Chapter 35 Promise of Power
Chapter thirty-five
Promise of Power
-Alarik-
The sea assaulted the cliffs below Nerium like it meant to break them, every eave a blow struck in warning. The wind howled with ancient fury, laced with the bitter sting of the gods' curse — reminding him of why he'd gone to such lengths to steal Maris from Nythra's grasp.
Alarik stood at the windows edge of his private chambers, the sea mist spray clawing through the open window, dampening the pale strands of his unkept hair and soaking the fabric at his collar.
Below, Nerium unfurled in a labyrith of elegant spires and shadow-drenched terraces, sea-blooms clinging to its ledges like forgot offerings.
The city had been carved of stone and salt, its foundation built on whispered bargains and secrets traded as commonly as coin.
Narrow streets twisted through it like veins, laced with glimmers of silver and gold ore.
It was beautiful, but Alarik wondered what it once offered its beholder before the curse darkened its shores.
Behind him, the sea-glass doors of his chamber opened with a hush.
Zairon’s voice followed. “The scribes await you in the scriptorium.”
Alarik turned to face him, thoughts still lost in the depths of his kingdom's past — what soon could return if he was successful. He moved past Zairon with the quiet elegance of a rising tide, offering a brief pat to his shoulder as he passed.
The ancient scriptorium of Calanthe had once been another temple, long before the gods cursed the land and turned their faces from their creations. Now it offered sanctuary to Nerium’s oldest scholars, their skin inked with glyphs of forbidden knowledge that predated kings.
Alarik strode between towering tomes and glimmering scroll walls, nodding once to the Master Archivist, whose white robes trailed like ghosts.
“She’s begun to awaken,” Alarik said without preamble. “The goddess stirs in her. But we don’t have time to wait for fate.”
The Archivist bowed his head, voice papery with age. “Then we will guide her.”
“I want everything written on the Veil. On the Breaker. On bloodlines of divine thread. Fae, human, nightbound… anything that survived the cullings.”
A second voice emerged quiet, feminine, from deeper in the archive. “And what will you do when she becomes something you cannot control?”
Alarik didn’t hesitate.
“I will give her a choice,” he said, “and hope she chooses us.”
Hope.
A dangerous word on a continent born of curses.
The Master Archivist slid a brittle scroll across the obsidian reading table, the ink dark as dried blood and veined in ancient runes no tongue had spoken aloud in a thousand years.
Alarik’s fingers hovered just above the parchment, reverent. Hungry.
“It was written,” the Archivist murmured, “before kingdoms had names. Before the gods fractured the world and cursed their own children. The Veil was meant to protect. But also to imprison. Behind it were cast all things too powerful, too mad, or too sacred to walk the waking world.”
“But when the gods grew weary of mercy, they corrupted the Veil, a divine barrier once for protection, turned a new, seeping horrors into the land that they themselves had birthed.”
“Five gods wove it, each leaving their mark: dream, flame, war, waters, and shadow. But one disagreed.”
“Eiren, goddess of mercy, wove light into the darkness. A flaw. A thread. A way back.”
Alarik leaned in. “A way back for who?”
The Archivist’s head bowed, the cloth of his robe brushing the text. “For her. The one born to awaken the sleeping balance. The one made of all things forbidden.”
“Blood of the mortal, the divine, and the nightbound.”
“The one who would not only see the Veil, but break it.”
Alarik closed his eyes. It was all coming together.
Maris was the flaw.
The thread. The promised return. And now she was his.
“Where is the rest?” he asked, voice like cold steel.
The second scholar stepped forward, this one robed in shimmering gray, marked by a dozen fate-knots tattooed across her hands. Her eyes glowed faintly with prophetic sight.
She unrolled another scroll. This one newer, but written in the same archaic hand. It wasn’t history, it was warning.
“Should the Breaker awaken before she understands her nature, the Veil shall bleed from within. Nightmares will spill forth from the gods’ prison.”
Alarik stiffened.
“She could destroy everything,” he said quietly.
The prophetess met his eyes. “Or remake it.”
Silence bloomed.
“And you,” she said, voice thinning into something otherworldly, “have tied your fate to hers, King of Calanthe. The dream-thread runs both ways. You entered her, and now you are bound.”
Alarik clenched his jaw.
“So if she breaks, you break with her.”
-Maris-
Evenings when Serenya retired to her own chambers were the worst, silence wrapped in salty mist.
The sea clawed up the cliff face as if it was attempting to swallow the palace whole, inching closer with each crash of the tide.
Maris wished it would, she craved escape.
She sat on a bench at the windows edge within her borrowed chambers, arms wrapped around her knees, eyes on the horizon — searching for him.
For a shadow slipping through fog— a flicker of molten eyes.
"Kael," She whispered, voice barely more than breath.
Her jaw clenched. She hated how much she missed him — hated that her heart reached for the bond, only to find whispers of it. No answer. No pulse of shadow. No warmth.
Only this damn polished palace. A cage of golden light.
She released her hold around her legs, and stood.
Her bare feet connecting with the warm stone of the chamber floor and turned from the window sharply, her steps hurried.
She'd had enough of waiting. Enough of Alarik's game and his too careful glances.
She was finished sitting rooms that smelled like sea lavender and old parchment. Done pretending.
She yanked the door open and stalked down the corridor, each pat of her feet slapping softly against the polished floors. A servant blinked at her from the end of the hallway, startled.
"Where is Alarik?" she snapped
The girl bowed quickly, eyes wide.
"I believe the king is in the war chamber, my lady. With Lord Zairon and the scholar from —."
"Show me." She cut.
The servant bowed once more, "Of course, my lady." She started done the corridor quickly, Maris on her heels.
Her magic pulsed beneath her skin, erratic reacting to the storm raging inside her. Doors flew open at her approach, tapestries billowed in her wake. The long halls leading to the war council room stretched before her like a gauntlet.
They suddenly stopped near the end of the last hall. "It is just through those doors, mistress." The female explained timidly.
"Thank you," Maris said with a curt nod, increasing her pace once more.
She shoved the heavy doors open — they slapped into the walls with a crack of sound like thunder.
Scrolls lifted, maps unfurled. The blue light sputtered.
A blast of raw energy shot outward as she stepped inside, and the chamber erupted into chaos — documents whipped through the air like startled birds.
A male with golden eyes and ebony skin caught the edge of a falling banner, Lord Zairon Maris presumed.
A white-robed scholar stumbled back with a cry as one of the scrolls was ripped from his hands.
Alarik stood frozen at the long topography table, his eyes voiced a silent admiration.
The lord was the first to speak, breathless.
"My lady, is there something—."
But her gaze was locked solely on Alarik, eyes burning.
She spoke directly to him when she said, "I believe I've had enough of sitting."
He took her in another moment before speaking, a smirk consumed his features as his eyes roamed up her.
“Ironic, is it not.” He preened.
“You are filled with fury toward me for my actions, but if I recall correctly did your beloved Kael not do the same? He took you against your will from the Kingdom of Eryndor?”
He saw the glint in her eyes and continued. ”And yet you've blindly fallen for his every whim, you handed yourself over — with a smile on that pretty face, did you not?”
Her hands curled into fists.
“You don’t know anything about me or Kael.” She shouted, eyes glowing wildly.
Alairk didn't falter.
“I do,” he said, stepping closer. “Not all of you. But enough to know what you’ve felt —your power is growing by the day. And I think you know deep down its to great to become a mere consort.”
The air stretched taut between them. Waves crashed somewhere beyond the balcony, the sea roaring like her thoughts.
Alarik’s voice softened. “The dreams. The burning questions. The magic that doesn’t belong in your veins but courses through you anyway— you have an ache to understand what you are, Maris.”
Her mouth opened then shut at a loss for words.
“I brought you here,” Alarik continued, “because those questions matter, you matter. Not just to Kael but to this realm. To Achyron.”
“Don’t speak of him,” she whispered, her fire dimming inside. “Don’t. Say. His. Name.”
“Then tell me,” he said gently, “has he told you anything? About what you are? About what you could become?”
She faltered. And with her pause—he knew he won.
“You’ve seen the veil, and the goddess.” he said quietly. “You’ve felt the weight of old power. You’ve been called, Maris. You’re not just a girl. Not just a consort. You are the hinge on which this world will close the door on a curse that's haunted our lands too long.”
Her pulse raced.
“I brought you here because I’ve seen what happens when power like yours is left unguided. It rots. It consumes. And I will not watch another fall to the whims of men and gods alike.”
“I’m asking you to stay,” he said, eyes bright with something raw and painful. “To let my scholars and scribes help you. Let me help you —because regardless of what you think of me. I swear that I will find answers to help you wield your magic, find a way for you to survive it.”
Her throat closed.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” he added, “and I swear on my crown, I will never touch you or force you against your will. But if you leave before you understand who you are…”
He shook his head.
“…Kael won’t be enough to protect you, once the four Gods realize what has been awakened beneath their noses, they will come for you.”
Only the sea spoke now, its ancient song howling through the glass arches. Maris stood there, staring at the man who had haunted her nights and strained her bond —knowing somehow that she was about to cross a line in the sand.
-Alarik-
Alarik remained still, the weight of his crown pressing invisible lines into his brow. The pause stretched, taut and full of something unspoken. He watched her, knowing she was balancing everything — him, Kael, and whatever may come next.
When she finally exhaled, it was sharp. Like she’d carved the decision out of her ribs.
“I will stay,” she declared.
The words landed like a blade piercing him to the hilt. For a breath, Alarik nearly sank to his knees in thanks. He hadn't expected it —not really. Every part of his being had braced for her rejection, he looked for her to turn and walk out — fire in her wake.
She cut through his thoughts, before he could speak. "I do not do this lightly, it's not for you." Her voice sharper now, eyes narrowed. "I'm staying for answers for myself."
He inclined his head, solemn and sure.
"As it should be," He replied.
His body slacked, tension gliding off his shoulders like an ebb tide.
His gaze found Zairon, who looked stunned for half a second before his expression cracked into a fleeting grin.
A look of triumph displayed proudly in his features.
The scholar was still frozen in the corner, eyes fixed on every precious scrolls and tomes scattered around the space.
She stood rooted before him arms crossed in distain. Her eyes hard, her jaw set in rebellion. “The moment I feel like a prisoner, I will find a way to flea.”
“I’ll have no locks placed on your door,” he promised. “No guards— only guides. You’ll be allowed to walk the gardens, speak to the scholars, ask anything you wish.”
She stepped back a pace, placing some distance between them and spoke. “And you won’t come into my dreams again.”
The tether between them tugged like an unseen chord plucked. A low thrumming of instinct and memory.
Alarik’s throat tightened. “I won’t. Unless you summon me, lady.”
She nodded slowly, then turned toward the door leaving without another word.
As her steps retreated down the hall- for the first time in a hundred years, he prayed.
Not to the gods.
But to she who might defeat them.