Chapter 10
He didn't wake with a violent jolt or the frantic slamming of pulses this time. It was a slow, gentle drift upward through soft layers of consciousness, like rising through warm water to greet a calm shore.
The Healing Sleep was entirely over.
Garrett opened his eyes to a room bathed in the crisp, golden clarity of mid-morning.
The suffocating, metallic stench of The Abyss was gone, replaced by the sharp, clean scent of fresh linen and sun-warmed oak.
He lay perfectly still, his senses drinking in ordinary details that felt nothing short of miraculous after so long in the dark.
A gentle, hot breeze drifted through an open window, rustling the heavy curtains.
Somewhere downstairs, the muffled, musical sound of someone laughing echoed up through the floorboards.
It was a normal, beautiful, mundane day on Earth, and to a man who had forgotten the concept of daylight, it felt like holy ground.
“We are whole, my boy,” Aodhan murmured deep in his mind, his voice a steady, comforting rumble.
Garrett swallowed, his throat clear of blood for the first time he could remember.
Slowly, he threw back the heavy blankets.
His muscles protested, stiff and hollow from weeks of trauma, but the necrotic burn of the silver was gone.
He swung his legs over the edge of the mattress, his bare feet touching the cool, solid hardwood floor.
Gripping the bedside table, his knuckles turned white as his knees shook violently under his own weight. He planted his heels and pushed.
With a ragged, quiet breath, Garrett stood.
He was weak. His balance swayed like a reed in the wind, but he was upright on his own two feet. He belonged.
Standing by the window, the warmth of the sun baking into his bare chest, Garrett closed his eyes. The physical ease of his body was nothing compared to the sudden, silent rushing tide inside his mind.
His memories were returning… slowly.
They didn’t crash down like a broken dam, and they didn’t arrive with chronological precision.
Instead, his psyche began to stitch itself back together through a series of sudden, vibrant emotional snapshots.
He saw a flash of silver steel, then Carrick’s massive, scarred hand locking against his own wooden training sword centuries ago, a deep voice shouting correction over a rain-soaked courtyard.
He smelled the crisp, tart bite of stolen apples, accompanied by the distinct sound of a young Ruairí laughing from a distant farmhouse porch.
Then he was in the sky. The cold wind ripped past his face, his heavy wings catching a thermal draft while Colton’s younger, erratic flight pattern stabilized right on his left flank.
Grey. A memory of his brother slammed into his chest, warm and deafening. Grey was throwing his head back, laughing so hard his entire frame shook, a tankard of ale sloshing over the side in a crowded, noisy tavern in the village where they were raised.
And then… Sydney.
Her snapshots were different– not tied to places he could easily name or dates he could pinpoint.
They were pure, concentrated emotion. The fierce, terrifying heat of her golden fire.
The soft, specific scent of her hair when she leaned close.
The unyielding strength in her blue eyes when she refused to let go of his hand.
But as the fragments settled into the quiet corners of his brain, one massive, towering realization detached itself from the fog.
Garrett’s breath hitched, his hand gripping the wooden windowsill until the timber creaked. He didn't just remember his life before the prison. He remembered the prison itself. More specifically, he remembered how he had survived it.
He remembered waiting.
During those endless, agonizing years when Leviathan tore at his flesh, when the silver poisoning turned his blood to liquid fire, and Aodhan was forced to retreat into a dark vault, Garrett hadn't just been a passive victim.
He had made a deliberate, conscious choice every single second to endure the torment.
He had held onto his sanity with bleeding fingernails because somewhere deep within the core of his soul, past the torture and the darkness, he had known she was coming for him.
He didn't know how he could have possibly known. Before The Abyss, they had barely begun to understand what the Universe had done by joining their souls. She was untamed Magic, and he was a disciplined soldier. They had been running out of time before they even had a chance to start.
Yet, in the deepest, most horrific throat of the Underworld, his soul had remained entirely certain of her. He had known she would cross Realms. He had known she would defy Demon Lords. He had known she would put her body between him and the Darkness.
That realization almost destroyed him.
It didn't come with a dramatic shout or a burst of destructive Dragonfire. It was a quiet, devastating collapse inside his chest. A single, hot tear slid down his cheek, reflecting the bright Texas sun.
He bent forward, bracing both hands against the windowsill as his composure quietly unraveled. No battlefield. No enemy. No chains. Just the unbearable realization that someone had loved him enough to walk into Hell.
The rich, dark aroma of roasted beans served as his North Star, guiding his unsteady legs down the winding stone staircase of the huge house.
Sydney stood at the kitchen island, her back to him as she poured hot water into a French press.
She was finally out of her dust-caked jeans, wearing an oversized gray sweatshirt with the sleeves pushed up to her elbows.
Her blond curls were tied back in a loose ponytail, a few stray tendrils catching the warm morning light.
Garrett’s bare feet made no sound on the tile, but she must have felt the sudden shift in the air, because she turned.
Her blue eyes widened, her entire body freezing as her gaze swept over his upright frame. Neither of them spoke immediately. The silence stretched between them, thick with everything they had survived, until Sydney finally managed to break the spell.
She crossed her arms. Her brow furrowed in a mock-stern line. “You’re supposed to be in bed, Dragon Man.”
Garrett leaned his shoulder heavily against the doorframe to steady his balance, his lips twitching. “I smelled coffee.”
Sydney looked at him for a beat, a soft, genuine smile melting the tension from her shoulders. “Good. Your priorities are still entirely intact.”
She gestured toward one of the heavy oak chairs at the dining table, and Garrett didn't argue. He navigated the short distance and sank into the seat, his muscles letting out a quiet sigh of relief.
Sydney moved efficiently, pouring a dark, steaming stream into a ceramic mug and sliding it across the table into his palms. Garrett wrapped his calloused hands around the warm clay, lifting it to his face to breathe in the steam.
He took one slow, deliberate sip, closed his eyes, and sighed, “...Yeah.”
The liquid heat spread comfort straight down into his chest. After a long pause, he looked back up at her. “I definitely remember coffee.”
It was so normal. No jagged portals were tearing the sky, no roaring primordial waters, and no Demon Lords demanding blood. It was just two people, a quiet kitchen, and a fresh pot of coffee in the Texas sun.
Garrett stared down into the dark, swirling depths of his ceramic mug. The sudden silence in the kitchen turned heavy, thick with the unsaid truths he had been carrying since the moment he woke.
Sydney didn't push him, even though he could feel that she wanted to. No, she leaned against the counter opposite him, her hands wrapped around her own cup, waiting patiently for him to find the words.
Listening to her thoughts as they flowed through the Mating Bond, he suddenly understood that she had learned the cadence of his mind. She knew he was a soldier who processed things methodically, and that he would build an internal defense before stepping into the open.
Finally, Garrett set his mug down with a soft, hollow click against the oak table. He didn't look up immediately.
"I don't remember everything, Sydney," he admitted, his voice dropping into a low, gravelly rasp that betrayed the sudden tension in his broad shoulders.
He forced his eyes to lift, locking his lavender gaze onto hers.
"The snapshots are coming back. I remember training with Carrick.
I remember Grey's laugh. I remember the smell of the orchard.
" He swallowed hard, his jaw tightening.
"But there are massive, gaping black holes in my head where my life used to be.
Entire years are just... gone. Wiped clean by whatever Leviathan did to my mind while Aodhan was locked away. "
She listened quietly as he spoke, her expression softening. She didn't flinch, and she didn't offer a hollow, easy platitude. She just nodded slowly, letting him speak his fear into the sun-drenched room.
Garrett leaned forward, his large hands gripping the edges of the table until his knuckles turned white.
The next question scraped out of his throat, carrying the raw, terrifying vulnerability of a man who had always been the protector, now completely exposed.
"What if all I can ever offer you is what's left?
What if the pieces Leviathan broke are permanently gone?
What if the man you knew before the Abyss– the one who belonged to Dragon Guard, the one who was supposed to be your perfect counterweight– is dead in that cavern? "
The silence that followed was all-encompassing. The gentle Texas breeze continued to rustle the kitchen curtains, but inside the room, time seemed to stand entirely still.