Page 66 of Golden Bond


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The water still ran clear. Still curved around the rocks where moss softened the edges. The place where I first saw him—startled, mouth parted, water on his lips.

The bond stirred faintly. A thread. A whisper.

I looked toward the bank and felt the pull of hope in my chest.

Nothing.

Just wind in the reeds.

I sat down anyway, cross-legged on the grass, the peach stone warm in my hand. The ache I had been staving off—word by word, step by step—cracked open.

I buried my face in my palm.

And let it come.

Chapter

Fourteen

CALLIS

The ship groaned beneath my feet, timbers flexing with each pull of the wind. The sailcloths, thick and sand-colored, billowed and snapped like the wings of great birds. Ropes creaked. The crew moved with practiced ease across the deck, their murmurs carried off by the sea breeze before they ever reached me.

I stood alone at the aft rail.

The dock was long out of sight. The cliffs had narrowed to specks, then faded into mist. Now the island itself—the orchards, the temples, the pale stone corridors where I had kissed Auren in silence—was just a faint shadow, growing smaller with every breath I took.

Eletheria was vanishing.

My hands tightened around the rail until the bones in my fingers ached. I was cold, despite the sun, despite the layers of fine garment Auren had wrappedme in that morning. The wind off the waves sliced through everything.

It smelled of salt and memory.

I did not wave. I had not looked back when the gangplank was raised. I had walked the deck as instructed, as a proper bonded man returned to his place. Quiet. Composed. Fortunate. The other passengers on board—mostly merchants and clergy making their way between the islands—had offered small nods and polite distance. One man had even congratulated me on my return.

I had smiled.

A false, stitched smile.

And now I watched the world behind me shrink to nothing.

There were books in the hold below. Crates of scrolls, marked with Auren’s seal. A gift, he had said. A gift for the little temple that raised me. For the acolytes with oil-streaked fingers who had never seen the golden script of the Old Cycle. For the records keeper with his limp and warm voice. For the shrine with no altar, only stone shelves and driftwood incense burners. For the cot that had held my body for years—narrow, sun-bleached, home.

That temple was waiting for me.

They would smile when I arrived. They would welcome me back. I would take up my duties again, as if I’d never left. I would tell them what I had learned, share what I had seen. I would teach them the new rites. I would wake before dawn, sweep the halls, and tend the sick. I would touch the old scrolls withreverent hands. I would speak softly in the evenings and write carefully by lamplight and maybe, just maybe, one day I would rise to something higher.

But none of that was today.

Today, I was half a man.

I turned from the wind, legs stiff with chill, and made my way down the steps to the lower deck. Lanterns swayed gently in their sconces. The scent of wax and salt hung in the narrow corridor. My cabin door shut behind me with a muted thud.

It was small. Barely wide enough for a bed and trunk. But clean and warm. The books—his books—rested against the wall, wrapped in linen. I sat on the edge of the cot, staring at them.

And then I folded forward, elbows to knees, and let the sob rise.

Not a cry of anger. Not pain. Just… loss. A loss too full for words, too old to name. My chest cracked open beneath the weight of it. My hands dug into my scalp. And still I wept, soundless and shuddering, like a boy grieving the only good life he had ever known.