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Chapter sixteen

HYACINTH

Tension pulled at the seams of the room, my eyes following every stride Landers took as he paced back and forth in front of me. His hands were clamped tightly behind his back while I gnawed at my cuticles, waiting for him to say something— anything .

I had never planned on mentioning the Fallen Ones, but when they asked . . . I just knew keeping it from them was not going to win us any allies.

When the meeting had come to an end, Andrues immediately found any other place to be while we waited for the Elders’ answer to our request for aid. The current of unease that crackled around us was palpable.

Landers finally glanced in my direction and fell into the chair across from me, running a hand through his hair. The muscles in his jaw flexed as he propped his chin onto his fist.

Now that he was staring at me, I wished he would stop. Wished he would go back to his pacing and look anywhere else.

“You’re mad at me,” I stated, tucking a curl behind my ear as I forced myself to meet his gaze.

“Yes,” Landers responded simply, giving a shallow nod.

“Do you want me to leave?”

His brows furrowed at the question. “What do you mean?”

I shrugged my shoulders, pulling my eyes away from his as I plucked on a loose seam in the blanket covering my legs.

“Do you want me to give you space? Or go back to Locdragoon?”

Landers was quiet for a long moment and I could feel his gaze still flowing over me. I lifted my eyes back to his as he let out a weighted sigh and dragged a hand over his face.

“No, Hyacinth.” He leaned forward as he said the words, resting his elbows onto each of his knees. “I am capable of holding two emotions for you at once. I can be mad, while still loving you just the same.”

The corners of his lips tilted up as he said the words, but the smile didn’t reach his eyes.

A deep breath filled my lungs as I pushed myself off the couch, closing the distance between us in just a few steps.

I straddled his lap, my arms wrapping around his neck as I rested my forehead against his.

The warmth of his body seeped into mine, comforting and familiar.

“Thank you.” I breathed as his hands found my waist, sliding his arms around my back and pulling me closer.

I didn’t know if he truly understood that the way he loved me healed parts of my soul I thought could never be mended.

“I should have spoken to you first before bringing up the Fallen Ones and I’m sorry for that.”

He pulled his head from mine, running a hand over my jaw as his thumb traced my cheek. The sadness in his eyes that I was becoming all too familiar with flashed behind the emerald and my hands shot to both sides of his face.

“What’s wrong, Landers? What is going on inside of you that you aren’t telling me?” My voice was pleading, begging him to let me in as I locked my gaze on his.

As he opened his mouth to speak, a knock sounded at the door of our guest home and his eyes snapped toward it. I slid off his lap as he stood, letting my hands fall to my sides as he strode over to the door and opened it. Gimara stood on the other side of the threshold.

“Landers,” she greeted with a soft nod as he opened the door wide enough for me to come into her view.

“Please, Gimara, come in.” He gestured his arm toward me but she held up a hand to stop him.

“I was hoping to speak with Hyacinth for a moment, alone.” Landers’s eyes flashed to me, worry embedded in his irises. “Will you walk with me?” she asked, leaning around him and meeting my gaze.

I nodded, grabbing my jacket from the back of the couch as I passed by and slipped my arms into it.

Gimara stepped a few paces away from the door as I approached and turned her back to us. I knew she could feel the heavy unease that saturated the room. Landers’s hand caught softly around my forearm as I moved to step through the opening and I glanced up to see fear staining his eyes.

“I love you, Hyacinth,” he said quietly, the cadence of his voice almost pained as his eyes flickered to Gimara’s back for one fleeting moment before he pulled them back to me.

I lifted my hand to cup his cheek, my lips parting to speak but he interjected before the words could come out.

“Tell me you love me.” Confusion flooded my features as I stared back at him, the crease between my brows deepening at the panic that was beginning to creep onto his face.

“Landers, what—”

“Please,” he cut me off. His voice was almost inaudible as he pulled me closer.

“Of course I love you,” I said, placing my other hand against his jaw. He leaned into my touch, bringing his hand up to hold mine in place.

“Hyacinth,” Gimara called and my eyes glanced toward her before looking back to Landers.

“I need to go.”

Landers nodded as he turned his head, his lips grazing against my palm before letting it fall to my side and shutting the door behind me.

“I apologize,” I said, rushing to Gimara’s side as she began walking the worn stone pathway leading away from our small bungalow.

“Trouble in paradise?” she quipped, raising a brow as she looked over at me.

My cheeks flushed and a nervous laugh slipped from my mouth as I folded my arms over my chest, but I didn’t answer. I wasn’t even sure how to answer her.

I cleared my throat, following after her as she took a right on the splitting path into the cedar trees that covered Ithia’s mountains. “What can I help you with, High Priestess?”

“You may call me Mara, if you’d like. Gimara was my mothers name and it seems I have, like you, stepped into a life I did not have planned for myself.”

I glanced over at her, forcing a smile onto my lips as we walked through the forest. Birds sang above us as the fresh air brushed against our skin and she continued.

“Times are changing—I can see that. And whether or not Rilius and Sashi want to move on from the old traditions, they know that they will not be able to stop whatever change is coming, be it good or bad. I would like our realm—I would like Ithia—to learn to fight.”

I listened as we stepped out of the tree line where a large ruin sat before us.

The stones and pillars that now lay crumbling on the ground were covered in grasses with flowers blooming between their cracks. The walls that still stood had become home to vines of wisteria, their purple and pink blossoms swaying against the subtle breeze.

“This was once our most ancient temple,” Mara said, her voice quiet as she stepped into the rubble and brushed her fingers reverently over the wall.

The cadence of her tone was full of longing, sadness saturating every word. And as she looked from the stones to me, I could see the emotion swelling in her eyes.

“It was said to have been here long before the Gods ever came to this world, that it was the beacon that called them to Nimbria.” She tapped the rocks as a heavy breath slipped from her lips and continued walking deeper into the broken space.

“This was one of the first temples to fall at the start of the Great War. Instead of fighting for our home, instead of dying for our land and our people, we fled into the mountains, hiding from the violence that would find us either way. I watched as hundreds of thousands were slaughtered because we refused to fight, refused to protect ourselves and each other. I watched as the King and Queen and their children were murdered in Edvhir, my mother with them. I refuse to let my people suffer that same fate. I refuse to cower behind our traditions for a second time and pray that another realm will come to save us.”

There was so much grief—so much anger in her voice, as if she was speaking for every lost soul that died on these peaks all those centuries ago.

I watched as the wind rustled the crimson strands of hair hanging around her face, almost as if it sang for her.

Sang the song of her people as it whistled through the cracks of this fallen temple.

She turned to face me, her large brown eyes landing on me with so much determination behind them as she raised her hands and lowered the cream cloth draped over her head.

“I will do whatever I must, Takaris, for the Yaldrin—for Ithia not to be wiped from the face of Nimbria. If that means waking the Fallen Ones, I will stand behind you, no matter what decision the Elders come to today,” Mara said as her hand slipped to the pommel of a blade strapped to her side.

I hadn’t noticed it until now, and as my eyes ran over its surface I realized she was the only person in Ithia I’d ever seen carry a weapon.

I smiled at her then, as understanding flowed through our intertwined gaze, knowing that we would both sacrifice the people we were, to save the people we love.

I stretched out my hand to her.

“Please, Mara, call me Cin.”

A radiant smile split onto her full lips at the sight of my outstretched hand. She shook it, bowing slightly before letting go and turning back to the ruins.

“Can I ask you a question?” I said, stepping to her side as she gave me a soft nod. “What does ‘Takaris’ mean? I have never been called that before.”

She tilted her head to look at me from the corner of her eye as she tried to hide the smile forming on her lips.

“ Mother of The People . Ithia is the only realm that still uses the dead language. Ris means ‘mother’ and Taka translates to ‘of the people.’ Names like this have always been given to the Gods. These names reflect what they mean to the Yaldrin as a people and are given by the Elders.”

“I see,” I said, my voice hushed as silence fell between us.

Pressure threatened to collapse my chest, to bring the sky down and trap me under the weight of it. So many people were relying on me to be the leader I didn’t know how to become.