Chapter nine
The wind shifted around him, curling through the trees as if tasting the world below.
Caelum stood at the edge of the cliff that overlooked the lower realm. The city lights twinkled like scattered stars beneath the rising mist, soft and unaware of who had walked among them just hours ago.
He had returned in silence not on horseback, for his kind moved differently. The veil between realms bent for him, parting like silk. It took no more effort than stepping through a curtain of shadow and thought.
And yet… the girl remained.
She had silver hair.
Not pale. Not white. Silver. Like the moon's own blood had been woven into every strand.
Just like in the dreams.
And her laughter it still echoed in his skull. Unwelcome. Beautiful. Dangerous.
But it wasn't her. Or maybe… it was?
The woman in his dreams was a ghost draped in flame and sorrow. There was weight in her silence, a fury in her stillness. That girl at the festival she was alive. Bright, sharp-tongued, ridiculous even. She poked at him like a child pokes a lion, unafraid, unaware.
Still, she looked at him like she knew him.
And for one breath just one he thought he knew her too.
He shut his eyes, and with them came the fragments again.
Fire.
Betrayal.
A scream swallowed by shadows.
Her name.
Always her name…just out of reach.
Caelum opened his eyes. He was no closer to clarity.
"She doesn't feel like the one," he muttered.
"But she looks like her," Thorne's voice said behind him, steady as ever.
Caelum turned his head slightly. His guard stood there, arms folded across his chest, eyes sharp but unreadable as always.
"I don't trust this," Caelum said quietly. "Not the dreams. Not the memories. Not even her."
"And yet you came here for her."
Caelum didn't answer.
The world expected him to protect it. He was forged to be its sword. Its silent shield. But no one had prepared him for the quiet ache in his chest or the way a single girl's defiance made everything… feel.
He shouldn't have let her speak to him.
He shouldn't have let her near.
And yet, when Thorne moved to stop her, Caelum had raised a hand. Let her talk. Let her smile.
Why?
"Maybe it's nothing," Caelum said aloud.
"Maybe," Thorne said, voice neutral. "But she stirred something."
Caelum clenched his fists.
That was the problem.
The morning sun burned far too brightly for someone trapped in a golden cage.
"Sit straight, don't slouch, smile,no, not like that, a princess smile." Mara's voice followed Selene like a ghost as she was passed from one embroidered chair to another, draped in dresses spun from moonlight and misery.
It was the King's birthday week, and after her little stunt at the festival, Selene had been strictly forbidden from leaving the palace walls.
Even her cousins, Aralyn and Lyra, were no longer allowed to see her without supervision.
"I'm not in prison," Selene had whispered to herself the day before.
But as she sat beside her mother, Queen Elaria, nodding and sipping from crystal cups she didn't care for, she realized something worse than prison performance.
Breakfast, brunch, lunch, tea, and dinner were all orchestrated like ballets. She danced from seat to seat, guest to guest, with a smile that ached her cheeks.
Every eligible noble bachelor across Aetherra had somehow been summoned by her father's advisors.
One by one, they were introduced.
The son of a general.
The heir to a shipping empire.
The foreign prince with elaborate metaphors.
Selene destroyed each meeting with the precision of a seasoned warrior.
To the general's son:
"Do you polish your armor as often as you polish your ego?"
To the shipping heir:
"If I were your wife, would I be expected to write sonnets about boats?"
To the foreign prince:
"I once stepped on a snake and it hissed less than you talk."
Mara was mortified. Her father looked ready to declare war. But Selene didn't care. Not today. Not after the silver-eyed stranger and the strange flutter in her chest.
Even now, she remembered the way he looked at her like she was both fire and danger.
He hadn't spoken much, but his silence had screamed louder than the crowd. And when Drian and Mara dragged her away, she'd felt something heavy settle in her chest something between regret and yearning.
That night, when the palace finally quieted and the last glass of wine had been drained, Selene returned to her room like a ghost.
She touched her lips, wondering what would've happened if she had stayed just a little longer. If she had asked his name. If he had asked hers.
And still, even with the ache of restriction, the fatigue of diplomacy, and the weight of royal duty pressing on her chest she smiled.
Because for the first time in a long time…
She wanted to escape again.