Sunbound (Of Sun and Shadow #1)

Chapter 1

Rynlee’s POV

I stood inside the small greenhouse behind our cobblestone cottage in Aurendale, the air heavy with mint and dittany.

Summer was fading, and soon I would leave for the Verdant Sanctum of Sylvara, the healing college nestled deep in the forest of Willowfen.

My mother once studied there, and I’d always believed I would follow her path.

The green robes had already arrived, folded neatly in their parcel, smelling faintly of sage.

They were the college’s uniform; every student attending there was required to wear them.

I had tried mine on last night, and for the first time in months, I experienced hope.

But everything was different now. Alaric, my best friend, had left to join Arcanna, the War College, at least five hundred miles from home, with treacherous terrain making that distance an unthinkable path, especially traveling by myself.

Without him, Aurendale felt emptier, quieter.

I did, however, make friends with Gianna a year ago.

She lived just down the street from me, and we really hit it off.

She filled the hollow space Alaric had left behind, but I still missed him.

I leaned over the workbench, crushing dewberries and spearmint with my mother’s stone pestle.

I was making a sleeping draught, meant to help with my insomnia.

Most nights, it worked. My mother’s old potion book lay open beside me, her elegant handwriting filling the margins.

The familiar motions soothed me, the smell of mint bringing me comfort, the same scent that helped the formulation work its magic.

I was engrossed in my task, distracted by the soothing motions, when in the distance raised voices drifted through the open window.

“You cannot send her to that school,” my grandmother said sharply, her voice fierce and cutting through the garden air.

“She is my daughter. I can send her anywhere I like,” my father’s reply thundered back. The pestle slipped in my hand. My chest tightened.

“I will not allow you to throw her into Arcanna,” my grandmother argued.

“That place will kill her.” The word Arcanna made my entire world tilt.

Arcanna? Not Sylvara? I had been preparing my whole life to follow in my mother’s footsteps; I dreamed of going to Sylvara.

How could my father want me at the War College?

How could he go against my mother’s wishes that I learn to help heal others, not drown in steel and blood.

“Then so be it,” my father countered, cold as iron.

“Better she learns to fight at Arcanna than waste her life in some healing hall. A war is coming, and she must be prepared.” The pestle clattered from my hand.

Anger boiled over me, every part of me was hot and shaking, and before I could stop myself, I stormed into the yard.

“Did you ever think to ask what I wanted?” I shouted with a stern bolt I didn’t realize I had. My voice cracked, but I stood tall, glaring at him. I had never spoken to my father in such a manner.

“It doesn’t matter what you want, Rynlee. You are going to Arcanna. There’s still time to take the entrance exam,” he said, his tone final.

“No,” I snapped, folding my arms across my chest. “I’ve already been accepted to Sylvara. My robes came yesterday.” His gaze flicked down to my hands where dewberries had stained my fingertips purple, then back to me, hard as stone.

“You will not wear those robes. You are my only child, and I refuse to have you grow up soft. Arcanna will forge you into something stronger. Those healing halls would’ve only made you weak.”

“Mom wanted this for me!” My voice rose, sharp with desperation. “She wished for me to follow her path. You can’t just cast that aside.”

My father’s expression turned dark, the words that followed shattering the breath from my lungs. “Your mother left us, Rynlee. If she truly cared, if she wanted you to follow her path, she would still be here.”

The memory struck me like a blade. Her lifeless body lay sprawled on the floor, honey eyes dim, an empty poison vial laid in her open hand.

The wound of it never healed, and now he twisted it deeper.

Tears burned at the corners of my vision, but I swallowed them back. I would not cry in front of him.

“Now,” he said coldly, waving a dismissive hand.

“Get your head out of the clouds and into Arcanna’s armor because you will need it for the entrance exam.

Which is in thirty minutes. And I expect you to show them what you’re made of; you’ll leave for Arcanna next week if you’re accepted.

” I couldn’t speak. Couldn’t breathe. So, I pushed past him, slamming the cottage door behind me.

The scent of lemongrass and dittany filled my room, herbs growing wild in the window boxes, tomes stacked high on my desk. This place smelled of home, of safety, of the future I had dreamed of. But now…now all I could see ahead was steel, leather, and the hope I could survive.

My gaze drifted to my bed where the brown leathers of Arcanna lay neatly folded, waiting.

They looked wrong there, like an intruder in my room.

I wanted to burn them. Maybe I could still run, slip away to Willowfen and beg the Verdant Sanctum to take me in.

The thought swirled, fragile as glass, when a knock came at my door.

My grandmother stepped inside. She had the same piercing blue eyes as my father, the same steel in her spine. Her cropped white hair framed a face etched with crow’s feet, the marks of a life spent fighting and commanding. She had once been a general at Arcanna, a woman known across the realm.

“He can’t do this, Grandma,” I whispered, wiping at the tear that slipped before I could catch it.

“I know, child.” Her voice softened as she crossed the room.

“But your father won’t budge. I’ve tried to talk him out of it, but he won’t listen to reason.

” She wrapped me in her familiar, warm embrace.

The kind that made me feel small again, safe.

“You are going to do just fine, child.” I shook my head against her shoulder.

“No, I won’t. I was never good at sparring, not growing up, not ever. Healing is where I’m meant to be.” My voice cracked, fear bleeding through. Arcanna was where cadets died in the first months, cut down by their own peers.

How could I survive that?

“Listen to me, Rynlee.” She pulled back, cupping my face in her calloused hands, her eyes fierce.

“You are a Yarrows. You possess your mother’s blood, which gives you compassion, the instinct to heal.

But you also carry your father’s… and mine.

Stubbornness. Strength. Will. You may think you were poor at sparring, but you always got back up.

Again, and again. That is what will keep you alive.

” Her words pressed into me like iron and warmth at once.

I nodded, even though I didn’t fully believe it.

Maybe she was right. Maybe I had more of my father and of my grandmother in me than I cared to admit.

“Now,” she whispered, brushing her thumbs against my cheeks, “get changed. I’ll walk with you to the entrance exam tent.”

“Okay. Thank you, Grandma.” She smiled small, yet proudly, and left. I stripped off my clothes and glanced at the robes I had dreamed of wearing. I let my fingers drag across the soft fabric and released a heavy sigh before slipping into Arcanna’s leathers instead.

They seemed heavier than they should, tight around my ribs, a constant reminder that this was not where I belonged.

But I shoved the thought down; I had to be strong, even if every part of me whispered I was not meant for this.

I stared down at the leather uniform wrapped around me, my grandmother’s words echoing in my head.

You always got back up… again and again. That is what will keep you alive.

Arcanna would only ever be survival. Not a place of belonging, not a home, not the dream I’d wanted, but a prison.

I glanced down at my hands, fingers still stained purple, the scent of dittany and dewberries clinging to them, remnants of the greenhouse, of memories filled with my mom standing beside me, going over instructions on how to chop up a leech.

Taking a deep breath, I gazed at the drawing of my mother resting on the small desk. Time to be strong. To be courageous. I closed my eyes, pressing my palm over my chest.

Mom, I’m sorry, but for you, I will try to be courageous.

I’ll survive. As I stepped out of the house with my grandma, I glanced back at the home I’d grown up in.

The memory burned into me: the cobbled cottage, the greenhouse, her voice teaching me which herbs healed which wound.

But like everything else in Aurendale, it was behind me now. Gone.

My grandmother and I followed the cobblestone path as it curved toward the examination tent. Cottages lined the road, homes of people I had grown up knowing, while the great forest pressed in around the small town, its towering trees a constant presence, protective and watchful.

Aurendale had always been tucked safely into the arms of the woods, quiet and unassuming, as though the world beyond the trees had little interest in it.

Ahead, black fabric rustled sharply in the wind.

The examination tent loomed at the edge of town, stark against the warmth of stone and greenery.

Each year, identical tents appeared in villages and cities across Solthera.

This was Arcanna’s way of enlisting young adults, usually those between twenty-one and twenty-three. Most of the older candidates were ones who had failed before and returned to try again, a fact I’d never fully understood. Why anyone would willingly come back was a mystery to me.