Chapter 14
Alina
Flying to The Barrow
We sweep toward one of the higher balconies. It juts out from the cliff, ringed with carved stone balustrades, flanked by two trees whose branches twist grow out of the rock itself.
Their leaves shimmer in the breeze as we approach, glowing soft gold.
Dagan lands with a controlled impact, taloned boots scraping stone, wings flaring to balance the weight. He holds me for a moment longer than strictly necessary.
Maybe I imagine it.
Maybe I don’t.
“You can put me down,” I murmur, though a traitorous part of me wants to ask him not to.
“I could,” he says. “I am considering whether it is wise.”
“Is it a safety concern?” I tease. “Or an emotional one?”
His eyes flash.
“We have already established I am not as stone-hearted as I pretend.”
“So that’s a no on safety,” I say lightly. “And a yes on wanting to carry me everywhere.”
He bares his teeth in something that’s not quite a smile and not remotely safe.
“Do not tempt me, Oona.”
But he does set me down—slowly, carefully, like he’s reluctant to lose even that much contact.
My feet hit the cool stone of the balcony.
The instant they do, I gasp.
The Barrow says hello.
That’s what it feels like, anyway—a low, welcoming vibration under my soles, like the fortress is some enormous living thing and it just recognized me.
The sensation shoots up through my legs, settles warm and solid in my belly.
I touch the balcony railing with one hand.
“Did you feel that?”
Dagan’s gaze sharpens.
“The Barrow greeted you.”
“That’s what that was?” I laugh shakily. “I was hoping it wasn’t just low blood sugar.”
“It recognizes the one I have bound myself to.” His voice goes softer, almost reverent. “Stone and earth and rock approve.”
I swallow. My throat feels suddenly too tight.
“That… means something here, doesn’t it?”
“In the Rooted Marches,” he says, stepping close again until his chest nearly brushes my shoulder, “nothing rooted survives long if it chooses poorly. The Barrow does not approve lightly.”
Well, great.
Now the castle is shipping us—rooting for a real relationship between us, too.
Heat crawls up my neck, and I’m glad the moonlight is doing weird things with the shadows.
“No pressure or anything.”
He studies my profile.
“Does it displease you? To be claimed by land and Lord both?”
“It…” I blow out a breath, staring out at the terraces below. Lanterns glow along the paths, little strings of light marking the route back to the town square where the last of the Sowing festivities are winding down. “…it scares me a little. I’m not going to lie.”
His hand brushes mine on the railing, pinky finger to pinky finger—so small a touch, I might miss it if I wasn’t hyper-aware of everything he does.
“But?” he prompts quietly.
“But it also feels good,” I admit. “It feels right. Like I’ve been walking around with the wrong set of coordinates in my head and suddenly everything lines up.”
I risk a glance at him.
His eyes glow softly in the Glowworm moonlight, some combination of tenderness and hunger and awe written there that makes my chest hurt.
“That’s because it is right, Alina,” he says, my name a low promise. “My Oona.”
My pulse jumps.
God, I am so in trouble with this man.
Dangerously close to loving him?
Yeah. That line was several miles back.
I think I blew past it the second he called me Oona and the earth went quiet for us.
Before I can say anything else, a flicker of movement catches my eye.
Down below, near the outermost terraces, the ground ripples.
It’s subtle—just a shiver along one of the lower retaining walls, a brief darkening of soil, like something exhaled under the surface.
I would’ve missed it before. Might even have chalked it up to tired eyes.
Now?
The moment it happens, my stomach drops.
Something is wrong.
“Dagan,” I say sharply, pointing. “Did you feel that?”
His head whips toward the terraces, eyes narrowing. For a beat, nothing happens.
Then the Marches answer.
A low, grinding rumble rises from below, like the entire land is clearing its throat.
The stone under our feet trembles—not much, not like the big quakes I’ve felt before.
But it’s there. A warning. A pressure building where there shouldn’t be any.
“What is it?” I whisper, even though I already know.
His jaw tightens. “The wards are shifting.”
I stare down into the darkness, heart pounding. The farmers’ fields look peaceful, lanterns swaying gently in the wind.
Somewhere out there are the people we met today.
Varen and his family. Kids who pressed glowing seeds into my hands and asked me if I really came from a world with no Dreamwrights.
The earth pulses again.
Not a greeting this time.
More like a bruise.
A bruise that’s spreading.
Dagan’s wings flare halfway, feathers rattling with contained tension.
“Inside,” he says, voice gone flat and dangerous. “Now.”
“Dagan—”
He looks at me, and whatever argument was about to leap out of my mouth dies on my tongue.
There’s no room for debate in his expression.
No room for anything but grim determination and a bone-deep, terrified protectiveness I feel echoing down our bond.
I swallow hard and nod.
“Okay. But you’re not shutting me out.”
His hand closes around mine, rough and solid and unshakeable.
“I would not dare, Oona.”
We turn toward the archway that leads back into The Barrow’s halls.
Behind us, the Glowworm Moon watches with its pale face—softly glowing, light emphasized by shadow—as the land of Nightfall shifts uneasily in its sleep.
Nothing is as it seems here.
Nightfall is wondrous. Alive. Full of magic, dreams, and impossible beauty.
But as the tremor rolls through my bones again, sharp and wrong, another truth anchors itself deep inside me.
Wonder and danger walk hand in hand in this place.
And whatever is coming?
It’s headed straight for us.