Chapter Fifty-one

The days that followed were a blur. Wilder spent much of them assessing the damage to the fortress with Torj and Vernich. To the naked eye, Thezmarr's mighty stronghold was in pieces – the Great Hall was gone and the outer walls were no more than piles of rubble. But the fortress had good bones, and there was much that could yet be saved. The residences, the teaching quarters and the war room, of all things, were salvageable with the right reinforcements.

As they worked, there was no missing the change in Torj, not to mention his new look, which took some getting used to. Wilder found himself startled more than once by his friend's silver hair and dark eyes, and the glimpse of lightning-shaped scars across his tattooed chest peeking through the fabric of his shirt.

‘Quit the fucking staring,' the Bear Slayer finally snapped, and Wilder could hardly blame him.

‘Sorry,' he muttered, busying his hands with the weapons inventory before glancing up at his friend again. His fellow Warsword had been distant since his brush with lightning, distant and deep in thought. ‘Torj?' he asked.

‘What?'

Wilder braced himself for anger. ‘Are you alright?'

Torj looked up from his task, his eyes stormy as they fell upon Wren, who was grinding herbs in a mortar across the hall. ‘When did you know?' he said, voice low.

Wilder's brow furrowed. ‘Know what?'

‘That Thea was the one for you?'

Rubbing the back of his neck, Wilder felt a pang of sympathy for the Bear Slayer, whose dark gaze hadn't left the beautiful alchemist. ‘I always knew,' Wilder told him honestly.

Torj nodded with a sigh of resignation. ‘Figured as much.'

The clean-up efforts were intense, so much so that Wilder hadn't yet had the chance to return to his cabin with Thea. As much as he longed to sink into his own bed and wrap his arms around her, most nights they simply slept where they collapsed from exhaustion.

Adrienne was overseeing the clearing of the courtyard. Her face was grief-stricken, but she gave out orders with her usual efficiency. Masses of rubble were removed, catapults dismantled and discarded weaponry gathered. The Naarvian general did what she could, but it would be months, maybe even years until Thezmarr was in any semblance of a working state again. Her efforts, however, did yield another result: the discovery of Osiris' hiding place. The former Guild Master was discovered in a partially ruined chamber, cowering as he had through the entire battle. Adrienne saw him put in chains and under guard to await Thezmarr's judgement, though Wilder knew he wasn't alone in secretly wishing she'd simply cut his throat.

Thea was caught up in talks with Wren, Audra, Kipp and Esyllt. Wilder saw the ravens come and go from the armoury, which they'd commandeered as their meeting house, though he didn't give much thought to whom these messages were sent. No one had seen King Leiko since before the battle at Aveum; Queen Reyna was still licking her wounds from said battle, while King Artos awaited trial in her ice dungeons. It left two of the three kingdoms without rulers, and the third hanging on by a mere thread. With Anya gone, Thea was now heir apparent to Delmira, but no one had broached the subject yet, which was wise. They had enough to deal with as it was. Plans for long-fallen kingdoms could wait.

With Farissa at the helm, Audra's warriors helped tend to the wounded, and the makeshift infirmary at the training arena was less full by the day. People from all walks of life who'd taken part in the battle returned to the fortress, injuries healed, ready to assist in whatever way they could.

No one had heard from Dratos since he'd found Anya's body, and Wilder didn't expect they would for some time. He didn't know if the nature of their relationship went beyond friends, but he had glimpsed that grief when he'd thought Thea lay dying in his arms… If Dratos needed to take to the skies to find reprieve from something similar, then Wilder would never begrudge him that.

As they slowly started to put the broken pieces of Thezmarr back together, Wilder sensed another farewell on the horizon. Sure enough, late one afternoon, Talemir approached him in the stables.

‘It's time we returned to Naarva,' the Shadow Prince said, a note of regret in his voice.

Though it felt like a punch to the gut, Wilder dipped his head. ‘I understand. You need to get back to Ry.'

‘We've already been gone too long.'

Wilder cleared his throat and offered his hand. ‘It's been an honour to fight alongside you again.'

Talemir glanced down at his hand before knocking it away abruptly and pulling him into a hard embrace. ‘The honour has been mine, brother.'

Wilder gripped his former mentor's shoulders. ‘Thank you… For all that you've done. Now, then… and in the years between. Without you, we wouldn't have won this war.'

‘We all had our part to play.' Talemir smiled, releasing him. ‘I almost called you "Apprentice" then… But —'

‘You realised I haven't been your apprentice in over a decade?'

‘I can't be that old.'

Wilder scoffed. ‘I assure you, you are.'

‘Matured like a fine wine then, eh?' Talemir said with a grin.

‘If that's what you need to believe.'

A pointed cough sounded from the door. ‘About time you two kissed and made up,' Drue said with a note of amusement. She gave Wilder a wink before she addressed Talemir. ‘I miss our son and his menacing ways. Take me home, husband.'

Talemir beamed at her, as though hearing the word husband from her lips still gave him joy after all these years. ‘I was just saying goodbye.'

Drue came forward and wrapped her arms around Wilder. ‘Don't be a stranger, Hawthorne,' she said. ‘Naarva is no secret now, and we'd love to have you and Thea any time.'

‘Thank you,' Wilder replied. ‘I hope it's not long before we see you again.'

Terrence soared into the stables then, landing on Drue's shoulder with an impatient squawk. Apparently the hawk was ready for the kingdom of gardens as well.

Wilder walked them out to the corral, where Talemir's wings materialised and his shadows swirled as he pulled his wife into his arms.

Wilder raised a hand in farewell. ‘Be seeing you,' he said.

When Talemir and Drue had gone, Wilder found Thea alone in the armoury, poring over a spread of maps and scrolls. She was rubbing her temples with a grimace.

Wilder leant against the doorframe. ‘Long day?'

Thea's gaze snapped up to his, her frustration instantly softening at the sight of him. ‘The longest.'

‘I was going to go back to the cabin. Come with me?'

She pushed off from her workstation and came to him, wrapping her arms around his waist and locking them at the small of his back. ‘Gods, yes,' she muttered, resting her forehead against his chest.

He huffed a laugh and kissed the top of her head. ‘Come on, then.'

With their arms around each other, they walked through the woods, towards the western foot of the mountains. The further they got from the fortress, the less evidence of the battle there was. Soon they were surrounded by trees, and it was as though the scorched ruins of Thezmarr were a distant dream.

‘We haven't talked about it,' Wilder ventured, with a tentative glance at the beautiful woman at his side.

Thea gave a rough laugh. ‘There hasn't been much time for talking yet… And you'll have to be more specific.'

After a moment, Wilder said, ‘It wasn't your fate stone.'

‘No, it wasn't.' Thea chewed on her lower lip, deep in thought. ‘It doesn't feel right to celebrate it – that my life isn't over… Not when it cost Anya hers.'

‘I understand.'

‘Truthfully, I don't know how I feel about any of it yet. That for all those years, I let a fate stone that wasn't mine influence how I behaved, the choices I made…' She looked up at him. ‘But how can I regret anything? How can I be sorry when everything led me to you?'

Wilder saw the conflict in her eyes, the unbroken swell of a summer storm. He wished he could take that pain, that guilt away, but he knew better than anyone that it was her burden to bear, that only she could free herself from its confines.

‘But I'm grateful,' she said suddenly. ‘Grateful that it's not the end, grateful that I get this time with you. That we have our lives together ahead of us.'

He stroked his thumb down the back of her hand. ‘As am I.'

Thea smiled at him then, and for a moment, it was as though the war had never happened, as though shadows had never ruled. She shone brighter for him than the sun.

‘Gods, I love you,' he told her. He had promised himself he'd never hold back from saying it again, that when the words rose in his chest he would say them to her, wherever they were, whatever they were doing.

‘I love you, too,' she said.

But her smile froze as his cabin came into view, and she stopped them in their tracks.

Wilder followed her gaze to his home.

Scorch marks scored the once-quaint porch. What had not been burned away was splintered and broken, including the front door.

‘Wilder…' Thea breathed. ‘I'm so sorry…'

Shocked, he said nothing, but approached the cabin, dread turning his stomach leaden. Inside, the place was no better. Parts of it had been set alight. The roof of the bedroom had caved in. His belongings were scattered across the floor in pieces, his potted plants either missing or ruined.

Wilder ran his fingers through his hair and sighed. ‘I don't think this was done by wraiths and reapers…'

‘What then? Howlers?'

He shook his head. ‘I think this was done long before Thezmarr was taken by the enemy. It must have been after Notos, when I was declared a fallen Warsword.'

Thea seemed shocked. ‘You think Thezmarrians did this?'

Wilder huffed a laugh. ‘You're forgetting your own anger so easily. Remember how you felt? Imagine that in the birthplace of Warswords…' He crouched by a bit of missing floor, where dirt and ash met splintered timber. ‘This isn't recent. The embers here haven't been hot for a long time.'

Thea made a noise of despair, hugging her arms to her stomach as though she felt physical pain at the broken sight before them. ‘Your beautiful home…'

‘It's just a building, Thea,' he told her. ‘You're my true home.'

‘But…'

Shaking his head, he went not to her, but to the untouched cupboard against the wall. There, he rummaged through the shelves until he found what he was looking for.

He held out the arrow to her, and when she took it from him with a look of disbelief, he smiled.

She turned it over in her hands, eyes wide. ‘You kept it?'

It was the arrow he'd shot at her when he'd found her spying on the shieldbearers in the Bloodwoods. The arrow that she'd gripped in the tree above her as he'd fucked her for the first time.

‘Of course I kept it,' he told her. ‘It's always been you, Thea. And as long as I'm with you, you're the only home I'll ever need.'

Wilder took her in his arms then, his gaze drifting back to that broken patch of floor, noting a speck of colour for the first time.

‘Look,' he murmured, pointing it out to Thea.

For amid the ashes, something bloomed.

Leaning down, he kissed Thea, long and slow. Despite the wreckage of his cabin, hope awakened in his chest. For the first time in a long time, he realised that beneath the festering darkness, the world had been beautiful, and it would be again.