Chapter 22
Alina
The Barrow
I let myself relax into Dagan’s side, cheek against his shoulder, breathing in the scent of stone and rain and him.
Marcel is fed and sleeping. Jules is pale but smiling, tucked against Alaric’s chest as he hovers like she might vanish if he looks away too long.
Delia and Thorne are murmuring in low voices near the hearth, his hand never leaving the small of her back.
Kael has Phoebe tucked under his arm, her face buried in his shoulder as she talks a mile a minute about baby gifts and protective wards and whatever else comes into that bright mind.
They’re exhausted.
All of them.
Giving birth, almost losing each other, racing across realms to fight living nightmares—it’s a lot.
Eventually, Clarisse claps her hands and shoos everyone out.
“Enough,” she scolds. “Lady Jules needs quiet. Go. All of you. Lords, viyellas, stray roots—out.”
We file into the corridor in a loose, sleepy herd.
The Barrow shifts around us.
I can feel it—walls easing, corridors stretching, doorways appearing where there weren’t any before.
The castle is making space. Giving each of us somewhere to collapse in peace.
“The Barrow provides,” Phoebe says wryly, running her fingers along a newly formed lintel. “Creepy. But convenient.”
“Nightfall takes care of its own,” Thorne rumbles, pressing a kiss to Delia’s temple.
Dagan’s hand finds mine, warm and solid.
“Rest,” he tells the others. “We may not have many nights like this.”
They nod, one by one, splitting off down different passageways as doors bloom into existence—arched stone thresholds softened with carved vines, lit by pale root-light and gentle lanterns.
By the time we’re alone, the hallway is quiet.
Just me, Dagan, and the hum of the Marches underfoot.
He squeezes my fingers.
“Come.”
Our door is already waiting.
It wasn’t there earlier, but now it is—set into the rock like it’s always belonged, a heavy slab of deep green stone veined with gold.
Tiny glowing fungi cluster around the frame, casting soft, mossy light.
“Show-off,” I murmur, brushing my fingertips along the carved spiral patterns. “Your castle is trying to impress me.”
“Then it is wise,” Dagan says dryly, and pushes the door open.
The breath leaves my lungs.
The room isn’t huge, but it doesn’t need to be.
The ceiling arches overhead like the inside of an ancient tree, roots twisting together to form elegant ribs.
The walls are smooth stone, warm to the touch, shot through with threads of luminescent crystal that glow like captured moonlight.
In the center sits a bed grown from the earth itself—roots and stone shaped into a broad, low platform piled with cushions, pelts, and impossibly soft linens in deep browns and mossy greens.
Tiny flowers bloom along the headboard, releasing the faintest hint of something sweet and wild.
“I—wow,” I breathe. “Okay, this is… yeah. This is ridiculous.”
Dagan’s mouth curves. “You approve?”
“Dagan, there’s a tree growing through the ceiling and starlight in the rock,” I say, turning in a slow circle. “I more than approve. I feel like I stepped into a very specific Pinterest board I didn’t know I had.”
He frowns. “I do not know what any of that means.”
“It means I love it,” I say simply.
The bond hums between us, warm and steady.
For the first time since he left for Stone’s Edge, I let myself really look at him.
The soot has been washed away, but he still looks like a man who’s been through hell.
Faint scorch marks linger on the edge of one wing; a shallow cut bisects his brow, nearly healed already. His shoulders are tense, his jaw tight.
“Are you okay?” I ask. “And don’t give me some Lord of Earth stoic nonsense.”
He considers that for a beat.
“I am… tired,” he admits. “Angry. Relieved.” His gaze softens. “And grateful. That you are here. That Marcel lives. That Nightfall still stands—today.”
Something in my chest tips, clicks into place.
“Come here,” I say.
I don’t wait for him to move.
I go to him.
My hands slide up his chest, over leather and cloth and the faint ridges of muscle beneath.
His heart thuds steady under my palm—slow, heavy, earthquake-strong.
When I look up, his eyes burn green-gold, pupils blown wide.
“Oona,” he murmurs. “You need rest.”
“So do you,” I counter. “But that’s not what we’re doing right this second.”
His hands settle on my hips like they belong there. Which, honestly, they kind of do.
“You are certain?” he asks, voice low, roughened by more than just exhaustion.
“Dagan,” I say, rising onto my toes until our noses almost touch, “do you really think I’m going to walk away from this night? From you? After everything we almost lost?”
The breath he drags in shakes.
“Point taken,” he murmurs
His mouth meets mine.
It starts slow.
Soft.
His lips are warm and careful, like he’s afraid I’ll break if he presses too hard.
His hands slide up my back, one broad palm settling between my shoulder blades, the other curling around the nape of my neck.
The Barrow reacts.
The lights dim, crystals softening to a low, intimate glow. The faint cool draft that’s always present in stone spaces fades, replaced by a gentle warmth that seeps up from the floor.
Somewhere in the ceiling, roots creak as they shift, enclosing us just a little more.
It feels like the whole fortress is leaning in.
Watching.
Approving.
“Okay,” I murmur against his lips, “this castle definitely ships us.”
He huffs a quiet laugh. “Ships?”
“Wants us together. Roots for us.” I nip his lower lip, emboldened by the way his fingers tighten. “Pun not intended. Maybe a little intended.”
“You are incorrigible,” he says, voice thickening.
“You love it.”
“I do,” he agrees. “Very much.”
The kiss deepens.
Heat sweeps through me in a slow, rolling wave. All the fear I’ve been tamping down—the worry for him, for Nightfall, for all the worlds balanced on this strange place—melts into something else.
Something sharper and sweeter.
Need.
Yearning.
Home.
“Dagan,” I whisper, tugging at the fastenings of his vest. “I need you.”
The words are bare and simple and terrifying.
His hands still.
For half a heartbeat, I think I pushed too far.
Then he exhales, a sound that’s half growl, half prayer.
“You have me,” he says. “All of me, Oona. For as long as the earth remembers my name.”
That shouldn’t make my eyes burn, but it does.
He helps me shed my clothes, fingers surprisingly gentle for a man who can crack mountains with his bare hands.
Every brush of his knuckles against my skin feels reverent, like he’s mapping fault lines and finding them beautiful.
When I tug at his shirt in turn, he lets me explore.
Pale, hard planes of chest and abdomen, scattered with faint scars that feel like history under my fingertips.
His skin isn’t smooth as it looks. It is etched with patterns—like whorls of sheer, iridescent markings are there, tracing paths right over his heart, echoing the patterns in the stone outside.
The powerful sweep of his shoulders, the flex of his arms as he braces himself above me when we tumble backward onto the bed.
The linens are cool silk over something soft and springy underneath, like moss laid on packed earth.
The whole bed cradles me, adjusting as I shift, supporting my back, my hips, my legs.
Of course it does.
This castle ships us hard.
“You are thinking loudly again,” Dagan rumbles, pressing a line of kisses down my throat. “Something about castles and… shipping?”
“Later,” I breathe, arching as his mouth finds the sensitive place just below my ear. “Much later.”
He smiles against my skin.
His hands move slowly, reverently, learning me all over again. Every curve, every scar, every place that makes my breath catch or my muscles tense.
The bond hums brighter with each stroke, each kiss, until it’s like we’re wrapped in a cocoon of awareness—his and mine twined together.
The world outside shrinks to the warmth of his body over mine, the rasp of his voice as he murmurs my name, the way the stone under the bed thrums in time with my pulse.
“Look at me,” he commands gently.
I do.
Green-gold eyes meet mine, burning with so much emotion it steals my breath.
“You are not a bargain anymore,” he murmurs. “Not a duty. Not a tool. You are my heart, Alina Fawcett. My center. My true viyella. Do you understand?”
My throat closes.
“I do,” I manage.
“Good.” His thumb brushes my cheek. “Because whatever happens next—whatever Idris brings, whatever Nightfall must face—this is ours. They cannot take this from us.”
Not just sex.
Not just comfort.
A claim.
A promise.
A choice.
Our choice.
“Then take it,” I whisper. “Take me. I’m yours.”
His control frays at the edges.
I see it in the way his jaw tics, in the way his wings flare just slightly, feathers brushing the carved roots overhead.
The air feels thicker, charged with the weight of his power and his want.
Dagan hisses as he presses my thighs wide apart. And when he looks at me? I shiver with need.
“You’re so beautiful, Oona. Do you know that? Like the earth molded you from all its finest ore just for me.”
“Dagan,” I moan as he traces my body with deliberate, firm caresses.
His hands find me hot and dripping, talented fingers spread my folds, fitting his stone hard cock to my entrance.
“With me, Oona. Always with me.”
When he finally moves inside me, it’s with a care that almost undoes me—slow and steady, like he’s aligning something deep and unseen.
The zareth bond flares bright and hot, but it’s not just heat. It’s grounding. It’s rooting.
I wrap my legs around him, fingers digging into his shoulders, and let go.
Of the fear.
Of the what-ifs.
Of the ticking clock outside these walls.
Now, there’s just this.
This man.
This moment.
This impossible, stubborn love blooming in the cracks of our broken worlds.
We move together in a rhythm that feels… right.
Like waves hitting a shore that’s been waiting for them.
Like a landslide finally settling.
Every shift of his hips, every breath, every whispered “Oona” under his breath layers on another piece of something I didn’t know I was missing.
When pleasure crests, it’s not a sharp spike.
It’s an avalanche.
Slow at first, then unstoppable, roaring down through every part of me, carrying away everything but him.
I cry out his name, clutching at him like he’s the only solid thing in existence.
Maybe he is.
The bond surges, strong and bright and sure.
For a heartbeat, I swear I feel the Marches respond.
The ground under the Barrow steadying, the roots tightening their grip, the wards flaring just a little brighter.
Dagan follows me over the edge, head tucked against my neck, breath ragged. His arms slide beneath me, holding me close like he’s anchoring himself as much as me.
We lie there for a long time.
Breathing.
Listening to the slow, steady thump of each other’s hearts and the faint, contented hum of the living stone around us.
Eventually, he rolls us onto our sides without losing contact, tucking me into the curve of his body.
One wing drapes over us like a blanket, feathers warm and soft.
I press my palm to his chest, right over the deep, steady glow of our bond.
“This started as a job,” I murmur drowsily. “A mission. Fix the fault lines. Save the multiverse. No big deal.”
“It is still that,” he replies, voice low and amused.
“I know,” I sigh. “But…I think somewhere along the way, it became something else, too.”
I don’t say it yet.
I don’t have to.
He feels it. I know he does. The bond pulses, his hand covering mine.
“Yes,” he says simply. “It did become something else. I love you, Alina Fawcett, and I bless the day I found you.”
“You love me?”
He nods.
Warmth fills my heart, and I make a sound—a cross between a hum and a purr.
“Well?”
“Impatient much?” I laugh.
“Alina,” he growls and nips my earlobe with his teeth.
“Just so happens that I love you too, Lord of Dirt.”
He presses his lips to my temple and holds me tightly.
My eyelids grow heavy.
The Barrow hums a lullaby I can feel more than hear, roots and stone and magic all whispering the same thing: rest, rest, rest.
For the first time in a long time, I let myself.
If tomorrow brings war, we’ll face it.
If Idris comes, we’ll stand against him.
But tonight, here in this impossible fortress with a Demon Lord wrapped around me and the earth itself cradling us both, I am exactly where I’m meant to be.
With him.
“Dagan?” I murmur, already halfway to sleep.
“Yes, Oona?”
“You better always come back to me,” I whisper, echoing my earlier promise, even though he’s not leaving. Not yet. “Always.”
He presses a kiss to my hair.
“Always,” he vows.
The bond settles warm and sure between us.
The Barrow sighs.
And in the deep, living quiet of Nightfall, with the Glowworm Moon still glowing faintly through crystal veins far above, I finally, truly sleep.