He doesn’t hear me. He doesn’t even flinch. Our bond flickers and dims, barely holding under the strain. Every wave of his unchecked magic is shredding my heart, his eyes wild with fury and anguish as more ice explodes around him, so forceful that it cracks parts of the stone floor.
“Riven!” I try again, reaching for the bond and finding nothing. “You promised we’d both get out of here alive! We can’t do that if you…”
I trail off, since what, exactly,ishe trying to do? Destroy himself? Kill his own brother? Freeze this entire court and bury us in its icy remains so none of us make it out of here alive?
Aerix steps back, uncertainty flashing across his face as he watches my Winter Prince unravel.
Good,I think, fierce and bitter.Let him see the damage he’s done. Let him witness the wreckage left behind when someone who loves deeper than anyone I’ve ever known—someone who could have loved him, too—snaps.
A sob escapes my throat, and finally, Riven’s eyes meet mine, their silver hue consumed by brilliant white power.
“Sapphire…?” he whispers my name like a fractured prayer.
“I’m here,” I promise, and with a surge of desperation, I summon every scrap of magic I possess. Water, ice, and air whip around us, forming a shimmering, protective bubble—a sanctuary built from my need to hold him together with every last piece of myself. “You have to stop. You have to breathe. I love you. Let me help you.”
It doesn’t work. His magic claws and rages, pressing against the elemental shield I’m holding up with every fragment of my strength. The storm around us intensifies, ice shattering into razor-sharp shards, wind screaming through cracks in the walls.
My strength drains with every passing second, exhaustion creeping into my bones, but losing him isn’t an option. I’d let the world collapse before letting him break.
“I feel it, Sapphire.” His gaze locks onto mine, wild and desperate, like a drowning man grasping for the shore. “It’s everywhere. It’s inside me, and it won’t let go.”
“Neither will I.” I push closer until I see my reflection in his eyes, our magic colliding like crashing waves in the space between us. “Do you really think we marched into the Night Court and won a war just for you to bury us all beneath a pile of rubble?”
There’s no smirk. No witty comeback. Just the wind rushing around us and the ice biting my skin as Riven fights and fails to focus on me.
I reach for him, trying to ground him physically, to remind him who he is—of who we are. But the moment my fingertips brush his skin, he flinches, pulling back like my touch burns.
Dread spirals through me as his eyes glaze over again, hollow and haunted.
“Riven,” I whisper, terror threading through my veins. “Don’t look at me like that. Not again. Come back to me. Please.”
But it’s like staring into the face of the Winter King’s madness—cold, distant, and detached.
My throat tightens, fear filling every space inside me.
Is this it? Am I going to lose the love of my life to the brother he never knew he had, to a cruel ultimatum he should have never been forced to make?
No,I think, blinking away the possibility.I won’t lose him. I won’t let him shatter. We didn’t come this far so we could go down like this.
“You’re Prince Riven Draevor of the Winter and Summer Courts.” My voice trembles, but I force strength into it, pushing forward. “You’re my soulmate. My husband. My everything. I love you, and I didn’t bring you back from the dead just to lose you now.”
The space between us is a battlefield—violent winds and lethal ice shards creating a storm of Riven’s pain. His eyes still burn white-hot with power, but a flicker of recognition remains. A flash of the man I love fighting against the chaos consuming his mind.
“Look at me,” I beg, the words nearly lost in the howling of his uncontrolled magic. “Please, just look at me.”
His gaze drifts to mine, unfocused and distant, but it’s enough.
I reach for his left hand, the one not holding his sword. For a heartbeat, I think he’ll pull away, but he lets me keep it and turn it over, so his palm faces upward. The scar there, a mirror to the one etched on my own palm, pulses faintly, a reminder of the vows we sealed beneath starlight and shadows.
Holding his gaze, I trace the first letter slowly.
I
The contact seems to startle him, his magic flaring, ice cracking up my arm. But I push through the cold and keep going, drawing each letter deliberately, my heart pounding like a drumbeat in my chest.
L
A shudder runs through him. The white glow in his eyes dims slightly, silver peeking through as his pupils focus on my face.
