Chapter 39 #2
The air smelled of beeswax polish and old cedar.
Pale light spilled across honey-hued floors that had been recently sanded.
The walls were bare but clean—fresh plaster smoothing over old scars.
Above, the vaulted ceiling arched. Someone had begun restoring the carved cornices; Cassia glimpsed intricate vines and moons emerging from beneath old layers.
Pale beams caught the sunlight. Magic hummed faintly in the walls—old protection wards and hearth-keeping spells layered like pressed herbs between floorboards and foundation stones.
She could feel them as a tickle on her skin, a whisper just under her breath.
Even unfurnished, even half-finished—there was something kind here. Something that wanted to be filled with voices and laughter. With warmth and love. With children. Life.
Cassia stepped deeper into the hall, one hand brushing the smooth banister of the wide staircase leading to the second floor. A prickle at the back of her neck—so faint now, after so many days without the bond being nourished—snagged her attention. She turned.
And stilled.
Inside the room by the stairway, a man stood, his back to her.
Arkenoth.
He stood before a vast, empty wall, his entire being focused on the single task.
In one hand, he held a creased photograph she couldn’t quite see.
On the wall itself, a single, empty picture frame hung, suspended by a thin, shimmering line of conjured chalk.
He adjusted the frame a fraction of an inch, trying to place it in the centre.
His shoulders tensed. He shifted it again, a low, frustrated murmur escaping him.
From the threshold, her heart hammering against her ribs, she found her voice.
“A little more to the left.”
He froze. The chalk line flickered and dissolved into a shower of white dust.
Cassia took one step into the sun-warmed room. “Just a little,” she breathed.
Wordlessly, he obeyed, his fingers twitching to guide the frame.
“A tiny bit more,” she whispered, her voice soft as the dust motes dancing in the air between them.
He moved it again. Silence descended, thick and heavy. For a long moment, they both just stared at the solitary frame on the immense, barren wall—a single promise waiting to be kept.
“Perfection,” she whispered.
He turned.
The world narrowed to this single point of light and dust and him.
Afternoon sun poured through the tall window, blazing a halo around his form, but she saw only his face.
The dust smudged on his cheekbone. The faint sheen of sweat on his temple.
The stunning, devastating ache in his eyes that unraveled her completely.
He took one step forward. Then another, as if pulled by a string tied to her very core. The photograph fluttered from his fingers, forgotten.
Her breath hitched. She blinked against the sudden, hot sting of tears.
And then she was moving.
Her feet flew across the floor, grace and hesitation forgotten.
She launched herself into him, and his arms locked around her—a solid band across her back, another cradling her shoulders, pulling her into his chest with a force that stole her breath.
She buried her face in his shirt, inhaling sawdust and familiar spice, the frantic rhythm of his heart.
His hand tangled in her curls, his breath ragged and broken against her temple.
“Ark,” she whispered into his shirt, the name a plea and a prayer. “Ark.”
His arms tightened around her.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’m sorry. I couldn’t let you—” She pulled back, just enough to look at him, her eyes burning.
“I thought I was protecting you. Your father was dying, and I was the complication you didn’t need.
I thought if I let you go, you could focus on what mattered. I thought I was doing the right thing.”
He kissed her. The days of silence and separation poured into the press of his mouth on hers—raw, desperate, inevitable. His hand closed around her wrist, the grip of a man who had no intention of letting her retreat from this again.
She tasted salt on his lips and realized she was crying.
“I know,” he whispered. “I’ve always known.”
For a moment, neither of them moved. They stood there, foreheads touching, breathing—as if making sure the other was real, and solid, and not about to disappear.
He pulled away and brushed his thumb along her cheekbone, wiping a tear. “There isn’t a single cruel bone in your body, Cassia. I knew, even before I saw my father. I knew you were breaking your own heart to try and save mine.”
Those words struck her like light through glass.
He never doubted what they had together.
In his mind, her betrayal had never outweighed the truth of who she was.
He was always like this. While she had flinched and faltered, tried to outrun the ache in her chest, he was solid. Unmoving in his certainty.
She looked up at him, eyes shining. “You waited?”
Ark gave a soft huff, the barest shake of his head. “You didn’t think I’d let you go that easily, did you?”
Cassia’s laugh broke on a breath. Her fingers curled into the lapels of his coat, grounding herself in him.
In the heat of his body. In the scent she knew too well to ever forget.
Ark’s hand came up slowly, brushing her hair back behind her ear.
His palm lingered against her cheek, thumb tracing a curve like he was relearning the shape of her.
“I’ve missed you,” he confessed.
She leaned into his touch, lashes fluttering low. “I missed you too. Every day. I just didn’t think I had the right.”
His lips met hers again. This time, it wasn’t rushed.
It was steady. Sure. His other arm came around her waist, anchoring her to him, and she let herself sink into the kiss, her arms wrapping around his neck.
There was no performance in it, only the quiet press of need and knowing, the taste of something she hadn’t realized she was starving for until now.
They parted, just barely—her breath catching, his eyes still closed.
Then he pulled back a little, frowning.
“How did you find this place?” he asked. “I was going to show you when it was finished. A surprise.”
Cassia couldn’t suppress a small, disbelieving laugh. “Your mother brought me here. She showed up at my house and drove me here without telling me where we were going. Whose house is this, anyway?”
“It used to belong to the Halewick family. It fell into neglect. Aegis & Ash bought it, cleansed it.” He stopped and faced her. “Now, it’s for you. For Starlight.”
Her heart stopped. “For Starlight?”
He nodded calmly, as if he hadn’t just handed her the impossible.
She stood there in the middle of the room, gaping at him. He reached down to grab the photo he’d dropped and held it out to her. She gasped. It wasn’t just any photo—it was a photograph of the Memory Wall at Starlight.
He’d been trying to recreate it—here, in this house.
She pressed her hand to her mouth. The room blurred, swimming behind a film of tears she couldn’t blink away fast enough.
“Ark.” His name came out broken. “How—when—”
“I started the morning after my father’s surgery,” he said quietly.
“I couldn’t sleep. Oromon was already in town, so I asked him how fast he could get a crew together.
” He took her hand and brought it to his lips, pressing a kiss against her knuckles.
“This is the only way I know how to love you when you wouldn’t let me do it in person. ”
She couldn’t speak, couldn’t do anything but stand there, holding his hand, letting the magnitude of it wash over her. This man—who had every reason to walk away after what she’d done—had spent his grief building a home for her children.
She told him, “To think I was so frustrated with your mother. She burst into my home this afternoon, scared off my buyers, my real estate agent . . . It all makes sense now.”
He blinked, his expression shifting into alarm. “Buyers? Cassia—were you selling your house?”
The way his voice dropped on the last two words made her chest ache.
“I didn’t have another option,” she said quietly. “The eviction gave us fourteen days. The only asset I could use to secure a new home for the children was—”
“Your house.” He said it like he’d been punched.
She nodded, not trusting her voice.
He was quiet for a long moment. Then, roughly: “How close did it get?”
She let out a watery chuckle. “They were picking out wallpaper for the living room.”
Something passed across his face—grief, fury, tenderness, all braided together.
He pulled her close, pressing his mouth against her hair.
He held her for a long moment, his jaw resting against the top of her head, his breath unsteady.
She could feel him processing it all. Then he exhaled, pressed a kiss to her temple, and stepped back.
“Come,” he said, voice low and a little hoarse. “Let me show you what we’ve been working on.”
They walked the main hall, the hush between them filled with golden light and settling dust.
He led her into a wide, sun-filled room. Bare walls, bare floors—but the light poured in like a promise.
“The sitting room,” he said. “Large enough for everyone to gather. Imagine it—a fire in the hearth, books on the shelves. A place to read, to talk. A place where you and the children can settle without fear of having it ripped away.”
Across from it, a dining room with high ceilings and bare walls, but Cassia could already see the long tables filled with chatter, mismatched bowls, Matilde swatting a hand snatching an extra roll with mock severity.
“The kitchen is just through here,” Ark said, leading her into the heart of the house.
It was enormous, equipped with an equally enormous hearth.
Bright windows lined one wall, facing what would become the backyard—maybe an herb garden.
Counters stretched along either side, the beginnings of cabinetry taking shape.
Even half-finished, it already smelled faintly of cinnamon and something warm she couldn’t place.