Chapter Forty-Five
KAEL
The room stills. The weight of Gellesk’s question settles like a hand on my chest.
Elyssara’s spine straightens, and I don’t miss the sharp breath she sucks in.
“What do you know of the fifth relic?” she snaps, and her words come out a fiery blaze.
Gellesk leans forward on the table of Amarisse’s private chamber—secretive, elusive. “Only that it can’t be taken. It must be given,” he whispers, as if his words hold the secrets of the realms.
Perhaps they do.
“Another fucking cryptic message. Great,” Therion grumbles under his breath.
Elyssara stands bolt upright from her chair. “What is it?” she says slowly, each word measured.
“A great royal Dravari heirloom,” Gellesk breathes, his eyebrows lifting in emphasis.
But before I can hold a blade to his throat to stop him being so fucking obscure, Amarisse bursts through the curtains—
“Out. Now,” she snaps, robes billowing behind her. “The king’s men are coming. They’re early for their usual appointment,” she explains, her mouth twisting in disgust. “I know you need to find your Arcanist, so go to Veil & Vine until you can. Signis will take care of you.”
Amarisse waves her arms in haste, ushering us out in a flap of panic.
“Finally, a drink. Thank the gods,” Therion says, lazily striding out of the room.
Elyssara looks torn between pushing Gellesk for answers and leaving the establishment before being caught, but Seren tugs on her arm and she follows. Frustrated. Unfinished.
The room clears out, and I stand to leave, giving Gellesk a nod—our alliance brokered, our march planned.
But I don’t make it three paces before his hand clasps around my forearm in urgent warning.
I spin to face him, but he’s already talking in a hushed whisper. “It must be given freely, in love. Without strategy or leverage, pure of heart. And it must cost the giver something they cannot easily bear to lose. Only then does it unbind her light.”
His voice sounds otherworldly—almost prophetic in its cryptic cadence.
I stare him down, boring into his eyes as if I’ll find his meaning there. I race through memories, call on myth and legend told to me by my father, retrace my experiences, searching for anything that would explain what in the realms he means.
My heart knocks against my ribs like a man at a closed gate.
It hits me—
A memory—her silver cuff glinting under moonlight, her reluctant trade in Duskridge Hollow—sharpens like a blade at the forge. The key. We gave away the fucking key.
“Her mother’s marriage cuff,” I breathe, eyes never leaving his.
He nods, eyes penetrating and intense.
“It's not about marriage—not really. That was the disguise. It started as just an heirloom—blessed by the gods and cherished by the Dawnmeres. It was gifted to the first-born daughter of each generation by the one who loved her most. They knew of the prophecy for many decades before it was enacted, and always suspected the missing fifth relic was in their possession, that they had something to do with it. But when Thalmyr exiled the gods, stories were whispered of their powers seen shooting through the night sky. That’s how the keys were created—one last divine act. Lesara wore the cuff when it happened. The gods’ magic reshaped the heirloom into the key that would one day unbind her daughter’s light.
That’s how she knew Elyssara was the prophesied one,” he whispers.
Holy fucking Stars.
Elyssara was chosen by the Stars long before she lived.
And somehow, regardless of the enormity, it feels right.
“I’ve seen the way you look at her—I know it’s love. It has to come from you,” Gellesk says by way of explanation.
My stomach roils at the thought of the thieving bastards in the Hollow trading it for poorly brewed ale, whores, or weapons.
“We don’t have it,” I say, my tone clipped.
Gellesk’s eyes blow wide, and he drags a hand down his face in devastation. “Why the fuck not?”
“We traded it,” my voice comes out lethal.
We traded a gods-blessed ancient relic that unbinds my Starbound’s magic for fucking horses.
“You traded it,” Gellesk repeats with a grunt, incredulous, throwing his hands in the air. “Lesara would be mortified.”
Elyssara’s mother. I want to ask him how he knew her. What she was like. But the urgent shuffle of boots beyond the curtain narrows my focus.
“I’ll get it back. You have my word,” I promise, and the words are an unbreakable vow the moment they leave my mouth.
“You’d better make it fast, Your Majesty, because we’ll need every last drop of her magic to take down The Decay, break the spell on the Marked, and reclaim both kingdoms,” he spits.
Fuck, but he’s right.
He pulls me in tight, grip desperate and harsh. “Given in love, pure of heart, a sacrifice. Without that, it’s a scrap of tin.”
Elyssara’s hand shoots through the curtain, reaching for me. “Come on, they’re here,” she says, and the smile on her face both guts me and arrests me.
But it also reminds me of everything at stake.
Everything I’m fighting for.
“Find it,” Gellesk grunts with finality, and all I can do is nod.
“Find what?” Elyssara asks, and I stumble through the pleasure parlor with her tugging on my arm, and towards the side door where the others await me. The silhouette of Royal Guards is visible through the front doors, and I know we have heartbeats before they barge in.
Can I tell her of the cuff? Or does it risk turning the act into leverage or strategy, rather than love? The relic demands love freely given, unbound by duty or plan. If I name it now, I risk breaking the only truth that will ever set her free.
Is she even ready to love me again?
For me, I never fucking stopped.
“The spell to break the Marked curse,” I answer finally, but I fucking hate myself for lying—my mouth tastes like ash, even if I’m doing it for her.
Because I don’t know if she loves me, but I sure as Stars know that I’ll eliminate every man in Duskridge Hollow to get the cuff back for her.