Page 6 of Stormvein (The Veinbound Trilogy #2)

I want to protest further, to demand she listen to me, but another surge of power steals my breath. This time, the shadows cast by the lightstones waver and bend. The mist stalker growls again.

“Fine. But tomorrow, we will talk about finding him.” I force the words out through gritted teeth, each one a promise and a threat.

“Tomorrow.” Lisandra’s voice is soft, full of pity. She thinks I’m in denial, clinging to false hope. Maybe I am. But right now, that hope is the only thing that keeps me from letting this power tear me apart.

Mira guides me out of the room and tries to guide me to the left, toward the main living quarters of everyone in Stonehaven. I stop, bracing myself against the wall.

“Ellie, we need to?—”

“No.” She’s about to suggest I go somewhere other than Sacha’s quarters to sleep. The thought sends a surge of panic through me that has nothing to do with the power. If I go anywhere else, it means this is over. That he’s not coming back. I can’t make that choice. Not yet.

“I think it would be better if?—”

“I said, no .” The words come out harsh, and the mist stalker makes a sound beside me—not a growl, but definitely a warning.

Mira glances at it, then at me, and sighs. “This way.”

She leads me through the tunnels, taking a route I know well. Another couple of turns, and we’re outside the door to his quarters. I hesitate, my hand hovering over the ward set in the wall.

What if entering makes it real? What if crossing this threshold means accepting he won’t be here? What if walking into his space means acknowledging I’m on the other side of something I can’t undo?

Nothing has changed when we walk inside. Maps cover the table, weapons hang on the wall, and an open book is balanced on top of a chair. It looks exactly as it did when we left. As if he might return tonight, pull out that chair, and keep reading.

His presence lingers in the air. This is his space, while I was a temporary occupant. Entering it now feels like a violation of privacy, but I force myself to move deeper into the main chamber, searching for … something. Some proof he’ll return.

“Do you need anything?” Mira doesn’t come beyond the threshold. I wonder if she feels it too—the lingering presence, the weight of absence.

“I need you to believe me.”

She sighs. “Ellie?—”

Shaking my head, I turn away. “I don’t need anything.”

When the soft sound tells me the door has closed, I let my entire body sag, eyes closing.

The room has an air of waiting to it. It shouldn’t feel sacred. But it does.

Stop it.

Straightening, I walk past the doorway that leads to my bedroom. I could go there, should go there, but my feet carry me toward his door instead.

My hand hesitates on the handle of his private room.

I’ve never entered this space. There has never been any reason for me to go there.

My bed is only a few steps away. But I push the door open anyway, drawn by something I can’t name—grief or desperation or simply the need to be surrounded by what remains of him.

If this is all that’s left, I need to be in it. Even if it wasn’t meant for me.

His scent hits me first. That distinct blend of shadow and stone, as odd as it sounds.

It’s a presence so unmistakable that for one breathless second, I almost believe he’s still here.

If I close my eyes, I can imagine turning my head and seeing him standing by the door, his sharp gaze tracking my every move, one eyebrow raised in that subtle way he has of questioning me. I can even hear him speaking.

What are you doing, Ellie?

The illusion shatters too quickly.

The room is too still. Too perfect. His bed stands against one wall, bedding neatly in place, waiting for an occupant who will never return. There’s a book open on the mattress, a pen beside it. His journal written in the same elegant handwriting I remember from the tower.

I shouldn’t be here. It feels like trespassing in a way that nothing else has—not entering the tower, not infiltrating Ashenvale.

This space never got to be part of the story we shared.

It was his private sanctuary. One that I was never invited to enter.

But that was before everything changed between us.

Before his shadows and my light intertwined.

Before he looked at me with something more than calculation in his eyes.

But he’s not dead. I won’t let myself believe it.

I sink onto the edge of his bed, my hands trembling as they reach for the blanket. The energy inside me pulses in time with my racing heart, casting strange patterns across the walls. For a moment, the shadows seem to reach back.

He’s not dead. The words pound through my skull, drowning out the unbearable silence.

Because if he is, then what am I supposed to do? I’m trapped in a world that isn’t mine, with a power I don’t understand, surrounded by people fighting a war I barely comprehend.

The power turns erratic, feeding off the chaos inside me.

I can’t do this. I can’t sit here, in this room that still carries the presence of him, pretending that he’s ? —

No.

He isn’t dead. I would know if he was. I would feel it. Wouldn’t I? There would be some kind of … severance. Some final breaking of whatever connection formed between us that night in Ashenvale.

A sob wrenches free before I can stop it. It startles me, as if it belongs to someone else. I press my hands over my mouth, but it doesn’t stop another from escaping. The next breath shudders through me, followed by another, then another, until I can’t hold them back anymore.

I fold forward, my forehead pressing against the cool sheets, and I break. My body shakes, my hands twisting into the fabric as sobs tear free—ugly, gasping, and relentless. My throat aches, my chest burns, but I can’t stop.

I don’t want to stop.

I clutch at the sheets, but it’s just fabric. It doesn’t hold warmth. It doesn’t hold him.

He’s dead.

No.

I squeeze my eyes shut against the flood of memories.

Sacha standing at my side, his voice delivering some dry, cutting remark in that low voice that sometimes, rarely , held a hint of warmth meant only for me.

Sacha catching my wrist, stopping me from walking into danger, his touch firm but careful. Always careful, as though he thought I might break … or worse, I might run.

Sacha looking at me like I was a puzzle he couldn’t solve. Or wouldn’t allow himself to solve.

The bed shifts beneath me as I curl into myself. I can’t breathe past the grief, can’t think past the echo of him.

I want him to walk through the door. I want him to tell me he’s fine. I want him to call me a fool for believing he could be lost so easily. To tell me I should have more faith in the Shadowvein Lord, the Vareth’el , in that arrogant tone that makes me want to grind my teeth.

I slip my hand inside my tunic, fingers closing around the cool metal of his ring. The weight of it grounds me.

It’s real. Solid. He was here. He was real.

He’s not dead.

He can’t be.

The thought steadies my breath just enough to fill my lungs. I breathe in again … then again. My heartbeat slows. My body stills. The grief is still there, suffocating, crushing, but somewhere beneath it, that faint sliver of denial remains. A tether to hope, however frail.

I won’t believe it. I can’t.

Sleep pulls at me like an undertow, dragging me down before I can untangle grief from hope, reality from delusion. My last conscious thought is of the ring pressed against my palm, a circle without end.

And then I dream.

I see the tower again, silver walls gleaming against the backdrop of an endless desert. I see a woman again, standing at the threshold, waiting.

I see Sacha.

He reaches for me through the darkness, his form insubstantial but unmistakable. Shadow tendrils curl around him, not fully formed, as if he’s struggling to maintain his shape. His eyes lock with mine, that penetrating gaze that sees everything, calculates everything.

I reach back, silver spilling from my fingertips, stretching toward his shadows.

“Sacha. Where are you?”

Our powers almost touch. Almost connect.

And then someone shakes me.

My eyes open to find Mira standing over me. She doesn’t ask why I’m in his room, why I’m holding onto the pillow like it’s a person. Her expression is blank, but I catch the concern in her eyes.

“The Veinwarden leaders are gathering. Varam suggested that you might wish to be there.”

I sit up, pushing my hair off my face. My eyes feel gritty, swollen from the tears I shed.

My head hurts. But the light has dimmed to a barely visible shimmer beneath my skin, and the power feels different now.

Not gone, but more stable, as though it’s settling into my body rather than projecting outward.

The mist stalker is sitting at the foot of the bed, watching us both.

“Has there been any news?” I already know what her answer will be, but I can’t stop myself from asking, from hoping that Sacha has returned while I slept.

She shakes her head, and answers like I’m asking whether there have been Authority sightings. “Our lookouts near the pass have reported movement in the valley, but no one has come close enough for us to be concerned.”

Her eyes dare me to tell her she misunderstood my question, but I don’t. We both know what I was asking. We both know she’s deliberately misinterpreting.

“Let me clean up and get dressed.”

I wash quickly and braid my hair. I don’t have time to wash it, so this is the next best thing. The ache behind my eyes hasn’t faded, but I smooth my tunic, pull my shoulders straight, and follow Mira through the passageways without a word.

When we arrive at the meeting chamber twenty minutes later, the buzz of conversation stops dead.

Twelve people sit in a semicircle, their faces solemn.

I’ve met most of them during my time here, always with Sacha translating.

Since … Well, since Ashenvale, I haven’t needed to ask for translations, I can understand everyone perfectly.