Chapter 34
Elariya
“The Rising Storm”
The gray realm swallowed me whole.
There was no sky. No ground. Just endless ash and mist that rolled over itself like a tide that had forgotten how to break. I couldn't tell if I was standing or floating. My feet touched nothing. My lungs burned as though I'd been running for hours, yet I hadn't moved.
Was I back there?
Back in Morg?ven?
"Ziyka." The voice sliced through the fog. Low. Achingly familiar.
My heart lurched.
"Ziyka."
Wolfe.
It was him.
I spun toward the sound, and the mist yielded, parting just enough to reveal a dark figure in the distance. A man. Tall, broad-shouldered, motionless.
It had to be Wolfe. He’d found some way to come to me.
Relief flooded me so fast it hurt.
"I'm here," I called out, but my voice was swallowed by the gray.
I stumbled forward. The closer I drew, the clearer he became.
"Ziyka." The voice changed.
Something was wrong. It was still deep, still male, but stripped of all warmth. Cold as winter stone.
The mist tore away in a violent rush.
And my heart stopped beating when I saw that it wasn’t Wolfe standing there.
It was Thayden.
He hovered before me, lips curved in a devious smile. Then his hand struck out like a viper.
I seemed to move to him faster, and his fingers clamped around my throat, lifting me from the nothingness.
"Did you think you could escape me?" he hissed.
I clawed at his grip, searching desperately for magic that wasn't there. No power thrummed beneath my skin. Only weakness.
Air slipped out of my mouth in tattered gasps as I tried to scream Wolfe's name.
Thayden's fingers tightened like a vise, and the gray realm bled to black at the edges of my vision.
"Mine," he snarled.
He reached into my chest and ripped out my heart, then crushed it right before my eyes.
I woke gasping, a scream trapped in my throat.
Mother's hands steadied my shoulders. "Elariya. It’s okay, sweetheart. It’s just me.”
It was only when I heard her voice that the nightmare's grip slowly loosened. Then I saw her face looming before me, but my eyes still darted frantically around the room, searching for shadows that might hide Thayden and the gray mist that might swallow me whole.
Morning light filtered through the curtains.
Morning.
The familiar weight of dread settled back into my chest as I remembered what the morning would bring.
When I looked back at Mother, I saw my own terror reflected in her eyes. Dark circles shadowed her eyes, and her hands trembled slightly where they rested on my shoulders. She looked like she'd aged years in a single night.
"It's time," she whispered. Those two words carried the weight of a death sentence. "Time to get ready for the wedding."
Mother's eyes filled with tears she refused to let fall, and I realized she was mourning me, too. Mourning the daughter she was about to lose to a monster.
It took two hours to transform me into a bride. Two hours of silk and pearls and hands carefully stitching and shaping me into something beautiful and doomed.
The dress fit too perfectly, like it was tailored to keep me from running.
The pearls at my throat felt less like jewelry and more like a collar.
Every pin in my hair was a nail sealing a coffin shut.
Now I was here, walking down the endless aisle of the Hall of Sovereigns, each step echoing off marble that had witnessed centuries of power and politics. Wars had been ended with the joining of hands and the sealing of treaties written in marriage vows.
Only royal blood and those who served the crown could wed here. If circumstances were different, it would have been a joyous occasion for someone like me, bridging the gap between two worlds.
My family tread behind me while Mattieu's hand found my elbow. In place of my father, he’d offered to walk me down the aisle.
His grip was just firm enough to remind me I was being delivered, not escorted. The contact sent revulsion crawling up my spine.
I wanted to pull away, to shake off his touch and walk this path alone, but I couldn't refuse.
Not here, not now, or ever. One wrong move, and my family would pay. So, I endured the weight of his palm against my silk sleeve.
We moved at a funeral pace down the endless aisle. The music swelled around us, harps and strings weaving melodies, but all I could hear was the thundering of my own heartbeat.
Ahead, I spotted Prince Maelor sitting on the throne, and a gray-haired priest adorned in ceremonial robes.
Then I saw Thayden.
He waited to the priest’s left at the altar. He wore formal attire and the ceremonial sword of his new position at his side. Against the backdrop of white roses and golden candlelight, he cut an impressive figure, perfectly embodying his new role as Lord Commander.
His smile was polished perfection as he tracked my approach with undisguised satisfaction, like a collector finally acquiring a prize he'd coveted for years.
To everyone else, he looked like the doting husband-to-be, but I saw the monster behind the smile. The bastard who’d backhanded me for refusing his mouth.
I could still feel his fingers on my throat, the ghost of his cruelty haunting me.
I wasn’t stupid. I was sure he’d hit me again. Soon, too.
People like him used violence to keep others in line. Others like me who were…weak.
The universe seemed determined to press the lesson into my skin. But today, the reminder felt more callous than ever.
I couldn’t believe this was happening. But it was. This was my new normal.
When I walked out those doors again, I’d be doing so as Thayden’s wife.
I tore my gaze away and focused on everything else besides him.
The hall stretched before me, soaring arches ribbed with gold, stained-glass windows that cast jeweled light across floors polished to mirror brightness. White roses and jasmine cascaded from every pillar, their perfume so thick it made breathing feel like drowning in sweetness.
Every detail was breathtaking, and there were so many people here dressed in their finest. They were here to celebrate, but to me, I was walking toward my own execution.
Faces blurred into a smear of jewels and judgment. The hall narrowed until all I could see was the altar.
Then we reached Thayden, and I had no choice but to look at him.
Of all the nightmares I’d endured, this one was the only one I could not wake from.
Mattieu's grip loosened on my elbow, and for one fleeting moment, the absence of his possessive touch was like a breath of air. But before I could savor even that small freedom, Thayden's fingers closed around mine. His touch made my stomach lurch.
"My beautiful bride," he murmured, low enough that only I could hear. His thumb traced across my knuckles in what might have looked like tenderness to the watching crowd. But I knew the warning in that touch as the reminder of ownership that would become absolute in mere minutes.
He drew me the final steps toward the altar, closing the distance between whatever fragments of freedom I had left and the priest who waited with his ceremonial book.
The priest smiled benevolently as we approached, his weathered face kind and paternal.
Thayden positioned us before the altar, angling our bodies so the crowd could witness every moment of my capitulation.
When the priest opened his book and began the ceremony, I realized with crystalline clarity that this was it. This was the moment when the girl I used to be would cease to exist forever.
Sixteen days until my memory reset. I couldn’t wait to forget this moment.
And Wolfe?
My heart lurched, then clenched. In sixteen days, I would lose him completely too—not just the physical distance between our worlds, but the moments we’d shared in this reset. All of it would vanish, leaving nothing behind but an ache I wouldn’t even understand.
Maybe that was a mercy. Maybe forgetting was the only way I’d survive what was coming.
I still had his soul mark. I thought I would feel something from it, anything, but nothing came. Maybe because everything else that tethered me to him was gone.
I didn’t want to remember this feeling of loss. Strange how we only appreciate something once it’s gone. I never thought I’d have to learn that lesson. Now I had.
Goodbye, Wolfe Nightblade.
The priest focused on us, looking from Thayden to me before addressing the assembled crowd.
"My Lords and Ladies, we are gathered here this day to celebrate the union of Sir Thayden Fairstrom and Lady Elariya Grayson in the sacred bonds of marriage.
By the grace of the Gods and the witness of this Royal Court, we have gathered to bind these two souls as one flesh, one heart, one destiny.
" He spoke with fervency. “Today, in the sight of the Gods and this noble assembly, we—”
A distant roar cut through the priest's words like ice cracking under pressure.
Everyone froze.
What was that?
It sounded like... No. I had to be imagining things. My mind was playing tricks on me, conjuring hope where none existed.
Then another roar echoed across the capital, closer this time, and unmistakable.
The stained-glass windows trembled in their frames. Murmurs rippled through the crowd like wind through wheat. Nobles twisted in their seats, craning their necks toward the windows, confusion and unease spreading through the assembly.
Prince Maelor rose from his throne, his expression sharp and alert. Mother rushed to my side, taking my hand.
Above us, massive shadows swept across the jeweled windows, the dark shapes blotting out the morning sun. For a moment, the Hall of Sovereigns was plunged into an eerie twilight.
The shadows moved with purpose, circling like predators, and with each pass, the roars grew louder.
Thayden released me and stepped forward, his polished composure cracking as his gaze darted between the windows and the increasingly restless crowd.
"What in the six hells—" he began, but his words were swallowed by another earth-shaking roar that came from directly overhead.