Page 22 of Silver Claws, Crimson Tears
I ignore the dragon’s mockery. My world narrows to the woman standing before me. She’s dirty, exhausted, but gloriously, impossibly alive. Her gaze holds mine, guarded yet somehow vulnerable. The air between us feels charged, crackling with everything unsaid.
For a heartbeat, I’m paralyzed by indecision. The last time we stood face to face, she laid herself bare, confessed her darkest secrets, admitted to killing Cindergrasp, revealed her true nature as a Weaver. She gave me everything, and I gave her nothing in return but shock and confusion.
The responsibility has rested with me these twelve months. Expecting her to reach out first now would make me the worst kind of coward. My feet move before I can second-guess myself. One step forward. Then another. Slow, deliberate. Zephyros growls low in his throat, but doesn’t stop me.
“I started to think I’d never see you again,” I say, my voice rougher than intended. “I thought?—”
Words fail me. How do I tell her about the sleepless nights? The way I’d wake up convinced I’d heard her voice? How I’d catch myself looking for her among the other Skyriders, in the training yard, around every corner?
Instead, I let my eyes speak for me. Let her see everything I’ve kept locked inside for a year, the worry, the regret, the longing that never faded.
Three more steps bring me within arm’s reach. Close enough to see the small cut above her eyebrow, the chapped state of her lips, the way her shoulders tremble slightly with exhaustion.
“I searched for you,” I whisper. “I tried but…”
Her breath catches. Something flickers across her face—surprise, perhaps, or disbelief. “Even after what I told you? Why?” Her voice is barely audible, rasped through a parched throat.
“Because none of it matters.” The truth rushes out of me like a breaking dam. “Not your secrets, not Cindergrasp, not the laws I’ve sworn to uphold. I tried to make it matter. I tried to remember my duty. But in the end, all that mattered was that you were gone, and I?—“
I reach for her hand, slowly enough that she could pull away if she wanted. She doesn’t. Her fingers are ice-cold, trembling as they slide against mine.
“I missed you,” I finish simply. It’s nowhere near enough, but it’s the truest thingI’ve ever said.
She sways slightly on her feet. Exhaustion or emotion, I can’t tell. But my arms are already moving, ready to catch her, to hold her, to never let her vanish again.
Her fingers tighten around mine, and something breaks open inside my chest. Relief crashes through me like a tidal wave, washing away a year’s worth of doubt and despair. The feeling expands, filling every hollow space the grief carved out, until I can barely breathe with the force of it.
And beneath that relief—or perhaps wrapped around it—is something else. Something I’ve been fighting since I first saw her in that balcony at the Rite of Flight. Something I tried to deny when she stood before me just over the ridge, confessing her darkest truths.
Love.
The realization settles into my bones with the certainty of ancient stone. I love this woman. This impossible, rule-breaking, stubborn woman who turned my ordered world upside down. I’ve loved her through absence and uncertainty, through duty and conflict.
For twelve wretched months, I’ve risen each day with her name caught in my throat, gone to sleep each night with her face behind my eyelids. Not once in over three hundred and sixty-five days did my thoughts free themselves from her. Even as I performed my duties, led my Skyriders, upheld the laws I’ve sworn to defend, fought countless harpies, she was there, a constant presence in the chambers of my mind.
Looking at her now, thin and battered yet standing tall despite it all, how can I deny what my heart has known all along? I believed I teetered on the brink of loving her when she vanished, but I’d already plummeted long before that moment, and even her disappearance couldn’t diminish the profound emotions she stirred within me.
I wrap her in my arms, gentle as if cradling somethingprecious and broken. She feels smaller than I remember, all angles and bones where once there was strength. I breathe her in. Beneath the dirt and sweat lies something uniquely Rhealyn, something I’ve dreamed of for endless nights.
Her thin arms hang at her sides for several heartbeats before they slowly, hesitantly rise to encircle my waist. The touch is light, uncertain, nothing like the fierce woman who once challenged me at every turn.
Something cold settles in my stomach. I pull back slightly, studying her face. Her hazel eyes don’t shy away from mine, but they’re guarded, holding a shadow I can’t name.
“Rhealyn,” I whisper, suddenly afraid. “What happened to you?”
The question hangs between us, heavy with all that remains yet unknown. For a year she was gone, vanished into the mountain with that stranger who claimed her as his own. His words echo in my memory.
She is mine. A new era dawns.
I remember his terrible power, and the casual way he scooped her away. What did he do to her in those dark depths? What horrors has she endured?
My hands drop to her shoulders, holding her at arm’s length as doubts assail me from all sides. Has she been changed by whatever transpired? Is she even the same woman I’ve mourned for twelve months?
“You don’t have to speak of it now,” I say, seeing the exhaustion in her eyes. “But know that whatever happened, whatever was done to you?—”
I falter, unable to finish the thought. How can I promise protection when I failed her so completely before? How can I swear vengeance when I know nothing of her captor?
Instead, I offer the only truth I have. “I’m here. And I will never leave you.”
