Page 34 of Ignite
Still, I can’t do this alone.
We follow Willow and Aster to the tree through which we entered the village, but it’s no longer open. No staircase to access or way down.
It isn’t long before the sound of splitting bark rumbles in front of us, and I’m transported back to the moment I left Crea. Back to when I didn’t know fae existed and only knew what I had been taught about Penyth my whole life. When I still thought my father was Reichardt—harmless compared to my true father. It was also when I still had Graylen by my side.
Willow and Aster step through the door she created, shaking me from my thoughts.
“I will find you, Graylen, but I have to save our home for you to have one to come back to.”I send the words down our silent bond, hoping that they’re able to reach him somehow. Hoping that he finds a way to hold on.
Calix and I walk side by side through the forest, the ground quiet and the light dimmed.
The trees shift above us, leaves fluttering to the ground as limbs shake. I can’t see anything other than branches swaying from this far away—if I didn’t know any better, it could be a forest animal bouncing through the trees.
“The village is beginning to wake,” Willow explains. “Kauri doesn’t come to life until dusk at the earliest, usually closer to the moon rising.”
Aster walks ahead of us and calls over his shoulder, “They’re up early today with all of the excitement.”
It isn’t long before voices begin to filter down to us; children laughing, women singing. It’s as if they all awoke to a bell only they could hear, filling the branches above us with the first real signs of life since we’ve arrived.
“Excitement?” I ask.
Willow raises a brow at me, and it hits me.
Us.We’rethe excitement.
We walk until I can catch glimpses of the sun nearing the horizon, the canopy of trees spread just far enough apart for me to see the sky.
A rush of anticipation fills my chest, the emotion leaving the faint taste of fresh strawberries in my mouth. The overwhelming need to fly comes after it, filling my veins with the weightlessness of free-falling and leaving me dizzy enough that I have to brace my hand on a tree.
“Lu?” Calix asks, turning to me. His hand softly lands on my shoulder as his face swims into view. “You okay?”
Zeph.
“My wyvern is up to something,” I huff out, my voice caught between amusement and suspicion.
I’m still getting used to feeling her emotions alongside mine, but what she’s feeling now is impossible to ignore. Each moment we spend together, each time we fly, it strengthens our bond. I might not have been able to read her emotions without being right beside her a full moon ago, but now it’s as clear as my own.
Calix’s hand flies to his chest, and I can see his eyes shift from pure joy to wonderment, his breath catching.
“Arryth,” he breathes, and I know he’s experiencing something similar. “He’s calling out to me.”
Willow chuckles in front of us, pausing for us to catch up. “They know we’re getting close,” she says with a broad smile, her eyes crinkling at the corners. “Follow me.”
Calix and I follow behind her and Aster, the light whooshing of waves crashing against rocks growing louder with each step we take. I watch Aster and Willow interact, their hands grazing but never fully slipping into the other’s. Not as if they’re embarrassed or hiding it, but simply because they can’t help touching every few breaths.
A lump forms in my throat when Aster reaches out to tuck Willow’s hair behind her ear, her answering smile soft and content. From the way his hand is angled, I catch sight of a pale white scar on his hand—jagged and running across his palm.
I’ve seen that before.
My eyes flick to Willow’s left hand, the same scar across hers.
“Do you think they got those scars in the war?” I lean over and ask Calix, hoping it’s quiet enough that they don’t hear me.
Calix gives me a strange look and shakes his head. “They’re soulbonded,” he whispers back. “Bound together for life through blood and ceremony. That’s the mark left behind, but I’ve never seen it happen myself. Just stories of how they formed them. The blessing of the soulbond disappeared far before I was born.”
My gaze flickers back to them, realizing their relationship goes so much deeper than I thought it did. It makes me remember Ellerry’s words when we were in her tree house duringtraining:“A mate hasn’t been found since the split of the Valon Empire…the pull just disappeared.”
Whatever curse Moros cast on the empire didn’t just affect the land; it affected its people. It may keep the humans and fae separated, “fixing” the issue of division, but in reality…it only made the divide wider.
