Swallowing, I dropped the weight and said, “Okay, Ria. For you, I’ll try. I love you so much. And I just had to see you. To know that you’re—you’re okay.”
Lyria smiled softly at me. Her eyes were bright, her hair in full waves around her shoulders, everything about her looking so healthy and vibrant.
“I am okay, Tolek.”
It was a stupid fucking statement. She wasn’t okay. She was taken from Ambrisk far too soon due to a fight I dragged her into. But she was smiling, and she seemed…at peace. And knowing that she’d found some relief in death’s embrace—that she wasn’t suffering—well, that soothed a bit of the bruise that had formed across my heart as she bled out in my arms.
And that gave me the confidence to ask the one question that had burdened me at her appearance. “Why haven’t you left yet?”
Though I was grateful to be able to speak with her, a part of my heart broke to know she was lingering here. That she hadn’t gone to the Spirit Realm.
But Lyria’s answering shrug was peaceful. “I accepted my death before it happened, but I wasn’t entirely ready to vacate Gallantia.”
“Did you have unfinished business?”
“Not of that sort,” she assured me, a devious glint in her eye. And I had a feeling Lyria Vincienzo was just as scheming as a spirit as she had been as Commander. But she didn’t elaborate beyond, “Soulguider magic is very intriguing. This war hasn’t seen the last of me, baby brother.”
“You’ll stay?” I whispered.
She nodded. “For a while. I’m content, and it means I’m closer to you. I promise, Tolek, I won’t leave for good without saying goodbye.”
Goodbye. It was one of the sourest parts of death—the fact that we lost so many without getting that chance to say goodbye. I’d gotten those horrible final moments with my sister while I held her in the theater, and that exceeded what many received, but I was fucking relieved to have a few more.
More time, more moments, more guidance when I needed her so badly.
Then, Lyria turned to Ophelia and said words I thought could break her. “I’ve seen him, you know.”
“What?” Ophelia barely breathed, hand tightening in mine. My own body tensed.
“He was the first to seek me out in this in between. He’s fully passed on to the Spirit Realm, but he’s so very proud of both of you, and he wants you to continue to be strong, to fight these injustices as the warrior sisters legends spoke of. He asked me to tell you he loves you.”
Ophelia suppressed a sob, but her entire frame shuddered. I pulled her closer.
Her father.
Lyria had spoken to her father. Not only that, but he’d been the first to find her, to comfort her when she was probably fucking terrified. And out of all the messages he could have sent to his daughter, he chose the simplest but most powerful: pride, strength, and love.
Ophelia’s lips trembled as she fought to maintain that strength now. “Thank you.”
Lyria nodded, smiling softly. Peacefully.
“Can you…can you tell me what it’s been like?” I asked. “What you’ve seen and how it feels?”
For whatever reason, I thought it might help ease that bruise on my heart further.
“I’ll tell you everything I can, baby brother,” Lyria said.
I swung my sword off my back and sank to the ground, the marble cool through my leathers, and pulled Ophelia down with me, wrapping an arm around her.
“By the way,” my sister added to the woman beside me, “I love the wings.”
We both laughed, Ophelia wiping her eyes as she said, “Thank you. I think I do, too.”
Lyria matched our pose, sitting on the floor with her legs crossed and black velvet fanned out around her. And for hours, we remained there, listening to my sister’s stories of the afterlife in the Hall of Wandering Souls.
And as she spoke, I thought all three of us found a bit of healing.
Chapter Fifty-Five
