The Visit
NOX
Nox makes her way down to the dungeons with measured steps, the smell reaching her before the darkness does.
It clings low and damp, something spoiled beneath the air, and she lifts a handkerchief to her nose as she continues, careful with where she places her hands, unwilling to brush against anything that might carry what remains of the harki.
The passage tightens as she descends, the air growing heavier with each turn, and by the time she reaches the far end, the sound finds her fully.
It is wrong. The thing that had once been useful writhes across the floor, a shape without form, folding and unfolding in on itself as it drags forward in uneven movements, reaching without purpose.
It does not know where to go, not without something to take, and its attempts are clumsy now, unfocused, its attention snapping back again and again toward the same point.
Toward the girl.
Yvara sits curled into the corner, her back turned, unmoving except for the faint shift of her shoulders each time the thing lunges and falls short. It reaches for her again, fingers that are no longer fingers stretching outward, grasping for something that never quite comes within reach.
The sound it makes grates through the space, loud and broken, something between a voice and the memory of one, and Nox feels irritation rise immediately. “Fix it,” she says, her tone cutting cleanly through the noise.
Larkin moves without hesitation. He steps into the cell and closes the distance in a single motion, his hand coming down with precision as he breaks what remains of its structure.
The sound cuts off at once, the body collapsing into stillness, whatever animates it retreating into nothing. Silence returns.
Nox lowers the handkerchief slightly, her attention shifting.
Yvara has not turned.
She remains where she is, folded into herself, the line of her profile just visible where her face tilts faintly toward the wall.
Nox studies her for a moment, taking in what remains.
The rumors had not been wrong. Even like this, dirt streaked across her skin, bruising dark against her cheek and collarbone, she holds a kind of beauty that does not diminish under neglect.
The fabric she wears is torn, whatever finery had been given to her earlier reduced now to something unrecognizable, hanging loose against a body that has already endured more than it should have.
Nox clears her throat, expecting the movement, the recognition, the immediate adjustment that comes when someone understands who stands before them.
“Be careful, sweet Yvara,” Nox murmurs. “I am not patient.”
Yvara does not rush. She shifts slowly instead, pushing herself upright before turning, her face coming fully into view.
The damage is clearer from the front. Dirt smudges across her skin, dried blood caught at the corner of her mouth, and when she smiles, it is not what Nox expects. One of her front teeth is missing, the absence obvious where the golden whore’s lightcraft must have broken it clean through.
The smile lingers anyway.
Nox looks at her, really looks this time, and something clicks into place with a clarity that feels almost insulting in its simplicity. “It was always you,” she says quietly. “Wasn’t it?"
Yvara says nothing. She simply holds Nox's eyes, that broken smile still in place, and waits.
Nox lets out a quiet breath that is almost a laugh. Almost.
"Interesting," she says.
There was no time to probe. Yvara was a thread worth pulling. Teorin now threatened to unravel everything before she could.
Perhaps it was time for new fabric.
She takes another look at Yvara. Then she turns and walks away.
The docks are quieter at night, though never truly still. Lanterns burn low along the edge of the water, their light stretching thin across the surface as ships shift gently against their moorings. The air carries salt and something older beneath it, something that reminds her, briefly, of home.
Nox does not slow as she approaches her vessel.
The crew sees her coming and moves at once, bodies straightening, voices cutting off mid-conversation as they scramble into place.
Larkin steps ahead of her without needing instruction, clearing the path, and she boards without looking at anyone, her attention already fixed on what comes next.
“Prepare the ship,” she says, her voice even but edged in a way that leaves no room for delay. “We leave now.”
There is a brief pause, the kind that comes from men who are accustomed to command but not to urgency without warning.
“Your Highness,” one of them begins carefully, “we were not scheduled to depart until—”
She turns her head just enough to look at him. The rest of the sentence dies where it began.
“We leave now,” she repeats, quieter this time. “Or I will find someone else to sail this ship.”
That is enough. Orders ripple outward immediately, ropes pulled, sails adjusted, the deck shifting beneath her feet as the ship prepares to break from the dock.
The crew moves with the efficiency she expects and nothing less.
The Yorali sigil marks each sail, two crossed swords in the shape of an x.
Larkin steps into place beside her. “Thrykis?” he asks, though he already knows the answer.
“Yes,” she says. “And quickly,” she adds, her gaze moving out over the water as the final lines are released. “I have business that will not wait.”
The ship pulls free, the distance between Rathmor and the shore widening with each passing moment. Nox remains at the edge of the deck, her hands resting lightly against the railing, her expression composed once more, though the tension beneath it has not eased.
He lied to me. Almost a decade of us, and he lied.
To the fucking Princess of Yorali.
The thought returns as the land begins to fade, clearer in its direction. She did not sacrifice or care for much. But she had for him. For years. A betrayal simply would not do. A smaller softer part of her hoped there was a misunderstanding to be clarified.
“I need to have words,” she says after a moment, her voice low enough that it does not carry beyond the space around her.
Larkin does not ask with whom.
“With one of its princes,” she finishes.
The water stretches ahead of them, dark and open, the path to Thrykis already set.