“No!” Vhalla tried to swing her feet over the edge of the bed, stopped short by the pain the movement caused.
“Lie down!” Elecia barked.
Vhalla resituated herself and pulled the covers over her head. She didn’t care if she was being childish. She had been strong for so long that all she wanted to do was spend a moment hurting. She wanted to hide from the shame that was about to be heaped upon her the moment she saw Aldrik’s eyes.
“Don’t shout,” Elecia snapped from the outer room, presumably opening the door in the process.
“Is she here?” Aldrik was relentless.
“She is.”
“Where?” Aldrik’s footsteps fell across the floor.
“Aldrik, you need to calm down first.” There was a tone in Elecia’s voice that Vhalla had never heard the woman take with her cousin before. “And Fritz, you should go now.”
“Is she in here?” Aldrik’s voice grew louder, and Vhalla shrunk further into herself.
“Listen to me—” Elecia’s attempt was too late.
A large beam of light stretched across the bed like an accusatory arrow the moment Aldrik opened the wood and paper door between the bedroom and the main room. Vhalla didn’t move, her shoulders trembled, and she hardly breathed. What could she possibly say to him?
“Vhalla,” he breathed, relief saturating her name. It put an aching in her heart that competed with the pain of her middle. “You worried me so much. I woke, and you weren’t there.” She felt his weight as he sat on the edge of the bed. “I couldn’t find you, and when you weren’t in Fritz’s room, I—”
He reached out his hand, barely brushing the blanket that covered her shoulder.
“Don’t touch me!” She cringed from his reach.
His hand hovered, obliging her wish but clearly uncomfortable with it. “My love . . . What could make you want to shy from my touch?”
“Aldrik . . .” She choked out his name.
“Let me reassure you,” he begged. “Was it a dream? A nightmare? There is nothing to fear.”
Delicately, tentatively, his palm lowered once more. Vhalla whimpered her consent, and it curled around her upper arm. It was equal parts reassurance and turmoil.
“Aldrik,” Elecia started.
“Don’t!” Vhalla sat, clutching the blankets around her.
“Where are your clothes?” Aldrik blinked, staring at her bare back.
“He deserves to know.” Elecia crossed her arms over her chest. “If you don’t tell him, then I will.”
“It is not your place to tell!”
“Then talk to the man who will be your husband!” Elecia slid the door closed so hard Vhalla and Aldrik jumped.
“Tell me what?” He rested his palm on her back, lightly kissing her temple. “Fear not, for whatever it is, we can tackle it together.”
“I-I lost our son,” Vhalla confessed, wide eyed. She remembered the note Aldrik had written, the one she had clutched to her breast. Her, him, their son.
“What are you saying?” Aldrik’s voice had gone monotone.
“We were careless.” She couldn’t bring herself to say the words.
“How were we careless?” He was too smart not to know the answers.
“You know how!” She turned to him, and a particularly sharp pain pulsed from deep within her abdomen. Vhalla collapsed back onto the bed with a choked sob.
Aldrik could only stare at her as it sunk in, and Vhalla avoided his gaze.
“Elecia.” He was on his feet, storming for the doors. “Elecia, tell me—”
“Stop being stupid,” Elecia said curtly, snapping open the doors and allowing herself back into the room. A hand, cooler than Aldrik’s, smoothed over Vhalla’s forehead. “Vhalla, here, drink this. It’ll help things move along.”
“I don’t want it.” She deserved every wave of pain she was to endure.
“Don’t start this. You promised me that your life would—”
“You don’t even know what my life means!” Vhalla twisted, ignoring the pain to stare down the Westerner. “You don’t know the sacrifices I’ve made. You think this—”
A small bottle was unceremoniously shoved into Vhalla’s mouth between words. It clanked against her teeth and her lips wrapped around it as Elecia forced it into her face. Vhalla swallowed the liquid within, resigned.
“Stop. Stop trying to make the illusion of strength. You don’t need it. Not here. Not now. Let yourself be sad until the real strength returns.” The empty bottle was gently pulled from her lips, and Elecia smoothed some of the hair away from Vhalla’s sweat-dotted forehead. It was a tender gesture that had no precedence between them.
“Cousin,” Elecia walked away as she spoke, “however completely idiotic I think you both have clearly been . . . However much I believe this could be interpreted as a blessing in disguise . . .” There was a long pause. “I am sorry.”
The other woman left, closing the doors once more behind her and resigning her room to the Emperor and his lady. The couch sighed softly as Elecia settled upon it, and Vhalla couldn’t help but remember she had slept on couches in this hotel the last time they were in the Crossroads, spending her night hours healing.
Aldrik hovered for several long breaths before finally returning to the bed. Her love settled on the bed next to her but did not touch her, the small distance between them feeling like the world.
The silence crossed the threshold into agonizing when he finally spoke. “Look at me.”
“No.”
“Do not fight me, not now.” His hand pulled on her shoulder. “Please.”
It was the please that called through to her. Vhalla rolled and looked up at her Emperor with red and burning eyes. Her face was twisted in grief and glistening with snot and tears. Aldrik caressed the expression, replying with tenderness.
“I am . . .” He took a deep breath, “Relieved you are all right.”
Vhalla squeezed her eyes shut. He didn’t even understand a fraction of how she’d wronged them.
“I was so worried.” His lips ghosted against her forehead. “I woke, and you weren’t there. I went to Fritz, and when you weren’t with him . . . If I’d not found you, I was ready to burn down the Crossroads in a rage to find you.”
“Don’t say that,” Vhalla hissed in agony.
“It’s the truth.”
“You said it before.” She remembered him bidding her farewell at a secret door the first time they were at the Crossroads. “Do not say it again. We have to be different than before.”
“Different?”
“I traded fates. We must break the vortex. We must do better.” Vhalla felt sick at herself all over again for what she’d done. The night was becoming a messy blob of memories that were distorting with time. Did she really have any idea what the truth was? Or was she just slowly losing her mind?
“What are you talking about?”
“There was a Firebearer.” Vhalla struggled to collect herself to say what needed to be said. “I met her the last time I came. She . . . then she told me. . . She told me I would lose you. She told me of Victor. I didn’t understand. I was worried, so I went—”
“You went out? Tonight?” The tender tones were fading from his words.
“I wanted to go alone . . .”
“To some curiosity shop? To a Firebearer with some smoke and mirror tricks? Why didn’t you tell me?” Justified agitation furrowed his brow.
“I didn’t want you to tell me not to go.”
“So you knew I would disapprove?” His touch vanished, and Aldrik withdrew. “You couldn’t respect my wishes. No, not even enough to try to talk it over with me?”
“I should’ve explained.”
“You should have. You don’t keep secrets from me, not you.” There was genuine pain now in his voice. His old insecurities flared brightly, and the wounds that had scarred his heart saw light once more.
“You know I do
n’t.” Vhalla looked at him for a long moment, challenging him to object.
He cursed softly and looked away.
“I’m sorry, I handled this poorly. I just wanted to know if . . . if we would really make it.”
“You shouldn’t have to ask a Firebearer to know that,” he mumbled.
“It isn’t as though we haven’t been on the run for weeks! I was scared, Aldrik. I thought that I could find something, some small reassurance to sooth the worry in my heart but . . .” She’d talked herself to the threshold she’d feared all along. How could she summarize what had transpired in a way that he would take seriously?
“But?” Aldrik pressed. “This Firebearer, did they touch you?” he growled. There was a protective dangerous gleam in his eyes. “Is it because of them that we lost . . .” Aldrik couldn’t bring himself to say it.
“No.” This was her responsibility, and Vhalla would accept it. “That was my fault alone.”
“It’s not your fault,” he mumbled.
She had to take a second and brace herself for what had to come next. Vhalla wanted to put the night behind her so badly, but she couldn’t do that if there were truths left unsaid. Through the slowly thickening haze in her head, she forced herself to carry on.
“I gave away the watch you made.”
He was so silent she wondered if he somehow hadn’t heard her. “You . . . what?”
“I had a reason!” Vhalla freed her hand from the blanket, thrusting her silver trophy before him. “This, Aldrik, with this—”
“Another pocket watch? Did you tire of mine so you wanted something more—”
“It’s a vessel!” Their pattern of interruption ended with that. His mouth hung open on the unformed word she had stolen from him with the truth. “It’s a vessel.”
“What?”
“It’s an unintentional vessel I made back when the Firebearer last looked into the flames to answer my question,” Vhalla explained quickly. “With this . . . With this I should be able to . . .”
Her words failed. Despite what she had just told him, the hurt had yet to vanish from his expression. Vhalla suspected she could’ve said she traded his watch for the entire Crescent Continent, and Aldrik would’ve still been pained. Tonight, she hadn’t paid the price for her choices. Aldrik had.
“It’s my fault . . . I wanted you, so I stayed. And because I stayed, I was where Victor could get me. All the people who have died, Erion, Craig, Raylynn, your father—it’s all because of me. All the pain is my responsibility. With this, with my magic, I can right what I wronged. I can beat Victor at his own game. He thinks he can kill or force all Windwalkers into hiding. But I will stand against him. I will do what I must for our people before I do what I want for myself.”
He was as still as a statue. Vhalla took the weight of his gaze upon her shoulders as well. She was carrying the world, and he was but one point upon it. Everything was lost if she did not make her vow a reality.
“I wanted to make things right. I hurt you while doing so, and I’m sorry. I never wanted to. But I . . .”
The heat of his palm on her lower abdomen silenced her. Vhalla stared at the man who was to be her husband. A storm raged just behind the darkness of his eyes.
He sighed. “What have I done to you?”
“Nothing I didn’t ask for.” She’d asked to be Empress. She’d chosen it the moment she’d chosen him. She’d been so busy surviving that she hadn’t accepted what that really meant. Now it wasn’t just about her survival, but her people’s.
“You should sleep. Your body needs to heal.”
Vhalla leaned forward, pressing her forehead into his sternum. Aldrik shifted to snake his arms around her. “I lost him,” she breathed.
“No.”
“The son of your dreams—” she tried to continue.
“Was not this child.”
Vhalla wished she could make him understand. His dreams had been scattered to the wind. Their future, the red lines of fate he had looked forward to, had been interrupted. But Vhalla didn’t try to make Aldrik comprehend the truth that was filling the hollow within her. Only one of them would have to bear this truth, and that would be her.
“We will try again.” He kissed the top of her head. “When we are wed, when I have my throne. That is when our child will be born. And when that day comes, this night will be nothing more than a forgotten nightmare.”
She needed his optimism. Her head was thick and heavy. Vhalla suspected the potion Elecia forced down her throat had been laced with Deep Sleep, but the cleric knew best. She closed her eyes, and Vhalla gave herself to that welcoming blackness.
The bed was cold, and dawn hovered in the morning air when Vhalla finally stirred. She heard Aldrik’s voice from the adjacent room, the sound pulling her the rest of the way from sleep.
“How did you find her?”
“She just appeared in the night,” Elecia responded.
Vhalla blinked groggily, the Deep Sleep slow to release her mind.
“She said she went to a curiosity shop. Jax, I want every last one in this Gods forsaken city turned up-side-down with the most discretion you can manage. If even one confesses any knowledge, I want to know everything. And—” Aldrik’s voice dripped acidic malice off his tongue. “—should you find one that laid a finger upon her . . .”
“No one will ever find the body,” Jax filled in the blank with methodological viciousness.
Vhalla shook her head, pulling herself into a seated position. Vi was long gone. Whatever that woman was, it was nothing like any of them had ever seen, and there was no way she had remained. Still, there was little point in trying to call Aldrik off on his demands. Vhalla was happy to concede to them if it pleased him and eased his pain.
“Now, Fritz, she claims this is a vessel.”
“It-it does feel like her magic,” Fritz confirmed with evident surprise.
“I already told you that.” Elecia’s eye roll was heard by Vhalla from the other room.
“You will help withdraw the magic so her Channel can be restored.”
“I’ve never—”
“I am not asking you, Fritznangle, I am telling you as your Emperor.”
Vhalla rubbed her abdomen. She needed to get up and call off her protective love before he made an ass of himself to their friends.
“But not yet,” Elecia said firmly. “I see what you are doing.”
“Elecia—” Aldrik warned.
“No. You are trying to fix it all and force it back to where it is comfortable for you. But you cannot force her. Her body is healing. This isn’t a battle scar, and it’s not going to be fixed when we don’t see blood anymore. You are healing, too.”
“Aldrik,” Vhalla called.
“Vhalla, what is it?” The doors were thrown open, and he rushed to her side. “What hurts?”
“I woke, and you weren’t here.” She tried to force a small smile.
“I was only taking care of a few things, my love. I’m here. I’m with you.”
“Stay,” Vhalla demanded.
Aldrik’s hair was a mess, and his eyes looked sunken. Somehow, his face had become gaunter in one night. Elecia’s advice to Aldrik hit Vhalla’s heart. They were both hurting, and that hurt would only be soothed by being together and letting themselves be sad.
Elecia came in as Aldrik situated himself next to her. She had clearly spent some of the night acquiring and preparing a new flight of potions for Vhalla to ingest. As the healer was leaving, Aldrik requested that she find a book for them to read.
Vhalla wondered if he had known what she needed to feel better. Or if, somehow in his own turmoil, he needed the same things as she. They spent the day tucked together, ignoring the world.
Aldrik didn’t even part from her when it came time to bathe again. He sent Elecia away, announcing that he would do it himself. Vhalla tried to avoid either of them helping her, but her attempts were futile.
/> “I can do it myself,” she insisted. “I don’t need you.”
“You’re right, you don’t need me. But I want to help you.” He guided her to the steaming bathwater.
“Aldrik, you don’t want to do this, it’s. . . very messy.” She had more eloquent words to describe the situation, but she didn’t use them. Clarity and eloquence bred heartbreak for her as they laid out neatly the situation she was in.
“Blood does not scare me.” Aldrik begun undressing her.
Vhalla grabbed his wrist. Tears of frustration and anger welled up in the corners of her eyes. Every word was trapped in her throat with no hope of freedom.
“If you want me to go,” he whispered. “Tell me plainly. Tell me to leave your side, and I will.”
She shook her head. She didn’t want him gone. She needed his presence and his love just as he seemed to need hers. The emotion persisted even when his hands washed away the blood that slicked her thighs.
The distance in his eyes eased as the days passed. The only time pain showed was when he focused on the sight of her barren neck. But Aldrik didn’t speak of it, and Vhalla didn’t force the issue. She could apologize and make excuses until the world ended. But it wouldn’t change anything.
The only thing that mildly helped was the day that Elecia deemed her healed enough to attempt recovering her magic from the vessel. It reminded them both that, despite what Vhalla had given up, hopefully something was gained.
“All right, Vhal,” Fritz began. “There isn’t much here. It should—should—be enough to have a Vessel to start calling to magic through your Channel. But you’ll need to withdraw every last bit of magic, to be certain.”
“Might it not work?” Vhalla asked nervously.
“If there’s not enough to unblock your Channel, the magic will just fizzle the first time you try to use it.”
“How do I withdraw it?” She didn’t allow herself to be scared. There wasn’t any other option but success.
“I’ll help you,” Fritz encouraged. “You hold it and imagine the watch is your Channel. Feel it, know it, and welcome it into you.” He curled her fingers around the watch and grasped her hand. “I’ll help push the magic out, help it move towards you.”