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And there, right beside her, sat Malyr’s anoa… … preening her damaged feathers.
The goddess showed me how you returned after having found your wings at last, just like she hoped you would.” I swallowed. “The goddess?” “Your mother,” she said. “The fate Lilieth.”
“You, Galantia, are Malyr’s fated mate. You were supposed to die together in Valtaris under boulders and shadows, with your little hand clasped inside his the way—”
What if she was more to him than a fleeting obsession, like I’d first assumed? More than a temporary distraction to soothe the torment of his past mistakes? What if he was… in love? With. My. Mate. I clenched my fist around the armrest of my chair, feeling the sting of splinters against my skin. In my own way, I loved Sebian like a brother, so naturally, I wanted him to make peace with the past and find happiness. That he might just do so with the woman destined for me, well… I didn’t know what to do with that at all.
But that was before… Before I’d had her blood on my lips, her scars between my teeth, her throat in my clasp, her moans in my ear, her reddened ass beneath my palm, her tongue gliding along my blade, her cunt tightening around my cock in pleasure and pain. It was before she’d spent cold winter mornings on my lap at my desk, the both of us wrapped in a blanket, practicing her gods-awful handwriting. That was before I fell in love with her…
“It’s interesting how you seem content pushing Galantia into the arms of a mate who couldn’t keep her from harm, because he’s the one who loves inflicting it. I never mistreated Ravenna; her death was nothing I could’ve prevented. Yet, for years, all you told me was what a fool I was. So irresponsible. A drunk. Useless. How you should never have allowed me to court your daughter. And I believed it.” Every. Single. Word. Well, I was done with that.
“I promised myself I’ll take care of Galantia, in whichever capacity she’ll let me, and I’m not going to fail a second time.”
“Nothing much changed then.” I’d known that before, and it hadn’t kept me from wanting to be with her. And now? Well, now my heart was too far gone to care. “Except for one thing: he damaged their fate to a degree that she might never bond herself to him, either.”
“I am a Raven,” I muttered to myself. “Wind is to my wings what the wave is to a ship: a persistent companion, sometimes caressing, other times chastising, but always essential in the journey.”
“Hear me, Galantia. No matter where you go, no matter what form you take, I will find you. You cannot outrun me. You cannot outfly me. Every path you tread, be it north, east, south, or west, I will chase after because… you… are… mine.”
“Deception’s most profound irony is how it can make the realest truths look like the greatest deceits.”
“That kiss was long overdue, and there will be a lot more in the future, if you’ll have me. But just for the record, because I’m not going to risk your doubt again over three fucking words,” he tugged the back of my head, pulling my mouth back to his as he rasped, “I love you.”
I had not seen the temple or even its roof in a decade, all of Valtaris sleeping beneath shadows ever so cruel. I would not see it tomorrow.
It took a good man to take care of a woman, but only the best would recognize what she truly needed, even if it meant embracing what he couldn’t provide.
“I might not be able to bond myself to you, but I want you to know that I’m yours until the end… whenever that might be. I will forever treasure you. I will forever provide for you. I will forever fly with you. I will forever care for you.”
An act of such guilt, remorse, and repentance, it struggled to co-exist with those last remnants of hate I harbored for him. Not many. Maybe none at all. Not anymore, now that I finally understood the burdens he’d carried, the weight of shadows ever so cruel.
“Whatever this thing is between us three,” he’d said, “it’s not going to keep either one of us from loving you right.”
What if my shattered heart had been much like a cracked mirror, not allowing me to see the truth that Malyr had tried to share with me all along? That he had loved me. That he loved me still? Was that what he’d wanted to tell me after the bonding?
His words resonated deep inside the cave of my chest, flooding a heart I’d carefully put back together. I braced for the torrent to rip away the pieces, reopening wounds barely mended. Instead, they seeped into the thousands of cracks that webbed the organ, filling each fissure with a warmth that spread like molten gold. Not breaking. Strengthening.
“Loved you when I told myself I did not. Loved you when I told you that nobody ever would.” A tug on my cheek. “Please, look at me.”
“My love is not gentle, or tender, or easy. But it is real, grown from hate and pain deep inside a chest sullied by shadows. It is cutting and biting, leaving behind scars as unfading as my love for you.” His warm lips scathed my jawline. “And once we are gone from this earth, I will continue to love you among the stars. I will be the night, the darkest patch of sky around you, just to ensure that everyone can see how you sparkle. And once your light starts fading, I will take you into my black embrace, and that is where I will love you beyond death.”
“Goddess help me, nothing compares to you. Nothing.”
Dear daughter, If you read this, then I am gone from this world, never having had the chance to meet you. But if I had, I would have asked you to take good care of my son. Do not shy away from his darkness… embrace it. Understand that shadows cling to crevices and secret corners, thriving in the unseen, the hidden, the unacknowledged. If you fully embrace my son’s darkness, welcoming every aspect of him without reservation, then those shadows will find their domain reduced, having less surface to cling to. I entrust him to you and hope that you can be the light in his life, as I pray you will
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Sebian was my protector, my haven, my sanctuary. He was my home in the truest sense: not a place, but a feeling of love and belonging; a knowing that wherever he was, I wanted to be. He was my choice.
“If there’s love in this pain, then I want it. I just don’t want there to be any pain in this love.”
Anoaley, I am writing this from our camp right outside of Ammarett, where every deathweaver, pathfinder, and fate of fighting age is waiting on my command to breach the keep, but we cannot do it without you. We need a distraction from within. Steal my gift. Wield my shadows. Unleash my darkness on them and show them how you sparkle as you make your way from the dungeon to the keep. We will come through the main gate for you. We love you. Come back to us. P.S.: Do you remember what I told you the night at the kjaer, when you and I spoke by the creek?
“You are not the damsel in distress you make yourself out to be,”
“What have you done, I asked her before I kicked the crate out from beneath that smiling cunt. And do you know what she said? Loved her the way I should have all along.”
and anything
Another swing of my blade. “Pure.” I kicked
“Only the deepest love was capable of bringing about the deepest pain.” Love and pain. Truth and lies. Light and dark. Fate and choice. None of them were adversaries; none of them could exist without the other. Together, they were life.
