Page 268 of Elemental Becoming

The grief. The guilt. The fear.

I let myself feel it.

The tears come quietly, slipping free without resistance.

Thane pulls me closer, asking for nothing in return. Just his arms around me while I cry into his chest.

THANE

She’s lying against my chest, her breathing finally even, tears gone. The tension in her body has eased.

Every time I think we’ve found our footing, something else hurts her. The prophecy. The court. Now Ardyn.

I keep trying to shield her from the uglier side of politics. The maneuvering. The games. The people who smile while they hold sharpened knives behind their backs. Those damn knives keep finding her.

She already carries too much.

Fucking Ardyn.

How did I ever see anything in her?

The answer sits heavy in my chest.

I was lost after Kastiel died. Mother followed a year later. I was angry enough to mistake bitterness for strength. I couldn’t see clearly.

Now I do.

And what I see leaves little room for regret.

I’m grateful Amara finally opened up to me. She shut me out during the Ashen Ring, even when I reached for her through our bond. For a while, I wasn’t sure she would let me in at all.

Gods, I want nothing more than to stay here. Her skin against mine. Her breathing evening into the slow rhythm of sleep. The bond wrapping around every part of me that still carries the weight of the Ashen Ring.

But there’s something I need to show her. I was going to wait, but now I think she needs it. Something that belongs only to her in this hard city of stone.

I press a kiss into her hair, then murmur, “Will you come with me? It won’t take long.”

She shifts to look up at me. “Now?”

Her voice is soft. Drowsy.

“Please.”

She stretches beside me.

“Fine,” she whispers, a ghost of a smile at the edge of her mouth. “But only because you said please.”

I grin. “You’re going to want your robe.”

A few minutes later, her hand is in mine as I lead her through the corridor and out into the gardens beneath our balcony, tucked beneath an overhang of stone and stars.

With a flick of my fingers, I set four fire orbs alight. They drift into the air, casting a warm golden glow across the path ahead. The path I’ve been waiting to walk with her.

We move in comfortable silence. I revel in the sound of her footsteps beside me. In the way her hand fits mine. In the simple, unbearable miracle ofher.

I know better than to believe moments like this last forever, but I have this one. And that’s enough.

Then I see it—tucked against the low stone wall. I stop in front of the raised garden beds, already prepared for the cold bite of late autumn.