Chapter 32 The Sea
Chapter thirty-two
The Sea
-Maris-
Salt. It was the first thing she noticed, sharp and crisp, curling in her nose like a whisper from another world. Followed by the sound of rhythmic crashes, not the gentle breeze of the woods beyond Calyrix, but the echo of distant waves breaking against stone. The tide, relentless and vast.
Her fingers moved first. The sheets beneath her were softer than anything even Kael had blanketed her in. Not velvet. Not silk. Something richer. They shimmered faintly in the filtered light pouring from a lattice of carved glass.
Her heart thudded.
This wasn’t their bed and Nythra’s capital had no sea.
Her eyes snapped open.
The room was a wash in pearlescent grays and deep ocean blues, light flickering from crystal sconces that mimicked the soft dance of underwater flames.
High-arched ceilings glittered with constellations painted in silverleaf.
The stone was pale and polished, veined with gold.
Outside of the open stained glass window the sky was full of darkness, flickers of shimmering stars hung in the sky.
How much time had passed since she curled in the warmth of Kael’s side to now be here without him?
And in the corner —a female sat silently.
Maris pushed herself upright, the silk sheets whispering against her bare skin like ghosts of a memory she couldn’t hold onto.
Salt clung to the air, cool and sharp. The woman was watching her like someone prepared for both kindness and war, she was beautiful—long braided golden hair, strong-shouldered, dressed in deep blue leathers.
“Where am I?” Maris rasped.
The woman stood slowly. “You are safe.”
“That’s not what I asked.” Maris narrowed her eyes, clutching the blanket tighter around herself. Her limbs ached with magic, like her body had been twisted mid-dream and left suspended between two realities.
“Who are you?”
The woman's bright blue eyes narrowed as she dipped her head slightly. “Serenya of House Kareth. I’ve been appointed your caretaker during your stay here in Calanthe.”
The name hit like a slap.
Calanthe.
“Stay?” Maris echoed, voice gone sharp. “I didn’t agree to stay anywhere.”
Before Serenya could reply, the massive carved doors to the chamber groaned open.
In stepped a figure, amusement shown in his face. A slight smirk painted across his perfect lips, sea-wind catching on his silver-blond hair, violet-blue eyes locked only on her.
With the sight of him her dreams stepped into the waking world.
The Nightbound male gave her a patient smile, “ I don’t believe we’ve been formally introduced. I am King Alarik, of Calanthe. Welcome to my palace and capital city of Nerium.”
He gave her a slight bow and his eyes flicked up to meet hers.
She suddenly became well aware of her lack of proper clothing, pulling the sheets closer to her frame, clutching it with a firm grasp.
Tall and regal in the gleam of sea-glass light, the King of Calanthe wore a white tunic barely laced, as if he dressed quickly, tucked into deep blue leather trousers. His hair was tousled, and his violet-blue eyes, gods, they were the same from her dreams.
Only colder. Only real.
“You,” Maris whispered.
Alarik paused at the foot of the bed, his gaze steady. “I see recognition has come quickly.”
“You’ve been in my head,” she hissed. “The dreams, I knew they weren’t fully mine.”
Maris swung her legs over the side of the bed, rising despite the dizzying weakness that still curled in her spine. Her skin was faintly glowing again, no longer dull but something kissed by divinity, altered by power.
“You watched me,” she said, stepping toward him. “Why?”
Alarik’s jaw flexed. “Because I had to be sure.”
“Sure of what?” Her voice cracked like breaking ice. “That I wasn’t insane? That the man haunting my dreams was real?”
“That you were the Veil Breaker.”
Silence stretched like a blade between them.
Maris staggered back a step, breathing like she’d been struck.
“You pulled me away from his side like a villain in the night, you arrogant bastard!” She threw a book from the nightstand at him.
The female Serenya rose quickly, looking to Alarik —an offer of assistance.
“You were about to bind yourself to him,” Alarik snapped, suddenly less composed. “I didn’t have time. The bond once completed on your wedding night would make it impossible to get to you. I had no choice.”
“There’s always a choice,” she growled. “Kael will burn kingdoms for me.”
Alarik’s eyes darkened, and for a moment, the air between them pulsed with something ancient and seething.
“Exactly,” he said slowly. “He’s already began. And you think that’s love? That’s obsession. You are more than his hunger.”
Maris’s heart slammed against her ribs. She launched another book aimed at his head this time.
Alarik narrowly dodged the assault, but took one step closer anyway. “You have questions. I have answers. Stay. Just long enough to hear them.”
“I’m not your guest,” she said. “I’m your prisoner.”
“No,” he said softly. “You’re my chance to save everything I love.”
She stilled and for just a moment, she saw something in him. Not just power. Not just arrogance. But grief. Hope. A desperation that mirrored her own.
Still, she turned away.
“I’ll listen,” she said, “but I won’t forgive this.”
“Fair,” he murmured, voice low. “But you will understand it, soon. I promise you.”
Serenya sat back in her chair, her hands clasped in front of her.
Outside, the sea howled against the cliffs, and a distant storm crawled over the horizon like fate on blackened sails.
-Alarik-
She stood before him like a fallen star.
Not broken, but burning — wrapped in Kael’s scent, his bond, and his mark.
Alarik wanted to rip it from her.
The thin white band and moonstone on her finger shimmered faintly with the same magic that laced her aura now.
He could feel it, barely-there tendrils of that cursed temporary tether binding her to the monster who’d murdered Elenwe.
It pulsed faintly in her emotions, coloring them, dulling what should have been confusion and fury with something… warmer. Longing.
The taste of it soured in his mouth.
And yet, she was beautiful.
More than in dreams, more than the stolen glimpses he’d caught through scrying glass and moonlit visions.
She was flushed from waking, skin kissed with the soft shimmer of her own power, her nightbound blood fully awakened now.
Her hair spilled over her shoulders in thick black waves, her eyes glowing with residual stardust, and the silk of the night dress clung dangerously low on her frame.
Tasteful, yes.
But barely.
Alarik swallowed hard.
She was everything the seer had hinted at and more. A spark. Potential. The thread that could unravel the gods’ weaving. And yet, all he could focus on in that first moment wasn’t prophecy or war.
It was her.
Her strength.
Her fury.
The way she looked at him like she might rip him open with her bare hands and he’d let her if it meant she looked at him like that again.
And the tether…
It tugged now. Not the cursed ring she wore, that was Kael’s doing. No, this was older. Deeper. The dream-thread he’d sewn between them, however recklessly. The one that let him hear her thoughts in half-whispers, feel her confusion, taste her nightmares like ash on his tongue.
He wondered if she could sense it too— that connection pulling her toward him even now.
He felt himself respond, not with magic, but with need.
When his gaze drifted down to her hand again and that ring caught the light, his breath hissed through his teeth. He wanted to break it. Smash it. Shatter every thread Kael had tied around her.
She didn’t belong to him.
Not in truth.
Not in fate.
Not when she was Alarik’s only chance at redemption.
But as she spoke cutting words, full of fire and accusation he couldn’t help but admire her even more. She didn’t cower. Didn’t weep. Even stolen away, disoriented, she faced him.
“You shouldn’t have taken me,” she said voice cracking slightly.
That’s when it hit him.
What twisted irony.
He had done exactly what Kael had done at the ball, centuries before, hadn’t he?
Only instead of ending a life, he had stolen one away.
He couldn't say he regretted it.
Not when she looked at him with those starlit eyes.
Not when the future of Calanthe, and his people might be rewritten by the fire wrapped in this mortal-immortal woman — who didn’t yet understand what she was.
He clenched his fists, pulse thudding.
Kael had held her. Touched her. Tasted her. That knowledge crawled under his skin like poison. But Alarik found comfort in knowing he would be the one to awaken her.
To show her what she was, what she could become.
And maybe he’d show her she could want something more than a shadowed crown and a monster’s touch.
Alarik made a vow then:
I will undo everything he made you believe about yourself. Even if it kills me.