80. Chapter 80
CHAPTER 80
Cassiel
C assiel opened his eyes to find the world was not as he left it. He sprang out of bed and his feet caught on the sheets. It sent him stumbling to the floor. His hands shook against the cold stone as he remembered . As if he had not endured enough.
Why this?
He had spent years hating his father. Hurting him with his anger. Years of simply wasting time.
All that time lost when he could have used it to be a son.
“Where am I supposed to go from here?” Cassiel looked up at the version of Yoel who had been with him all winter.
So young and carefree. He sat on the windowsill against the sunrise, smiling at him tenderly. A soft white light hovered off him and his wings. He no longer seemed solid anymore.
“I can’t tell you where to go. Only to keep going.”
He shook his head. “I should have been faster. I should have been stronger. If I had reached you in time you would still be here. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
“I am here. Didn’t I say, I would be with you as you for as long as you needed me?”
“But I have to let you go now, don’t I?”
Yoel stepped down and came over to him. “There is a time for everything, son. What is coming is far better than what is already gone.”
Cassiel lowered his head, to hide the way that hurt. “You should have lived...”
“I do.” Yoel laid a hand on his shoulder, yet he could no longer feel it. “I live in your memory.”
Cassiel’s vision blurred. How was he supposed to go on without him? “I feel lost.”
“I know. But now it’s time to find your way back.”
“What if … what if I can’t back?” he asked in a broken whisper.
His father smiled and held out a hand to him. “Then we will find our way back together.”
Cassiel took it and Yoel pulled him up. When he blinked open his eyes again, still in bed. He had been dreaming.
His father had come to say goodbye.
“Sire?”
He turned his head, finding Yelrakel standing watch at his door. Her shoulders slumped with relief and she rushed to his bedside.
“My king, how are you feeling?”
Cassiel looked back at the empty windowsill. The bright sun had been replaced by a moon and the last traces of that assuring presence fade away like a breath on the breeze.
Alone.
There was an empty hole in his chest, and he didn’t know how to fill it. How did he get here?
Cassiel missed the days where he didn’t know who he was, when he was a stupid boy taken with a girl he met in the forest, learning what it meant to love. How could he find his way back to who he used to be?
Without his father, without his mate, what was there to live for anymore?
Sometimes he thought death was easier. Life was much harder.
But Cassiel reminded himself he had returned to this world for a reason.
“Dyna?” he asked.
“My Queen and her Guardians departed Greenwood through the Elder Tree,” Yelrakel said. “They are on their way to Red Highland.”
“I am going after her.” Cassiel sat up and began dressing in fresh clothes. He had been too late to save her in their first life, but Elyōn gave him a second chance. He wasn’t wasting it. “Have the Valkyrie prepare to fly out.”
“I have already sent them ahead with her, sire.” Yelrakel put on her helmet. “My ride awaits me on the roof.”
She looked back at him steadily, ready to serve. With her Pegasus and the speed of his flame, he could recall the rest of his Valkyrie from Sellav and catch up to Dyna.
“Then I will see you there, General.”
She clanked a fist over her heart and marched out of the room.
Stepping out onto balcony, Cassiel climbed up onto the banister. Dynalya flowers rustled gently in the wind. The moon called him west and promised to light his way. Closing his eyes, Cassiel breathed in the fresh air, filling his lungs.
And he leaped.