Chapter 81
“No,” I whisper. I refuse to believe him as he tells me the deal he made with Maethrel. “You’ve known this whole time?” My voice breaks as my tears begin to fall.
“I’m sorry,” he whispers. “There was no other way.”
“There’s always another way!” I scream so loud the whole village might’ve heard me.
“We all cared about this cause above everything else, Elysande.” My heart is slowly breaking at every word that spills from his mouth. “At one point I thought… I thought we could just give up and run away together.”
“I would’ve,” I say weakly.
He shakes his head. “You’d never forgive yourself. If you had the power to save so many people, save Everrynd, and you gave it all up for me… I couldn’t let you do that.”
“You didn’t even give me a choice.” My voice is cracking and desperate.
“I couldn’t.” He holds onto my hands tighter.
“Maethrel said if I told any of you, our entire path would change, and we’d fail.
He said you’d give up if you knew. But I’m still sorry…
I’m sorry I let you fall for me. It was the most selfish thing I could’ve possibly done.
I tried to fight it, I did. Even though Maethrel assured me that it was an inevitability.
I still fought it, because I knew where that would leave you in the end.
But the truth is, I was already falling for you before that.
I was screwed. I’m sorry,” he finishes with a whisper.
“Don’t you dare apologize,” I say. “I would choose you again and again and again. In every life. I do not hold it against you. Thank you for loving me. But this isn’t the end. There must be a way.”
“Elysande.” His voice and eyes are so gentle now, it crushes my heart into a million pieces.
Not even pieces. Dust. My chest is empty where my beating heart used to sit.
“I started this to save my people. And so many others. But I fell so deeply, madly, eternally in love with you that I would have run away with you in a heartbeat if you asked me to. I would have done anything you asked me to. But I couldn’t put that choice in your hands.
So I suffered in silence, enjoying every minute with you I could.
Every laugh, every cry, every flip of your hair, every whiff of that intoxicating seaside scent, every taste of you, every moan of pleasure.
I spent countless nights lying in bed beside you until my eyes refused to stay open, just looking at your peaceful, sleeping face.
When we were apart, every single fucking day that I couldn’t get back to you tore me apart from the inside out.
I knew what those days meant…” His face fills with anguish.
“Less time in this life with you. The physical torture I endured was nothing compared to the knowledge that my limited days with you were being taken from me one at a time.”
I whimper as tears stream down my face, and he reaches out to brush them away with his thumbs. “There has to be a way.” I won’t say goodbye like he’s trying to. I refuse to accept this.
“My soul is already trying to leave my body. There’s nothing we can do to save me. And I won’t end up like one of Maethrel’s—”
“Fuck Maethrel,” I seethe, surprising myself with the venomous response that filled me with rage.
A ghost of a smile touches his lips as he continues to watch me tenderly.
“Does it hurt?”
“Every second,” he says, shoving a knife through my empty chest cavity. He’s been in pain this whole time, his soul trying to rip free from his physical form like it knows it’s not meant to be there. I reach out and touch his chest gently, feeling the scar that took him from me.
“How could I not know?” I say weakly through the tears, shaking my head.
“Shh.” He grabs me, pulling me into him, and I try to inhale his entire essence through my choked sobs, but I can barely breathe, and it makes me sob even harder.
“Who… did… it?” I ask, unable to hide the promise of vengeance in my tone. I’ll hunt them down. I’ll scour every corner of this world until I see them bleed.
“It doesn’t matter.”
I pull back. “Tell. Me.”
He twists his lip into a corner, then releases a heavy breath. “Adrian.”
“He’s dead.” I say. But I mean it with every fragment of my being. I won’t spend my last moments with Daegan letting him consume another piece of my thoughts, though. That’s for another time. Instead, I wrap my arms around his torso and breathe him in.
We stay like this for a while before I’m ripped out of the moment, realizing Maetrel might still be nearby.
I pull back in desperation, glancing around. “Maethrel!” I scream. “He can fix this. He has to fucking fix this.”
Kezra is watching from a distance. She’s sitting on a rocky ledge, and I could be completely delirious, but I think I see a tear stream down her cheek.
“Kezra?” I cry out desperately.
She shakes her head in dismay, her eyelids fluttering down.
“There’s nothing anyone can fucking do?”
“Elysande,” Daegan says calmly, pulling me into him again.
I push off. “No. I can’t stand here and accept this.”
“Raef!” I scream his name and turn around. It’s a broken, shrieking, desperate plea, and it feels like a knife cutting my throat from the inside. “Raef!”
“Elysande!” Daegan’s voice is raised, pleading. “Please.” His voice finally cracks, and it forces me to turn and face him. His heartbreakingly calm eyes look right into my soul, and I step closer to him again. “I don’t have much time left.
My stomach flips. “How long do you have?” I whisper, and I’ve never feared an answer more than I do in this moment. The moment that will forever be the worst one of my life.
“Until the dragons fly,” he whispers.
He pulls me close, placing a frantic kiss on my wet, salty lips as he squeezes the sides of my face with his desperate hands. Then he pulls me into his chest and strokes my hair.
I tilt my head just enough to look up, and my stomach drops once again. The veil has cleared a massive section of the sky directly above us. Thousands of tiny lights twinkle at us, and it feels like they’re laughing at me.
Fuck those stars.
I can’t bear to look at them. If this is the last night I have with him, I will forever hate those stars that are watching, mocking.
I don’t want any of it if it means he won’t be here.
I’ve dreamed about seeing them my entire life, and now all I want in the world is for the haze to reform and cover them all up, keeping Daegan safe down here with me forever. But it’s too late now.
I want to throw up.
“We’ll tell them not to fly!” My words tumble out of me in a rush. “If they never fly, you can stay with me forever.”
A shard of hope sparks in me, before a simple shake of his head and a pained look in his eye smothers it just as quickly. “It’s not just about that. A few years living like this, and I’ll end up like one of Maethrel’s wraiths. I don’t have much time either way.”
I squeeze my eyes shut and bury my face in his chest. My home. I breathe him in again, squeezing my eyes so tight I think I can shut out the world. It doesn’t work.
Maybe they still can’t fly. The sky is clearing and not a single dragon has taken flight yet. Maybe the curse did irreparable damage. Maybe after a thousand years of being forced on the ground, they simply lost the ability. Maybe it was all a cruel joke made by Maethrel.
A dreadful, dark feeling tells me that’s not true, though.
“We did it!”
Raef’s victorious voice makes me jump, but my tight grip on Daegan remains strong. I don’t turn. I keep my face buried in his chest. I’m never letting go.
“I heard you call me from all the way over there. I almost thought you were in trouble, but you guys actually did it!”
I sob into Daegan’s chest again.
“What’s wrong?” Raef asks hesitantly, his tone shifting.
Daegan wraps me in his arms tighter, stroking the back of my head. He doesn’t answer Raef right away.
“Guys? What the fuck? Where’s Kezra?”
“I’m here,” I hear Kezra from somewhere behind me, her voice monotone, almost… sad.
“What’s going on?”
“The blue dragon made a deal with Maethrel long ago, during your first visit with him. The oracle saw the only possible way for you guys to succeed involved Daegan’s demise.
He’s known this entire time and only just revealed it to us.
Explains why I’ve sensed something different about him since he found us after the battle…
” she trails off at the end, talking more to herself.
“What?”
“He’s dead,” Kezra explains more bluntly.
“What the fuck are you talking about Kezra? He’s right there. Alive and well.”
I try to tune out the painful story being told again, pressing myself so deep into him I almost think we could merge into one person.
I focus on the deep tenor of Daegan’s voice and the rumbling in his chest as he summarizes the story again for Raef.
I tune out the details, unable to hear it again.
I just want to feel him, absorb him with all of my senses.
“You fucking prick.”
Raef is mad. Madder than I’ve ever heard him. Daegan says nothing as he continues to hold me, occasionally kissing the top of my head.
“So do we just sit up here and wait until one of them flies?” Raef scoffs, anger and sarcasm tinging his words.
“It’s only a matter of time. Seems like a nice enough place to… wait. You’re all here now.”
My chest. My fucking chest. I can’t breathe.
“Why the fuck didn’t you tell me you stubborn bastard,” Raef says with anger dripping in his voice. But worse than that… I hear acceptance.
“You know why.” Daegan doesn’t sound angry or hurt or scared. He sounds like he’s accepted his fate, and he’s enjoying his last moments with his loved ones with peace and serenity. It breaks my heart even more. “Has anyone tried yet?”
“No,” Raef answers. “They’re afraid to. Much of the veil still remains.” His words are tinged with deep sorrow and less anger.
I finally pull my head away from Daegan’s chest, still holding on, but enough to look back at Raef. Our eyes lock, and our anguish mirrors each other’s.
He shakes his head, breaking eye contact, and takes a seat on the sandy hill. He looks up at the sky and exhales. “This was supposed to be the best moment of our lives,” he mumbles.
Daegan turns me around, keeping his arms around me as he guides us to the ground. He leans back on his hands and I lean against his chest. I don’t know what else to do except sit here and just be with him.
“Stupid fucking stars,” I mumble, refusing to look up at them.
But it’s hard to avoid now. The veil is dissipating more with every passing, anguished moment.
“Daegan,” I say softly, unable to muster anything more. “Do you… want to try?”
“No.” His answer is immediate. Certain. “I’m staying right here. With you.”
“Okay,” I whisper.
We watch the dragons assembling below, now illuminated by the light of the stars and the moon somewhere. I don’t care to look. I’m more spellbound by the way everything looks at night now. Bright. Glowing.
And then it happens.
With the flap of a dragon’s wings, my whole world is changed.
I whip around to look at him. My heart and soul.
Our eyes lock, possibly for the last time, and so many emotions flood his eyes.
He looks sad, but also grateful, serene, and most of all, he looks at me with so much love that I could never possibly doubt it.
“I hope you live the best life, Elysande. Be happy, be brave, and be fierce. I’ll be waiting for you.”
He glances at Raef, his best friend, for a moment. He nods, his expression full of gratitude. “Look out for each other. Unite Everrynd.”
We both nod as my eyes well again. I don’t want to look behind me. I hold his gaze, and for a moment, I let myself hope. Maybe he got it wrong. Maybe Maethrel found a way.
But as I hear the flapping of massive wings rising on the air behind me, I somehow know.
“Goodbye, Elysande. My star.”
“I love you with my whole heart and soul, Daegan Vaelor. Always.” A chocking sound escapes me as I reach out and wrap an arm around him, lowering him to the sand.
And then I watch as the life leaves Daegan’s eyes.
His hand goes limp in mine, his strong, steady presence already gone, just like that.
A sound escapes me that I can’t describe as I fall against his chest, sobbing, and the world blurs around me.