Page 5 of Stormvein (The Veinbound Trilogy #2)

Chapter Three

ELLIE

When obedience breaks, the fragments cut both jailer and bound.

Authority Codes

The last mile to Stonehaven feels like it takes an eternity. Each step requires more effort than it should, the strange energy straining against the edges of my control. But it’s not only the power threatening to break loose, it’s the crushing weight of what we’ve lost.

He can’t be gone. He can’t be.

The words circle in my mind like a prayer I don’t believe anymore.

I force the grief down. If I let myself think that he’s dead, if I accept that I watched him die and couldn’t save him …

I don’t know if I’ll be able to survive it.

The power responds to that terror, clawing at my ribs from the inside.

My eyes burn with tears I refuse to shed. Not here. Not when I have to face his people and watch while Varam tells them their hope is gone.

The mountain path we’re walking along is familiar now, but it blurs as exhaustion presses behind my eyes. The fatigue is nothing compared to the ache in my heart. We’re returning as bearers of the worst news imaginable. Their Vareth’el is never coming home.

How do we tell them? How do we look at their faces and destroy all the hope they found with his return?

We stop when we reach the hidden entrance.

Varam places his palm against the rock face.

I’m sure I see his hand shaking before he gets control of it.

He’s been silent for miles, speaking only when he needed to change our direction.

The stone shimmers to reveal the passage we left through just days ago.

This time, the mist stalker glides silently at my side … and Sacha doesn’t.

I should have done something. I should have learned how to control this power faster. I should have found a way to reach him before ? —

Two guards straighten as we enter, their eyes immediately searching our group.

One nods at Varam, confusion clear in his expression when he counts us, recounts, then searches behind us for a figure that isn’t there.

He looks at Varam, but Sacha’s commander doesn’t meet his gaze.

This isn’t the place to talk about what happened.

The second guard stares at the mist stalker, then at the silver light surrounding me.

His mouth falls open before discipline forces it shut.

But I see the shock there. I’m not what I was when I left this place.

I’m something else now. Something born from loss and rage and power I never wanted.

We walk through the tunnels in silence. The familiar amber glow of lightstones illuminates our path, but everything is different now.

Wrong . The shadows are empty and flat. I find myself watching them anyway, half-expecting them to shift and coalesce into his form, to hear his voice echoing from the darkness telling me this was all part of some plan I wasn’t told about.

They remain still. Ordinary . Just darkness without the life that gave them meaning.

Somewhere ahead are his quarters. His books, his maps, his journals. All of it waiting for a man who will never return.

The thought rips through me like teeth, and the power surges, flaring bright enough that the mist stalker turns its head toward me.

No. I won’t believe it. I can’t. If I accept he’s gone, I’ll have nothing left.

The central cavern falls silent when we emerge.

The kind of silence that comes before terrible news.

People stop mid-motion, conversations dying as they take in our appearance.

Worn clothes, exhausted faces, the look of people who have witnessed something unthinkable.

Several fighters who were there when we left for Ashenvale step forward, hope bright in their expressions until they begin to scan our group.

I watch as their expressions change. The dawning realization that settles over them. They’re counting, and the numbers don’t add up the way they should.

Six went out. Five have come back.

A woman’s hand flies to her mouth. A man takes a step backward.

They know. Even without us saying anything, they know we’ve lost him.

Lisandra cuts through the gathering crowd from the far side, but even she falters when she reaches us.

She’s too experienced not to read the signs.

The way Varam won’t lift his eyes, the grief carved into Mira’s face, the unnatural creature pacing at my side.

She glances at me, then to the glow that rises and falls with my heartbeat, to the mist stalker shadowing my steps.

But she doesn’t voice the questions that are clearly in her head. Instead, she turns to Varam.

“My quarters.” Her voice carries the tone of command, but there’s a tremor beneath it.

We follow her through the cavern. The mist stalker draws stares and whispers. A few children point at it, wide-eyed, but their parents quickly pull them away before they can get too close.

How do we tell them that he’s dead? How do I explain that I watched it happen and couldn’t stop it?

Lisandra’s quarters are laid out like Sacha’s, but where his held maps and weapons, hers is more austere. A few personal items hint at a life beyond command, but everything else serves a clear purpose. She closes the door behind us and faces Varam.

“Report.”

Varam stiffens, clearly unaccustomed to being commanded by anyone other than Sacha. For a second, I think he’s going to refuse to reply, but then he sighs and straightens.

“We were caught leaving Ashenvale. Sereven was waiting for us. He has a new weapon. A crystal that …” He shakes his head. “I don’t know. When Sach—” He stops, his throat working as he swallows. “When Lord Torran tried to use his shadows, the crystal tore them apart.”

“His familiar … the raven …” Mira takes up the report when Varam falters.

“It came to her after he fell.” Her eyes close for a second, her composure almost breaking.

When she opens them again, they’re bright with tears.

“When it touched her, everything changed. A storm rose from nowhere. Something in her broke open. And then … this …” She turns her head to the mist stalker.

“She is prophecy brought to life. The Stormvein Lord.”

“I’m not a prophecy. I’m not a Veinblood. I don’t want that name. I want to find Sacha.”

“Ellie.” Mira says my name sadly. Like I’m a child who’s refusing to accept an obvious truth.

“He’s not dead. There wasn’t a body.” I don’t mean to shout, but the words burst out before I can stop them.

“There wouldn’t be.” Varam’s voice is gentle. “Not after what you saw.”

“You don’t know that.” I clench my fingers to stop them from shaking. “None of us know what that crystal did.”

My throat locks up. There’s not enough air in the room … in my lungs … in the world.

“You don’t know.” I can’t hide the desperation in my voice. “He could be hurt somewhere. He could be trapped. He could be?—”

“Why do you believe he’s alive when those who served him for so much longer don’t?” Lisandra speaks over me.

My hand moves to where his ring rests against my skin. She knows about the tower, how I freed him. But she has no idea how deep that connection goes, how we became something more than ourselves when we touched.

“I just do.” The words sound weak even to me, but they’re all I have.

Because if I allow myself to believe he’s dead, then I am truly lost here.

More than lost. I’m stranded in a world that was never mine to begin with, surrounded by people who see me as a symbol instead of a person drowning in grief.

Silence falls. The mist stalker shifts. Everyone stares at me with the same expression, as though I’m a wounded animal that might lash out. I can see what they’re thinking. That grief has made me irrational. That I’m clinging to hope because the truth is too painful.

Maybe they’re right. Perhaps I am losing my mind.

Lisandra looks at Varam, then Mira, then fixes her gaze on me with uncomfortable directness. “You say he’s not dead. But no one else with you saw him survive.”

I open my mouth, but she lifts a hand. “I don’t say that to wound you, Ellie.

But I can’t make decisions for Stonehaven based on hope.

Only on facts.” She turns toward the door.

“We need to call the Veinwarden leaders together. They need to know what happened, and …” She glances at me again, and I see it now.

The way she looks at me has changed. I’m no longer the stranger who freed the Shadowvein Lord.

I’m something she doesn’t know how to handle. “... and what has changed.”

My lips twist. What has changed. Like I’m a problem to be solved instead of a person falling apart.

“She needs to rest first,” Mira says, the strain in her voice clear. She’s worried about me, and I hate that I don’t know if it’s because she’s my friend or because she’s concerned about what I might be. “Her power is not stable.”

As if summoned by her words, the pressure spikes without warning.

Light breaks loose before I can hold it down, silver fire crackling across my skin.

My balance falters, and I stumble against the wall, gasping as the energy tears through me.

The mist stalker moves, putting its body between me and the others, lips curled back in a silent snarl.

This creature, born from his familiar’s death, is protecting me. While I can’t protect anyone.

“Ellie.” Mira’s voice is cautious.

I reach out toward the creature standing guard in front of me, my hand shaking. “It’s okay. I’m okay.” But I’m not okay. I’m breaking apart, and everyone can see it.

Lisandra stares at the mist stalker, then lifts her gaze to meet mine. “Get her settled. Somewhere secure. We’ll convene at dawn.”

Secure. Like a prisoner. Like I’m dangerous.

“I need answers more than rest.” I don’t want to waste any more time.

“And you will get them, if we have them,” Lisandra assures me. But her tone has changed. It’s clipped, distant. Dismissive . “But not while you’re about to collapse.”