Chapter 9 #3
To the wooden box.
An’sidwain.
In the old fae tongue, it meant ‘the heart’, but it was also the name of the dragon stone I had retrieved for her, the one that beat like a heart, pulsing with life.
“But she lives.” I dragged my gaze from the box, refusing to let it cast a nefarious spell upon me too, lowering my focus back to Neve.
She whispered, “She lives.”
“And she is in the Summer Court.”
She slowly nodded, barely moving her head. “I saw her… in a forest of blooms, by a crystalline stream. I heard her sweet singing.”
“And saw Saphira hurt.” I fought the rage that swept through me as I put voice to those words that were so abhorrent to me.
She could not be hurt. I would not allow it.
I had sworn to keep her safe, to protect her, and to tear down the realms to take her back should anyone dare to take her from me. I would not fail her.
Neve nodded again.
I eased down into a crouch so I was eye-level with her, and softly as I could manage said, “I need to see more. I need you to see more, Neve. I need no ambiguity. Not this time. Do you see me there?”
She swirled a lone finger through my shadows as they snaked across the stone floor and onto the rug where she knelt, her motions carrying a weight of sorrow that shone in her eyes as she bravely met mine. “You are the darkness, are you not?”
I was.
Relief pulled a breath from my tight lungs, but it did not soothe my heart as I needed. Her message was clear. She had seen me in the Summer Court, and she had seen Saphira hurt, meaning I needed to be there. I would be there.
Before I could stand, Neve caught my hand, pinning it to the bars, her eyes bright and clear as she shook her head.
“You are needed elsewhere first.”
I shook my head too, refusing that command. Saphira needed me, and I would go to her. I would not let her be hurt.
“I saw the buds of the Dyr’scalaer tree as they began to unfurl, coming into bloom. You know that tree, and that it will not bloom for another lunar cycle.” Her tone was hard and unyielding, warning me not to argue.
As if she was the ruler of this court.
“I cannot wait that long.” I pulled my hand from beneath hers, scowling at her as my shadows poised to strike her down for suggesting I allow Saphira to suffer, resting on my laurels here rather than preventing someone from laying a hand on her.
“You must,” she bit out. “I do not know what will happen should you venture there too soon. You might disturb the threads of fate as a child might run their hand through a still pond, rippling the surface. Those ripples could prove catastrophic.”
That night at the ball at Ereborne reared up on me and I could see that pond before me, and how I had pulled the stars down for Saphira, disturbing the pool and the very fabric of this world for her.
Neve’s visions were always linear, and she was right. I could not be in the Summer Court before she had seen me there. I could not risk meddling with fate and the order of things. I could endanger Saphira if I did. Those marks Neve had seen on her could become a far worse fate and I might lose her.
But goddess, asking me to wait that long, aware every day I was apart from her that someone was going to hurt her.
I reached for her through the bond, desperate to warn her, even when I could not relay anything other than my feelings through the connection and I did not want her to feel this fear that coated my tongue.
“Promise me.” Neve gripped my hand again, fingers pressing tightly into the back of it. “You have work to do before you can go to her.”
“You saw something else too,” I murmured as I stared at her hand that held me in place with enough pressure I was sure I would have bruises when she eventually released me.
“Promise me, and I will promise you I will try to have another vision, one that might give you a clearer idea of the location you must reach.” She looked from my hand to my face, her tone softening. “Promise you will try to find her.”
She was not talking about Saphira now. She was speaking of her twin.
“I will. I promise. I will master my need to go now, and will use the time wisely, plotting how to enter the Summer Court to reach where I am needed. And when I am there, I will find your sister… and I will reunite you.”
Her hand fell from mine as a sob burst from her lips, a single one escaping her before she mastered herself and straightened, raising her chin in defiance of the emotions that had slipped beyond her control.
A lunar cycle.
It would be just enough time to put everything into place, to move all the pieces into position and set them in motion.
“We shall be patient,” Neve whispered, “and you shall use your time wisely.”
“Tell me what else you saw,” I demanded.
Rather than answering me, she toyed with the bracelet she wore—one I had made for her—pulling my focus there.
Revealing what she had seen.
I remembered the promise I had made to Saphira.
That I would craft her first token of her travels for her bracelet.
A miniature of her dagger.
A promise I would keep.