The storm, which had begun to calm, surges back with vengeance when grief strikes Theo without warning.
It is sudden.
Unexpected.
Theo closes his eyes.
He mourns a new friend he has just lost.
The pain is sharp and deep, far deeper than he anticipated for someone he had only just met. Yet it feels natural. Inevitable.
He feels unusually close to Alex.
They are alike in ways that are almost cruel.
Both willing to die to protect the people they love.
Both living on borrowed time.
Borrowed lives.
Alex had been easy to talk to. Honest. Straightforward. Around the same age Theo had been before Caelthorn fell.
A man who understood responsibility.
A man who carried guilt.
Theo lets the grief take him.
He does not fight it.
He does not suppress it.
And the storm responds.
The wind begins to roar again.
The waves rise higher and higher, climbing like towering walls of water.
Rain lashes down harder, as if the dark sky itself is grieving with him.
He opens his eyes.
