20. Kaedryn
Kaedryn
The moment the temple city disappears behind rain and distance, Adelina stops looking like a woman who has been captured and starts looking like one who has already been sentenced and has accepted her fate.
I stand beneath the aft canopy while the boat cuts north across the Celestial Sea, watching her from a distance because distance is the only mercy I know how to offer right now.
She has not spoken since the temple road.
Not when I carried her through the crowd.
Not when I placed her on the boat. Not when I assured her she would not be harmed.
She sits where I left her, hands folded, eyes turned toward the water without seeing it.
The silence should anger me more than it does.
She is not helpless in this. She is not innocent of consequence.
And yet, every time I look at her, all I see is the instant the fight left her body. Extinguished as if my words on the temple road had doused the last flame in her.
I grip the rail and look away. The Celestial Sea spreads around us in shifting gray and blue, rain dimpling its surface while the climate line waits somewhere ahead, invisible and absolute.
South of it, Maralis remains warm and green and fragrant with rain.
North of it, Dravaryn waits with winter, stone, and ice.
Adelina does not shiver yet. She will, and the thought of her cold or hurting causes an irrational anger to burn through me. That irritates me because it’s small and human when everything else is political fire.
“Your Highness,” Rowan says from behind me.
I turn.
He stands near the hatch leading below deck, damp hair pushed back, expression carefully neutral. He has known me long enough not to soften what matters. “The captain says the private cabin is ready. The Astral Stone has been anchored.”
My father, then.
I glance once toward Adelina. She still hasn’t moved.
Sylas stands near her. Kellan watches from the opposite side of the deck with a sick look he cannot quite hide. Merritt is forward with Soren, speaking quietly to the captain and keeping one eye on the horizon.
“Don’t leave her alone,” I say.
Rowan’s gaze flicks toward her. “We won’t.”
I head below. The cabin is narrow, built more for function than comfort, with bolted-down furniture, a single table, and a round window blurred by rain and sea spray.
The anchored Astral Stone sits in a brass cradle at the table’s center.
It is larger than the travel stone in my bracer, clearer too, a moonshard cut into an oval and polished until the light inside it looks like a sleeping star.
I shut the door.
For one breath, the cabin is silent.
Then I touch the stone. Silver-blue light blooms beneath my fingers, spreading through the crystal in fine veins. The air cools despite the warmth of Maralis still lingering in the walls. The light rises, bends, and forms the faint shape of a man beyond the table.
My father’s face appears first.
King Rhaegar of Elyrion carries the weight of the southern crown like a blade. His dark hair is threaded with silver at the temples, his expression carved by years of decisions that cost other people sleep, and his eyes settle on me with immediate assessment.
“You have her,” he says, not a question.
“Yes.”
“Condition?”
“Alive. Healed enough to travel. Exhausted.” I pause. “Terrified.”
His expression does not change. “Of you?”
I think of her sobbing on the temple road, bound by my magic, begging me to let her go.
“Now?” I ask. “Yes, but not just me.”
“What then?”
I look through the round window, though there is nothing to see but rain streaking over glass. “Of Varek.” The light inside the stone flickers once as my shadows stir.
My father notices. “He is her brother and king.”
“She ran from him like death was kinder.”
“A frightened woman may exaggerate danger.”
“She reached the Sea Temple steps and begged not to be taken back to Dravaryn.”
“Because sanctuary would free her from the marriage.”
My jaw tightens. “That is one explanation.”
“It’s the most useful and most likely one.”
“She risked her life to flee. Useful and likely doesn’t mean true.”
His gaze sharpens. “Careful, Son.”
The command in that one word is familiar enough to settle over my shoulders like armor I did not ask to wear.
I straighten. “Something is happening in that kingdom.”
“Several things are happening in that kingdom. Varek’s hold is weaker than he led us to believe.
His people are lying to soldiers. The princess has become a symbol whether she intended it or not.
Zerath will be watching for fracture. Maralis is already irritated by armed men crowding their sacred roads, and Dravaryn will claim insult if the princess is not returned through the proper process. ”
“That’s politics.”
“That is rule.”
“No,” I say, and the word comes out sharper than I intend.
“There’s something else. Something inside that castle.
The servants know it. The people helping her know it.
Freya knew it. Adelina knows it, but she will not say it aloud.
” I lean closer to the Astral Stone. “She’s not simply avoiding a marriage. ”
My father is silent for several seconds. But his silence is never idle. His carries calculation, irritation, and something too controlled to be concern.
“What evidence do you have?” he asks.
Evidence.
Not instinct. Not the look in Adelina’s eyes. Not her body going still at the word Dravaryn. Not the way she fought my binding until I named her selfish, then stopped like I had confirmed something she already believed about the world.
Evidence.
“Not enough,” I admit.
“We cannot move a kingdom on suspicion.”
“I’m not asking to move a kingdom.”
“You’re asking to bypass a king’s authority over his own sister before the transfer ceremonies have been completed.”
“She is my betrothed. The contract is signed by all.”
“She’s not yet yours under full treaty and Celestial law.”
Something in me recoils from the word yours, even though earlier I told her she was mine.
My father continues. “The contract is signed. The treaty is signed. But the formal departure from Dravaryn rites were never performed. Varek can claim that you seized her before the proper ceremonies, removed her under duress, and coerced her into southern custody. If you bring her directly to Elyrion, he will call it abduction.”
“She ran from him.”
“And he can say you found her and exploited her distress.”
“He would be lying.”
“Kings lie. Courts decide whether the lie is useful.”
The old frustration rises hot under my skin. “So we reward him because he knows how to frame dishonor in ceremonial language?”
“We prevent him from handing Zerath a wedge to drive between north and south.” Rhaegar’s voice hardens. “You know this.”
I do. That is the worst of it.
I know every step of the argument before he finishes making it.
If I take Adelina south without returning her first, Dravaryn can accuse Elyrion of kidnapping.
The treaty could rupture before the ink fully dries.
Dravaryn would claim the alliance was built on coercion and scandal.
Maralis would distance itself. Smaller border houses would hesitate.
The eastern empire would not need to strike immediately.
It would only need to wait for the realm to distrust itself into weakness.
My father did not raise fools.
He raised sons who understand the cost of being right in the wrong order.
“She is not safe there,” I say.
His eyes narrow slightly. “Has Varek threatened her in your presence?”
“No.”
“Has she accused him of harm?”
“No.”
“Has any witness given sworn testimony?”
“Everyone who knows anything refuses to speak.”
“Then your hands are tied, Son.”
“My hands?”
“Ours.” His voice lowers. “Do you think I enjoy this? I don’t want the girl to suffer.”
I hold his gaze through the shimmer of the stone. Enjoyment has nothing to do with him. Duty does. Stability does. A kingdom does.
He knows my silence for what it is.
“Unless you find proof or the princess asks for help, we cannot risk our entire kingdom for one woman,” he says.
The sentence lands with the clean weight of a book slamming shut.
One woman. Adelina’s face flashes in my mind as she lay bound on the wet temple stones, looking past me at the steps she almost reached.
“She may be more than that,” I say quietly.
“Politically, yes, which is why you will return her properly.” His expression shifts, only slightly. “Personally, perhaps, which is why you will be careful.”
“Careful?”
“You will return her to Dravaryn under witness and remain vigilant. You will finish the formal transfer and take her south.”
“And if Varek refuses?”
“Then he reveals himself before witnesses.”
That is strategy.
Cold. Sound. Insufficient.
The boat pitches as we cross a harder current, and somewhere above, a crewman curses. The sound is muffled by wood and rain. For a moment, I imagine Adelina hearing the same shift of water and knowing we are turning back toward the place she spent days trying to escape.
“What if she cannot bear it?” I ask.
My father’s gaze sharpens in a different, more personal way. “Can you?”
The question is not kind. It’s not meant to be.
“You believe I’m letting feeling cloud judgment.”
“I believe you have been chasing a frightened woman through hostile territory while an unknown bond pulls at you and old magic interferes with your command. I would be a fool not to question what that does to judgment.”
I go still. “What do you know”
“Sylas reported that she broke your command. But I know you are my son.” His voice remains even. “And I know there is something about this woman that has you conflicted.”
The thread beneath my ribs tightens at the acknowledgment. “She’s my starbound,” I say.
My father is silent for a long moment. “You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
“This may change things, but you will not let it rule you.”
I take a deep breath. “I will return her,” I say.
“Good.”
“But if Varek lays one hand on her outside formal custody, I will remove her.”