22. Wilder
Wilder
Aether sweeps the balcony. It reaches along the stone and down the mountain, crawling through the moss and roots. It drifts with the leaves on the wind, woven through every object and being.
I weave my magic through the realm, reaching out until it finds the sandy shore far at a distance. An edge where the Well bites back in harsh waves.
I try to stretch farther but find a limit.
Those didn’t exist before I went into the prison.
Within the realms, my magic was endless.
Even in places where aether was not at the heart of the realm, my magic could do just about anything.
It’s why I shaped it into lightning, careful that no one would know the truth.
Power is fickle, and at a certain point, others do nothing but fear it.
But now, with my heart knocking hard beneath my ribs, the Beating creating a reminder of my imminent mortality in my chest, my fingers shake the harder I push my magic. What was once endless has a stopping point. Not around me but within.
Footsteps rustle behind me, and aether draws back in, collapsing into my palms and wrapping around my heart.
I turn to see Elorie walking through the arch that leads to the balcony.
She’s wrapped in a thin sheet she stripped off the bed.
Her hair is a wild mess that was splayed out on the pillows beneath me not too long ago.
Even when we’re physically apart, I’m lost inside her at one glance. Nothing sates this desire.
I’ve kept my distance in recent days, giving her space to work through what happened in the Ley Court and the prison. Now that she’s let me back in, it takes everything in me not to throw her over my shoulder and carry her back to our bed.
No more barriers between us.
No more fear.
I understand her hesitation. How I feel about her terrifies me more than anything in this life. She is my one weakness. My heart wandering outside my body. The other half of my soul.
And she chose me, a male who will never be worthy of her, even if I’ll try.
“You barely slept,” she guesses, glancing up at the moon as if she’s trying to figure out how long I’ve been awake.
I snag her with my magic the moment she’s within reach, pulling her against me at the edge of the balcony. “I tried.”
It’s not a lie. My mind drifted long enough to float to the same place it always does.
To the edge of sleep where darkness waits.
A place where I watch my sister get stabbed through the heart over and over.
Where I see everything that might still go wrong play out before me.
Visions where it isn’t Selia who dies, but Elorie.
I left the prison, but it has not left me.
Elorie reaches up, cupping my cheek with her warm palm. Her thumb brushes the edge of my scar, and it sends a shock wave through my bones. Her touch, even when her magic is at bay, is electrifying.
“I have nightmares too,” she admits, lips downturned. “And I was only in the prison for a few days. So I can’t imagine what that must be like for you.”
Elorie’s heart is so big; she feels guilty for having suffered less than I did, but time is irrelevant.
I was in her thoughts long before we ever met.
I know what horrors came to her while I was locked in an obsidian cage, unable to help.
I have no doubt the prison used those same nightmares against her.
I hate thinking about what the prison might have shown her.
What pain it caused to cast this darkness in her heart that wasn’t there before.
“Time is irrelevant there,” I remind her. “It could be a moon or a thousand years, and it doesn’t matter. The prison is unbearable in both situations. It doesn’t take much time to plant visions that never leave.”
Elorie swallows hard, blinking up at me. “What do you dream about?”
“My sister.” I glance away, my teeth clenching. “How I failed her. Sometimes I save her, and sometimes I don’t, but it never matters because she resents me anyway. Sometimes it’s just memories, and sometimes it’s what might come to be of all this. Either way, it’s nothing good. What about you?”
Elorie frowns, and when I meet her gaze, she’s the one who looks away this time. “I see Idunn. My mother.”
Bitterness is clear in her tone and emotions that thrum through the thread. While she hasn’t told me more than anyone else about finding her mother in the prison, I’ve guessed there’s more she’s holding back.
“Sometimes I dream about what the prison showed me. You dying over and over in so many different ways. The worst part was that it refused to show me your face.” Elorie grazes her fingertips along my jaw, shuddering. “But mostly I just see her.”
“Do you want to talk about her?”
Her lips press in a thin line as she nods once, so I lead her to a chair and pull her into my lap.
Her winter-kissed scent envelops me. The ice crystals sparkle in her eyes.
Moonlight bathes her porcelain skin. The rosy blush of her cheeks from earlier has yet to fade entirely.
The lingering glow of her magic hangs around her.
Elorie Vale is the most beautiful star.
“What was your mother like?” I tuck her hair behind her ear.
Elorie bites her lower lip. “She wasn’t what I expected. I didn’t say that to the others, mostly because it doesn’t matter—”
“It matters to you.”
“I guess you’re right. But she was colder than I expected.
She made it clear she couldn’t care less about my father.
And as for me…” Her gaze lifts to the sky.
“Maybe I shouldn’t have expected her to care that I was her daughter.
There was obviously a reason my father kept her a secret from me.
I should have trusted that he knew what was best. But to see how little I truly meant to her was difficult. ”
“Some Fae live too long to care about anything other than themselves. Even family bonds,” I remind her, knowing it won’t soothe the disappointment.
“Logically, I know you’re right. But Idunn was unlike any Fae I’ve met. She was so cold; it was like she was completely detached.” Elorie shakes her head, and I brush her hair off her face. “I see why my father kept me from her. She’s my blood, but she isn’t my family.”
I’d like to say I don’t understand, but while I was close with my mother, it was not the same way I was close with my sister. There was no warmth to my mother’s love. It wasn’t love at all. It was obligation.
“I shouldn’t complain to you about this. You have more important things to worry about.”
I pull her closer. “I want to hear everything you’re willing to share. Nothing matters more. Tell me everything, Starfire.”
Peace is strange. I’ve experienced it in the quiet between wars, in the comfort of friendships. But nothing compares to the utter tranquility Elorie brings to my heart. She sets every thought at ease, no matter what rages around me.
Elorie’s shoulders relax as she sinks against me. “I look a lot like her. I have her face. Her mouth and nose. Even her freckles sparkled like mine do. Although she has a lot more than the three on my cheek. But her hair was white, which was surprising.”
“Why?” I toy with the blue ends of her hair.
“You mentioned a blue-haired Fae to me once. One more powerful than any before her. Part of me wondered if that Fae was my mother.”
“That text was too old for it to be any living Fae. Well over a thousand years, and for all I know, she might have been a myth.”
“Myth is usually born from something. Things we’ve long forgotten. A bit of truth that’s been twisted and changed until we no longer believe it could have been possible. But that doesn’t mean it wasn’t once.”
“I suppose you would know. Constantly doing the impossible.” I grin, and her eyes brighten.
“Maybe testing fate is my secret power.”
“That and bringing me to my knees.” I lean forward, kissing the tip of her nose. “Speaking of forgotten lore and impossibilities, I need to tell you something.”
She must sense my surge of worry through the thread because her smile immediately falls. “What is it?”
“It’s about the aeraliss.” I frown. “Rior found mentions in our texts that contradict the journals Callum brought. It says there’s a limit to its strength and that—”
“It might burn out.” She finishes my thought in a whisper.
“You suspected it already?”
Elorie nods. “Letia was scratching her hand when I saw her earlier. I didn’t know if the reaction was unique to her, but I sensed something was wrong with the ring.”
“The records could be inaccurate,” I try to assure her.
“But we can’t risk it.”
“Exactly.”
She sighs, closing her eyes. “Thank you for telling me.”
I tip her chin up. “I’ll do everything in my power to figure it out.”
“I know you will.” Trust blooms in her eyes when she blinks them open.
So pure it would knock me off my feet if I wasn’t already sitting.
“Look at us.” Her smile is tentative. “Communicating.”
“Communication was never our problem. We did plenty of that in the Ley Court.”
She rolls her eyes. “Yes, with daggers at each other’s throats while we talked in circles.”
“It was a start.” I shrug. “And you’re a sight to behold with daggers in your hands, so I didn’t mind.”
Her laugh wraps around me. With all the unknowns right now—the orb, the realms, my beating heart—nothing is certain. But here, with Elorie in my arms, I let everything else fall away and focus only on her. A starry sky behind her. She’s one with the night.
My star.
My wish.
My everything.
The single light when all else goes dark.
“You’re beautiful.” I tuck her hair behind her ear.
Elorie wraps her arms around my shoulders, and the sheet falls away, revealing her perfect breasts and hard nipples. I graze my hands up her ribs, toying with the peaks and making her shiver.
“You’re not so bad looking yourself,” she whispers against my mouth, pressing the softest kiss to my lips.
She moves against me as I tangle my tongue with hers, and I’ve never needed anything more than to make her feel good. To wash away whatever nightmares woke her in the middle of the night and to bring peace to her mind.
Elorie kisses me deeper as my hand slips between her legs, finding her weeping and needy as I sink a finger into her heat.
My thumb toys with her bud of excitement as she wiggles on my lap.
My cock aches to sink inside her, but I resist the need in favor of pleasing her.
I drive another finger deep, curling them as she shakes in my arms.
Warmth gushes over my fingers as hers dig into the back of my hair, and I lean in for a kiss. For a taste of the scream that rattles her throat as she reaches her climax.
If I find no peace in the After, I find peace in this.
In her.
Her silver eyes gleam as she blinks them back into focus. Her hands draw a path down the sides of my neck. Her nails rake my chest as she reaches for my cock. Just shy of wrapping her perfect fingers around me as a knock comes at the door.
“Wilder,” Perame calls.
I groan, ignoring her.
“We should probably get that,” Elorie mumbles against my lips when I continue touching her and ignoring the persistent knocking.
“Or we could make them wait until morning.”
She breaks the kiss, resting her forehead against mine. “We’ll continue this later.”
“Wilder, put on your godsforsaken pants and get out here.” Perame’s words make Elorie laugh.
She climbs off my lap, the sheet completely falling away, baring every inch of her beautiful flesh as she walks back toward our room.
“That’s not helping,” I growl as her hips sway in the moonlight.
Her pale skin practically glows.
She glances over her shoulder, smiling. “I never promised I would be helpful.”
Gods, she’s going to be the end of me.
I’m still grumbling by the time Elorie and I are dressed in leathers. When I swing our bedroom door open, Perame has her arms crossed over her chest, glaring at me. Atlas and Rior stand leaning against the wall on the opposite side of the hall.
Atlas smirks, his gaze moving between me and Elorie, while Rior’s annoyance is written all over his face.
“Took you long enough.” Perame rolls her eyes. “We need to talk. I think I found it.”
Elorie rushes forward. “The void?”
Perame nods, sending her orange-red curls bouncing around her pink cheeks. “It’s not completely clear, but I have hints as to where it might be. I saw… something. All magic vanished around it. It has to be the void.”
“That must be it,” Elorie agrees, excitement dancing in her eyes. “If we can get it, then we might be able to pacify the orb. We might have a chance.”
Perame’s smile falls at that, and I don’t miss that Atlas and Rior share a glance.
“Where is it?” I ask as Elorie steps closer to me, clearly noticing the same as her smile falls.
“Like I said, I’m not certain.”
“Where is it, Perame?” Elorie asks this time.
Perame frowns. “The Mortal Realm.”