Page 30 of Ignite
“How are you feeling this morning?” she asks Brielle.
Aster leans toward Brielle slightly, watching her closely.
“Better,” Brielle answers simply. “Mylah has been a very gracious healer.”
Willow nods, pleased, but tension refills the space within seconds.
Brielle is right—despite her knowing them in the last war, and Leda growing up hearing about their honor from our mother, it doesn’t change the fact that we don’t know who they arenow.
Leda clears her throat, looking at Aster. “So you fought together in the wyvern fleet?”
Aster looks up at her. His eyes reflect the sadness in Brielle’s and Willow’s expressions.
“Brielle was our second,” he explains. “We were all in the Alpha Fleet together during the war.”
A war that was over three hundred years ago.
“You two never came back,” Brielle says suddenly, the anger in her gaze fading as she shifts toward Willow. “You said you wouldn’t, but… I didn’t think it would truly last. We are family, Willow.” She clears her throat and looks down. “Wewerefamily.”
Willow’s eyes flicker, pain flashing across her face before she takes a deep breath and looks back up. It’s not hard to imagine them all on the Alpha Fleet—Brielle as the second in command with her natural instincts and ability to lead those around her, Aster with his calm demeanor, and Willow with her bravery.
I may not know Willow and Aster, but there’s no denying the warriors that they once were—that they still are. It’s easy to tell by the way their eyes watch our movements, and in how they saved us.
“The realm is not what it once was,” Willow grits out, but any hostility in the words is softened by the anguish in her voice. “We were drawn here, a place where the darkness hasn’t reached.”
My brows pull together. Not long ago, Crea was the only place darkness had seeped into—with its dodder vine infestation and corrupt ruling class, Penyth looked like the golden child of the two.
Now, I’m not so sure. Not after the trial ended with so many souls lost, and especially not with the wyverns’ arrival.
“But the realm has been at peace for years,” Leda says slowly. “Until the wyverns arrived, Penyth had been thriving beneath Queen Evelina’s rule.”
Willow falls into silence, her mouth pressed into a thin line. The longer she remains quiet, the more tension fills the air. Finally, she releases a long breath, her eyes drifting back to Ledaas she says, “There is never such a thing as peace, just preparing for when the next war will begin.”
I glance at Leda and find understanding reflecting in her gaze.
“I think we can all agree we don’t know what the future holds.” Leda’s even and strong voice reverberates through the room. “What we know is the present, and that’s what our focus should be on.”
I couldn’t agree with her more.
My future has always been either uncertain or filled with dread.Futureused to be a word Reichardt would use to remind me I would always belong to a man—be it him or the husband he would choose for me. Then, when I came to Penyth, it became something new. Something terrifying. I didn’t know what would become of my magic or where I fit in the world.
Now, I still don’t know what it means to have my trial abruptly ended—if I’ve lost my chance to connect to immortality or if Eurydice will give us another chance. My eyes slide to Calix, and I see the same trepidation written across his face. I wasn’t the only one to have their trial cut short.
Not only that, but I don’t have a solution for getting Graylen back. Nor do I have one to release the souls from the Vale that don’t belong there.
The present is the only thing that tethers me to sanity.
“Then let’s start with how you all found yourselves on the edge of the Shadow Lands,” Aster finally says.
I look to Brielle, unsure what to give away, but she nods, encouraging me to go on.
“The last trial—mine and Calix’s—ended before it could finish.” I start from the place I can pinpoint where things truly started to go wrong. It was more than just my magic presenting in ways it shouldn’t, more than learning who I was and coming to Penyth.
Willow and Aster share a look.
“Ended?” Willow asks.
I nod and focus on keeping my voice steady as I say, “Everything was going fine through the first two trials, but the third… Vidaris found a way to corrupt it. Sacrifices were made to get us out, but not everyone made it.”
