Page 26

The sky stretched out like a canvas as the earth crunched beneath our boots.

Takoda once said that everything was connected, from the smallest seed to the most distant star, but as I studied the oil-painted night, its ambivalence appeared endless.

For what worries could the cosmos have over rocks and men?

“You’d never think anything was wrong just by looking up,” I said, voicing my musings aloud as Rowen and I ventured beyond the village.

“That’s the beauty of it,” he said with a smirk, our rucksack and supplies for the night strung over his shoulder. “That’s why I wanted to bring you here. It has the best views for stargazing.”

“Do many people know of this place?” I asked, stepping over a fallen log.

“It’s long been abandoned, and I’ve never shown it to anyone,” he said, pushing aside a curtain of branches, inviting me to pass through. “I’ve only ever come here alone, but now I want to share it with you.”

I stepped through the tunnel of trees as a hidden meadow unfolded before me. In the center of the secluded sanctuary, the ruins of a breathtaking temple emerged like a forgotten dream. “What is this?” I asked in an awed whisper.

“These are the ruins of Fleur Uaine. From what I understand, it used to be a lush and thriving garden temple,” Rowen said, leading me to a colonnade of arches and thin pillars crafted from white marble.

The delicate structure looked as though branches and vines had been coaxed into stone but were now slowly succumbing to time.

The overhead awnings were full of weathered gaps and tears.

But the intricate carvings upon the stone told tales of maidens dancing amidst lush hanging vines, fountains overflowing with water, and foliage cascading in abundance.

The ethereal temple, even now in its forgotten ruin, left me speechless.

“It’s beautiful,” I breathed, tracing my fingers along the etchings.

“This used to be one of my old sleeping camps,” he said as if he hadn’t been plagued with misery while searching for this sanctuary. “I found it after I escaped the Crypts the first time.”

My soul flame bond tightened painfully in my chest. Rowen’s memories weren’t even mine, but with our golden connection, they may as well be. I felt his emotions as strongly as my own. It was why I had been so drawn to him and could always feel him near.

An intrusive thought wiggled inside my brain. Had Maddock suddenly felt a swift tug on his heart? Was he questioning why now, in this exact moment, he suffered from a memory he couldn’t quite recall?

I wanted to feel empathy, but all I felt was anger. If Madds was experiencing pain from Rowen’s past, then it served him right for being a bond stealer.

I shook the thief from my mind as Rowen unfurled our bed and laid it in the center of the ruins.

“This is how you used to sleep?” I asked, lowering myself onto the thin bedroll. I understood roughing it, but this was something else entirely.

“I came here frequently, especially the nights you stayed in my dome,” he said, joining me on our bed for the night.

He rested his elbows on his knees and tilted his head toward me.

“As you know, I didn’t care much about what happened to me.

I used to come here to escape myself, but when you arrived, I came here to escape you.

” His gaze met mine, dark and swarming with desire.

“My will to keep away from you was weak. I knew if I stayed in the village, nothing would stop me from entering your room and taking you in my bed. I considered all the ways I could have you without anyone knowing. At night, after I was seen leaving you, I would steal my way back through the shadows and quietly open your door. I’d join you on the bed and slowly remove whatever thin bottoms you were wearing.

My fingers would inch open your thighs to bare you before me.

I would trace and tease you until you woke, and when your eyes shot wide, I’d clamp my palm over your mouth, silencing your screams as I sank my fingers deep inside you and made you come. ”

Desire flared along my touched-deprived skin, making my mouth water. “That’s what I always hoped you would do. Sleeping in your bed without you was agony."

“I believed I was protecting you. Escaping here. Sleeping under the stars is what granted me the strength to stay away. Though when I used to come here, the land was thick and ripe with life, but now . . .” His throat tightened as he looked at the desolate scene, the dead leaves and vines hanging around us.

“Most nights, I’d be lucky if I made it to one of my encampments.

I would walk circles around the village, waking to find I’d collapsed from exhaustion, sleeping wherever I fell, my gaze always tilted towards the heavens. ”

My heart twisted thinking of the life he’d led after escaping Fou. “I know the feeling of using the sky as an escape. It’s what I used to do when I was younger.”

“You once shared with me how you felt trapped in your old life. How you would look at the stars for hours, taking comfort in the fact that somewhere, something was free. Even if it was only a speck of light in the sky.”

“You remember that?”

“I hang onto your every word. I always have.”

“Even though so much has happened, I still feel like that trapped girl.”

“Keira, you are no longer caged. Look at the stars. Do they look free to you?”

“Yes,” I whispered as the pinpricks of light glimmered above.

Though my gaze was looking into the past, I knew my eyes were scanning across prophecies of the future, placed there by the Elder Spirits.

One, somewhere, even spoke of me and my return to Luneth.

The Synodic Son who would bring life and light back to the dying lands.

“The stars are but a reflection of your eyes. You are free,” Rowen said, holding my gaze gently.

“Remember your telescope? The one you told me about. You just have to turn the lens inward. See yourself the way the heavens do. The way I do. What must the heavens think of your beautiful soul? Seeing past the flesh and blood, witnessing the living embodiment of itself. Isn’t that why we were created?

For the universe to see itself through our eyes? ”

“That’s a comforting thought,” I said, genuinely trying to take Rowen’s advice and turn the lens inward, to see myself as the heavens might. “You really think this will help?”

“It can’t hurt to try,” he said with a hopeful smile, lying back on the bedroll and patting the space beside him.

I joined him on our sorry excuse for a bed, already worrying how my back would react to this .

He pulled a blanket from his pack and draped it over our separated bodies. Though the quilt kept me warm, I wished I could curl into him and fill the distance between us. But we remained our usual twelve inches apart, stargazing from within the roofless ruins.

I had doubts about sleeping in the middle of nowhere with barely a blanket, but the views of Fleur Uaine made it all worth it. I could see why Rowen loved this place, and if it weren’t for the single crease between his brows, it would appear as if he slept peacefully.

My finger itched to smooth away the worry line, but I kept my hands achingly by my sides.

Eventually, I allowed myself to drift. The rise and fall of Rowen’s chest, along with the churning galaxies and shooting stars, eased me into a meditative state.

The threads of the cosmos unraveled before me, and I carefully pushed through the tendrils of light that dangled like vines.

I searched each strand, hoping to find the one that would solve all my problems.

Suddenly, my gaze fell upon a black, void-like string. Its eerie sound hummed within me and pulled on my senses like a powerful magnet.

A mounting pressure grew in my skull, and my bones vibrated. It wasn’t until it was too late that I realized it wasn’t a single thread at all. It was a net.

The black threads sprang apart and enveloped me, their sinewy tendrils wrapping around my body. There was no time to struggle or react as the threads held me fast and dragged me into oblivion .

Like a butterfly ensnared, I was swept away, and the celestial lights around me vanished.

I was somewhere dark. Very dark.

There were no stars or galaxies overhead, no ancient ruins surrounding me, only a dank chill that crept up my spine.

“What is this?” said a voice that leeched the warmth from my body. “A little dreamer come to visit?”

As my eyes adjusted, I realized I’d been here before. I was in the crevice, trapped with the Dark Spirit I’d banished here. Memories of what it took to imprison him flooded back and stole the breath from my lungs.

I needed to get out. Now. I would find no answers here, and I was a fool for falling into Erovos’ trap.

I searched for the golden thread that would guide me back to Rowen, but the Dark Spirit rushed towards me like a tornado of shadows, and my fingers trembled as I scrambled for my soul flame bond.

When I finally managed to grab hold of it, I pulled, but the frayed thread from where Madds had severed our bond took me by surprise, and I ended up yanking it sideways.

Suddenly, the cave opened in a rush of grey stone. Though the dark cave remained behind me, the night sky twinkled before me like a movie screen, revealing two bodies lying side by side. Weathered white arches framed the figures who faced each other without touching.

“Ah, how interesting,” Erovos hummed from the dark recesses of the cave. “You are full of surprises, my little light.”

I peered closer, immediately recognizing Rowen sleeping on a thin bedroll. A woman lay beside him, her brown hair spilling over her shoulder to reveal one perfectly pointed ear. Even though they weren’t touching, envy blazed through my blood .

The woman’s lonely fingers reached for Rowen’s body, and her skin begged for his warmth.