Kaiden held her there, disbelief breaking through his composure.
"Why," he demanded, voice shaking for the first time, "are you so desperate to die that you would give yourself to a mindless end?"
Inara's strength was already leaving her.
Her legs buckled.
Kaiden lowered her slowly to the ground without realizing he was doing it.
Darian watched, frozen.
His mother's face blurred as tears flooded his vision.
He remembered her voice, soft, calling him in from the yard.
He remembered her hand in his hair when he was sick.
He remembered her laugh.
"Inara," Kaiden said hoarsely. "Stay. Please."
She didn't look at him.
She looked at her son.
"Darian," she whispered.
He choked on a sob. "Mom…?"
Her lips trembled.
"Be… good," she said softly. "I'm sorry."
She turned her head just enough to look at Kaiden.
"And… I'm sorry," she whispered. "For everything."
Kaiden just stared at the blood on his hands as if it were a mathematical error he couldn't solve.
Then, the silence of the field was broken by a sound that wasn't a shout—it was a low, jagged howl of a man who realized he had won the war but destroyed the prize.
Her eyes lost focus.
Her breath stilled.
Silence fell.
Kaiden stared down at her, unmoving.
Then—
"No," he shouted.
The word tore out of him, raw and broken, echoing across the fractured space.
He tightened his grip around Darian without meaning to.
The boy cried out.
Kaiden didn't notice.
He was still looking at Inara.
At the body that wasn't moving.
At the woman who had chosen to disappear rather than belong to him.
The world around them settled.
And somewhere far away—
....
"Mom—!"
The word tore out of him before he hit the ground.
Something hard slammed into his back. The air rushed out of his lungs in a sharp, painful burst.
"Ugh—"
He rolled onto his side, coughing violently. His stomach twisted—
Hrrk.
He vomited.
Dark crimson fluid splattered onto the dirt. He retched again, but nothing came up.
His ears rang. Each breath burned.
He stayed where he was, face pressed into cold ground, fingers digging into damp soil.
When the spinning eased, he opened his eyes.
Black.
Not empty—thick. Pressing.
He blinked. Again.
Nothing changed.
Vesperyn swallowed and pushed himself upright. Pain flared along his ribs. His hands brushed rough bark. Then more of it.
Trees.
He tilted his head back.
No sky. No stars. Just uneven shapes crowding close.
A forest.
He looked around sharply and reached out.
"Darian—"
His knees gave out. He dropped back into the mud, the sound that escaped him small and broken.
"Mom?" he said. Then, quieter, "Darian?"
No answer.
The silence didn't feel empty. It felt alert.
He folded in on himself without thinking, arms tight around his chest.
His hands wouldn't stop shaking.
He looked down.
Fragments lay scattered near his palm. Tiny pieces of metal, cold to the touch.
The ring.
He closed his eyes.
His mother's voice.Darian's scream.The man.
It's been thirteen years since I last saw my child.
Darian.
His chest tightened.
"…Whose child am I?" he whispered.
The words sounded stupid the moment he said them. He knew who his parents were. He knew—
Did he?
His thoughts spiraled, tangling over each other.
The thought slipped the moment he touched it.
Light.Darkness.The way his mother had looked—not surprised. Afraid.
None of it made sense.
He pressed his palms into his face and breathed until the shaking slowed.
He stayed like that.
Time passed.
A sound snapped through the dark.
Crack.
Vesperyn flinched hard.
He lifted his head.
Another sound.
Closer.
Crack.
Something was moving.
His heart began to hammer.
He stood up too fast, dizziness washing over him, but fear shoved it aside. He turned in the first direction that didn't look completely blocked by trees and ran.
Branches whipped against his arms and face as he stumbled through the dark. He couldn't see where he was going—
"Mom—!" he whispered, his voice breaking. "Someone—please!"
His foot caught on a root and he nearly fell, catching himself at the last second. He didn't stop running.
Behind him—
A low, wet sound.
Close.
He risked a glance over his shoulder.
At first, he saw nothing.
Then his eyes adjusted.
Something tall and hunched moved between the trees. Its body bent wrong, joints folding in ways they shouldn't. Its head hung low, almost dragging, as if it was sniffing the ground.
Sniffing.
His stomach dropped.
It reached the dark stain on the dirt.
His vomit.
The thing stopped.
Its head lifted slowly.
Whatever passed for eyes fixed on him.
"No," Vesperyn whispered.
The word barely made it out.
He ran harder.
Tears blurred his vision as panic flooded him, hot and overwhelming.
The ground seemed to tilt under his feet. His lungs burned. Every breath scraped painfully through his chest.
The sound behind him changed.
Closer.
Too close.
Something slammed into his back.
He screamed.
"Aaaaah—!"
He hit the ground hard, palms scraping against dirt and stone. Before he could push himself up, a weight crashed down on him.
Pain exploded in his arm.
Something sharp dug into his skin, piercing through muscle.