s ear. “And listen to the guards. And Opal.”
“We will, Mom,” Ellie promised, her voice unusually small.
With a heavy silence of everything left unsaid, they retreated to their own suite. Malin moved with mechanical precision, checking the straps on her travel pack and ensuring everything was secured.
Will checked the edge of his blade. The rhythmic shick-shick of the whetstone was a steady, grounding pulse in the quiet room.
Typically, he was her anchor, but with their distance, even he couldn’t stop the cold dread pooling in her stomach.
Her mind kept drifting back to the syrupy scent of the teahouse and the haunting clarity of her mother’s voice.
“Will,” she said, her voice catching him mid-stroke. She told him then… about the dirt road, the signpost for Four Winds, and the blurred face of the woman behind the counter who spoke with her mother’s tongue.
Testing his blade with his thumb, Will paused.
He didn’t immediately dismiss it as she had feared he would.
He looked at her with a sharp, curious intensity, his brow furrowing as he committed the details to his own memory.
“Four Winds,” he repeated softly. “We’ll keep our eyes open, Sparks.
If your mother is reaching out, we’ll follow the trail. ”
She nodded, a small spark of hope finally cutting through the gloom.
Shouldering their packs, they moved toward the door. It was a silent victory; she was going with them. She had fought for her place on this mission, and she had won. But as the heavy thud of their boots echoed in the hallway, Malin knew that winning the argument was the easy part.
Surviving the Fellspire Hold would be something else entirely.
She squeezed Will’s hand one last time as they reached the shimmering threshold of the gateway chamber.
The portal ahead pulsed with a cold, fractured light, a doorway to a land that wanted them dead.
With a final breath, Malin stepped forward, leaving the safety of Mellyrn behind and walking straight into the unknown.