Chapter Text
I’m in our chambers in Aretia, getting out of the bath when Xaden finally wakes up.
I gaze at myself in the mirror for a little too long, at my damp hair that desperately needs a trim because even braiding it up is hardly enough to contain it, at the dark hollows under my eyes, and at the faint outline of an ashen handprint wrapped around my left bicep. Then, bent over to towel off my hair while still dripping on the tile floor, Tairn alerts me.
“He wakes.”
I stumble and barely catch myself on the sink in time so I don’t bust my head open on its side. Tairn makes a sound that’s somewhere between a growl of annoyance and a disappointed sigh. I scramble to grab the towel and wrap it around myself in order to have any semblance of being put together when seeing and speaking to my husband—really speaking to him—for the first time in eight months.
As I move to the door, Tairn speaks again.
“Silver One, wait.”
Wait? There is no waiting. I’ve done eight fucking months of waiting to be with Xaden again, and I will not let another second pass. I toss the door to the bedroom open, trailing water behind me.
“Xaden?”
Xaden is sitting up in bed, gazing down at the golden band on his ring finger. My heart stutters and is so light it feels like it might fly away. He startles at my entrance, eyes widened a fraction as his gaze flickers down to my towel and then back to my face. Gods, his eyes—his gorgeous golden-flecked onyx, no amber or red or—
Or any emotion, actually. His face is now carefully blank as he assesses me in the doorway, a look that’s recognizable but never sent in my direction, especially in our chambers. Even before we were together, any look he sent my way was usually accompanied by a sneer or a smirk.
Okay. That’s okay, I tell myself, even as a pang hits my chest and sits in each beat of my racing heart.
There’s a new scar on his chest that sits under the one he took willingly for me, fresh from the dagger I held in both hands, not even two days ago.
I swallow past my own pain and instead put my focus on only him. Making sure he’s okay is first. If we’re okay, can come after.
“How are you feeling?” I ask, trying for a gentle smile.
He blinks. “…Fine.”
Fine? “Xaden, please. You’re not hurting?”
I move to sit at the end of the bed, by his feet. He pulls his legs closer to himself and rests an elbow on his knee, feigning nonchalance, but his jaw tenses.
Another pang hits me, nearly making me flinch. I fold my hands in my lap, desperately trying to come up with the words to encompass my regret, sorrow, apologies, fears, anything that I can give him to dispel some of this tension.
“Xaden, I’m so—”
And then my scalp prickles, but there’s no fucking bond for him to tug on right now.
I slam my shields up. Tairn growls.
“Don’t you dare,” I spit out, my voice cracking.
It’s his turn to flinch back, his eyes wide.
Fury churns in my stomach. He opens his mouth, closes it, and then stares off over my shoulder, likely listening to Sgaeyl.
“Violet,” Andarna murmurs. “There’s something wrong with his head.”
My fury quickly turns to fear. “What do you mean?”
Did something not work? Did he come back…wrong?
There’s no hint of red in his eyes, at his temples, but as an Initiate…no. He can’t be. This can’t have all been for nothing.
I do not have the strength to kill him twice. I just don’t.
Andarna doesn’t answer. When Xaden meets my gaze again, an eyebrow raised, I prepare for the worst. And yet—
“You’re Tairn’s rider?”
Nothing could prepare me for this. A heavy pit opens in my stomach.
“…What?” I respond, my voice barely above a whisper.
“Tairn’s—”
“Yes.”
I can’t fucking bear to hear him ask that again. I press my trembling lips together, goosebumps rising on my bare arms. Droplets of water from my hair trail down my cheeks.
“Silver One, he does not—”
“Xaden,” I say, tuning Tairn out. Gods, no.
Xaden’s head tilts as he watches me, waiting for me to speak. I shift to pull my knees under me and crawl a few inches closer, wrapping a hand around his ankle and feeling the heat of him through the blanket that’s drawn up around his waist. He stiffens, but doesn’t move away.
I probably look deranged, trembling and dripping water all over our bed, in nothing but a towel. He doesn’t look exactly his best either, his face still gaunt and yellowed, and his frame a little thinner. But he’s alive. He’s home.
It takes everything in me to form my next words. I manage it, although my voice is thin and brittle.
“Do you know who I am?”
I am Violet Sorrengail Riorson. Third-year cadet. Fourth Wing, flame section, second squad. Duchess of Tyrrendor. Lightning wielder. Dream-walker. Tairn and Andarna’s rider. Your wife.
Your murderer.
I would take any single one of those answers. Any flicker of recognition in his gaze, because gods, he is looking at me like he’s trying to place me. His expression is bewildered now, between me clinging to him and whatever Sgaeyl has said to him. I hold my breath and try not to fall to pieces.
After the longest moment of my life, he shakes his head.
It’s as if a bucket of ice water has been dumped over me, and the cold seeps into my bones. I want to scream, but all that escapes me is a breathy, disbelieving giggle.
This can’t be happening. Before, all that was left of his shattered soul was me. He said it himself. And now he has it back but, what? I didn’t make it into the patchwork of himself that was pieced back together?
Xaden pulls his ankle from my grip, and I fist my hand in the sheet instead.
“Maybe you should go,” he says, flatly.
My head snaps up to meet his gaze. He’s cleared his expression of the confusion I know is still running through him, with the shadows unfurling from under the bed and wrapping closer to him a dead giveaway. His head is definitely not on right—until he gained more power from channeling the earth, I hardly ever saw his shadows so closely reflect his emotions, especially not anxious ones. That’s something Lynx is dealing with, but not Xaden.
“Go?” I respond. “Go where?”
“Does he think I’m some fucking one night stand?” I hiss to Tairn.
“I am unsure,” he grumbles, clearly displeased with Xaden’s attitude. “His soul is no longer damned. But if he does not correct himself soon I will send him back to damnation.”
Right. Tairn hasn’t been speaking with Sgaeyl much, after their return. He wanted to see what happened when Xaden woke before…recommitting? My poor old man dragon is not doing much better than me, in the heartbreak department.
“Do not attribute your human petulance to dragon affairs.”
“I don’t know,” Xaden scoffs. “Out of my room would be a great start, if you don’t mind.”
Perfect. There’s a bit of the snark I know and love, even if being asked to leave our room sends another stab straight to my heart.
“Can you get Brennan up here?” I plead. “Probably Garrick, too?”
I sit back on my haunches and curl my hands into fists in my lap. I don’t know how to approach this. I want to cry, or scream, but seeing as he thinks I’m just a strange woman in his bed right now, neither of those will be very helpful. Out of any possible ways for this to go, having to reintroduce myself was not one I’d rehearsed as I laid by his side and watched him breathe for the past two nights.
But I’ve never been one to just sit and take his shit, so I won’t be starting now.
I lift my chin to meet his glare. “Why would I leave my own room in nothing but a towel?”
He narrows his eyes as I climb off the bed and walk to our wardrobe. I take a steadying breath while grabbing my things out of it.
“And…my name is Violet,” I add, softly.
I glance over my shoulder at him; he’s watching me carefully, but there’s no recognition waiting there. His face scrunches for a moment, like he’s searching for it himself, and finds nothing. Goes back to watching me with vaguely annoyed apathy, and then distantly as Sgaeyl probably continues speaking to him.
He would recognize my last name—or, my middle name now, but I want him to remember Violet, not just relive the first moments we met, when he really wanted me dead.
I realize too late that maybe I should’ve taken my clothes to the bathing chambers and changed there since he thinks he doesn’t know me, rather than just dropping my towel and doing so in the middle of the room. When I hear him curse under his breath I don’t even know how to respond—say sorry? We’re married, for Amari’s sake.
I dress quickly in my loose training pants and corset, having a little more trouble than usual tying the latter up in the back due to my fingers trembling.
Behind me, Xaden clears his throat. When I turn, holding the front of my corset to my chest, he’s slung his legs over the side of the bed, resting his weight back on his hands.
“Need some assistance?”
The lightness in his tone sounds forced, but I find myself nodding anyways, craving him in any way I can get.
He crosses the room to me, barefoot and with just a pair of loose cotton pants sitting low at his hips. It feels wrong to stare right now, no matter how much I want to, so I turn my gaze to the ground and hold my hair over one shoulder, still damp and tangled from my bath.
He doesn’t speak at first as his hands make quick work of tying my corset up. His warmth so close to me is soothing, despite the situation, and he hovers close after finishing, his knuckles brushing the inside of my bicep and making me shudder. I opted for a sleeveless undershirt today, and just the hint of his touch leaves me buzzing and then aching for him to hold me close.
“Sgaeyl says you’re trustworthy,” he mutters. “That I…owe you my life.”
I swallow hard, wrapping my arms around my midsection.
“That’s probably the kindest thing she’s ever said about me,” I say. And a funny way of describing recent events.
“He wouldn’t be standing here without you,” Andarna adds, a fierceness to her tone that almost makes me smile.
“Without the others.” Sloane, Dain, Cat. “My job was the exact opposite of saving.”
Xaden snorts in response to me, and I turn to look up at him, lips curving up at the sound. He’s so close to me, staring down confused and thoughtful. I want to reach up and trace the scars on his chest, feel the tangle of his hair in my hands, cup his face and stand on my tiptoes for a kiss and for him to inevitability scoop me into his arms so he doesn’t have to bend down so much to kiss me back.
Instead, he crosses his arms in front of his chest and I feel the inches of distance between us like a physical blow.
I have to clear my throat before speaking again. “I asked Tairn to get Brennan and Garrick, so you can—”
There’s a loud knock at our door, and then Garrick’s voice carrying through.
“Sorrengail,” he snaps. “Come get your fucking dog before I—”
I dart to the door and throw it open, to both save Garrick from whatever he’s going to say about my lovely personal guard I’m sure is outside, and to escape Xaden’s sharp, furious gaze as he stiffens and realizes whose daughter I am.
Garrick is standing there in his flight leathers, scowling, with Captain Aspen Farroway standing close behind, one hand resting lazily on the pommel at his hip. A corner of his mouth lifts at me, like he can’t be bothered to smile fully.
“Violet,” Aspen greets, and I bite back the correction on my title. He’s not worth the effort, as the past however many months have reminded me.
“Captain,” I respond. “I asked for Tavis to come here.”
“And I was escorting him.” He shrugs. “Trying to make conversation, even. Wondering what someone on house arrest is doing in their flight leathers.”
“It’s a rider thing—”
“Need to do some fucking laundry—”
I wince. Garrick sends me an exasperated look at my attempt to help. Aspen clicks his tongue.
I continue on quickly. “I asked him here because Xaden is awake. Can you bring some water and breakfast from downstairs for him?”
Garrick perks up, gazing over my shoulder, but Xaden isn’t in view from the doorway. I know because I can feel his fucking glare from the corner of the room that’s growing more lethal with each passing second.
Aspen tilts his head, a single dark curl falling onto his forehead. “Don’t know if fetching pastries is in my job description.”
“You useless little—”
“Brennan!” I shout down the hall as I spot my brother reaching the top of the stairs.
The two men in front of me turn to him at my greeting, and I send a desperate look that hopefully screams hurry the fuck up before Garrick loses the little bit of patience he has left. He never has a lot of it, but since returning from the isles with Aaric a few months ago and getting put on leave due to abandoning post for so long, he’s had trouble even being allowed to go for a flight for Chradh, and any rider knows that’s fucking torture.
Still better than the alternative that Aaric somehow talked his father out of—which was a dishonorable discharge and being thrown in the brig at Calldyr.
Thankfully, Brennan does read my face and puts some pep in his step. When he reaches my door, I grab him and Garrick by the wrist before he can even say hello.
“Maybe you can be useful and get someone else to bring that stuff up, Captain?” I ask, plastering on a fake smile.
He looks me up and down, considering, and before he can reply, Brennan does so.
“That’s an order, Captain,” he snaps. “And a dismissal.”
Aspen straightens and smiles, suddenly the picture of a perfect infantry officer. “Of course, Colonel.”
I tug the two of them through the door and throw it shut without another word.
I blow out a sigh and run my hands through the tangled mess of my hair, trying to gather myself before daring to face Xaden. Brennan and Garrick are greeting him, anyway.
“Riorson,” Brennan says. “How are you feeling?”
“Glad to see you back in the realm of the living,” Garrick adds, grinning wide.
“Is this a fucking joke?” Xaden hisses.
I glance up at him and press my lips into a tight line at the fury in his gaze, the lump that’s been forming in my throat threatening to choke me now. If he decides to kill me, I guess this time it’s really only fair.
“He will not lay a hand on you if he knows what his life is worth,” Tairn growls.
“Well, there’s not really anything stopping him, this time,” I reply.
Even if he remembers the favor my mom called on, she’s dead now, and with no mating bond between Tairn and Sgaeyl, there’s nothing tying our souls together. Nothing bringing value to my life over his revenge, really.
“Violet,” Andarna chides.
Garrick is trying to say something else to him, but Xaden cuts him off.
“How is Violet Sorrengail in my fucking room? In Aretia?”
Garrick glances back and forth between us, brows furrowed. “Xaden, c’mon. You can’t blame her. Violet had to—”
“He doesn’t know what you’re talking about!” I yell, my voice cracking as the tears that have been waiting bubble up and fog my vision.
Silence stretches across the room.
“Oh, shit,” Brennan mutters.
“He doesn’t recognize me,” I continue in a small voice, trying to blink back the moisture in my eyes.
“…What?” Garrick asks, looking back at his friend in disbelief, and Xaden’s jaw pops.
“Got it. Okay,” Brennan says, holding his palms out. “Listen, Riorson, you’ve been…missing for a while. And you were badly hurt. I need to check your head.”
Xaden turns to him, considering for a moment, and then slowly nods. At Brennan’s urging, he moves to sit at the desk that’s behind me, and grows even more confused when Garrick shifts to shield me from him as he walks by us. When he sits, Brennan places one palm on his forehead, the other at his nape. Garrick squeezes my shoulder before going to stand at my husband’s side.
Maybe I should’ve put on my leathers. Or at least some of my daggers. I feel too vulnerable like this; I reach for the funnel of Tairn’s power in my mind, not pulling anything out, just letting the power rush through my veins to give me some strength.
Brennan’s brow furrows as he searches for any wounds, and by the tight look he shares with Garrick and I, followed by him dropping his hands to his sides, I already know the answer.
“Okay,” he sighs. “Physically, your head is fine.”
Xaden goes to stand, and Brennan pushes him back down by the shoulder.
Xaden scowls up at him. “What?”
“I still need to get some Healers to look at you and figure this out.”
“Figure what out? That I forgot meeting Violet Sorrengail last night? Who cares?”
I can’t hold back the flinch at his words this time. For fuck’s sake. Brennan’s hand on his shoulder tightens, and Garrick glares.
“You don’t need to be such a fucking asshole right now.”
“What are you talking about?”
“The Duke is usually one of my favorite humans,” Andarna mutters. “But he’s quickly veering into snack territory.”
“Andarna,” I chide. It’s still Xaden, he’s just…confused. And being a major asshole about it.
“…Don’t tell Sgaeyl.”
“Xaden,” Brennan interrupts. “I know you’re confused, and I’m probably going to piss you off even more in a minute. You’re misremembering more than you realize, right now, and I need you to answer my questions to help figure this out. With minimal snark, please?”
Xaden rolls his eyes, but leans back in the chair and waves him on.
“How old are you?”
“Twenty-one.”
I gasp, feeling like the floor is falling out from under me, and Garrick curses. Brennan shoots a warning look our way.
Holy shit. That’s not just me that’s missing from his memories—that’s years gone. How could that happen? I could understand his time as a Venin being foggy when he returned, maybe, but three fucking years?
“Do you know what today’s date is?” Brennan continues.
“It’s…” He shakes his head as he comes up blank.
“That’s fine—”
“No, hold on,” Xaden snaps. “I know the fucking date.”
Brennan watches him carefully and waits.
His face twists in pain as he thinks, and I have to fold my hands behind me to keep from reaching out to him.
“We were just out flying with Bodhi for—” He glares at me, and if he notices my flinch at his cousin’s name, he doesn’t comment. “We were out for a flight. Garrick, what the fuck happened?”
Garrick swallows. “Xaden, we went—we’ve gone on a lot of flights with Bodhi.”
He winces and rubs his temple.
“I don’t—” He stops, his gaze catching on the wedding band on his finger. His jaw tenses, and his eyes dart to me for a moment. He looks pained, but there’s a flicker of hope in my chest that maybe some pieces are falling back into place.
“Where’s Catriona?”
My stomach plummets.
“Catriona?” Garrick asks. “Why the fuck does it matter where she is?”
“Because she’s my wife?” He spits out.
A wet, hysterical laugh bubbles out of my chest as I put my face in my hands. My ring from Xaden is still resting on the side of the sink, where I had left it in my haste to come out and greet my husband after he woke up.
“You’re not married to Catriona,” Garrick corrects, quickly.
“Who else—”
“Me!” I drop my hands and meet his confused expression with watery eyes, thunder rumbling in the bright blue sky outside. “You’re married to me.”
Xaden stares. Looks me up and down.
And laughs.
He might as well have taken a dagger and twisted it into my heart. My hands tremble as I watch him. Brennan rubs a hand down his face and paces away from Xaden, while Garrick takes my arm to steady me.
“What kind of joke is that, Sorrengail?” Xaden mocks. “You—”
“Xaden,” Garrick snaps. “That’s enough.”
I can’t hold them in anymore—tears run down my face in rivets as I fight to control my breathing. It takes all my focus, leaving my fingertips sparking with power and Garrick yanks his hand away with a hiss. My chest may as well be collapsing in on itself.
Xaden watches me closely, the mocking smile slipping as lightning crackles in my hands, like he’s reassessing me.
And it’s not as someone to love. It’s as a threat. I don’t need a mental bond with him to recognize that.
“Violet,” Brennan says, softly.
“I’m leaving.” I spin on my heel to walk to the bathing chambers, entering quickly to grab my ring from the sink and make a show of slipping it on my finger when I return. Xaden’s eyes widen. “I’ll send some fucking Healers.”
When I leave our room, slamming the door shut behind me, I’m immensely grateful that Aspen is off doing whatever he does when he’s not up my ass. Writing his latest report to King Tauri, probably.
It means the hallway of the family wing is empty, and I hurry to my office, where a pile of endless paperwork and missives waits for me to drown in.
I reach for Tairn and am met with a wall of onyx. I take a shuddering breath.
“Andarna?” I try.
“I am here,” she assures me. “Tairn and Sgaeyl are…arguing, I think.”
“Shouldn’t Sgaeyl be there for Xaden?”
He’s being a total ass, but his mind is probably a disaster right now. And if she has him blocked off like Tairn does me…Who else does he have to keep him steady?
“I know. I don’t think they’ll be long. Things were just getting a little heated, for a moment.”
Okay. Got it. The five of us are doing superb right now.
I wipe the tears from my face and compose myself enough to stop the first guard I see and have them send some Healers to our room for Xaden. Hopefully between them and Brennan, they can figure out how to fix this. Fix him.
He’s alive, I remind myself. He’s home.
The last time I spoke to Xaden, I was dream-walking, and he was surprisingly forward in his intel, much more than he had been for the past few months he’s been gone and I’d been able to briefly find him in dreams.
He couldn’t avoid this fight that was coming to us, he said. Stay away from the border. Stay safe.
Yeah, right.
We had an emergency meeting; I got a small group to come with me on my allotted few days of leave to deal with Tyrrendor affairs and bring them on a rescue mission, full of daunting steps that included me putting a dagger into Xaden’s heart.
I did it. I pushed a blade through skin and muscle up into his organ—and the worst part wasn’t the physical strength it took to do so. It was the brief moments after, watching his expression melt into relief, his final act reaching up to grasp at a strand of my hair before he collapsed. Hearing Sgaeyl’s wail. Having to lay over his unmoving body and hope and pray that the half-assed plan Dain, Brennan, and I put together actually worked.
But Xaden’s alive. His soul is intact. We can get through this. I can deal with the apathy, the snark, even a bit of cruelty while he recovers. I’ll just add it to the list of things he has to grovel about when he has his memories back.
Like proposing and getting married to me after turning Asim, leaving me in charge of his province, and then going off the grid for eight months.
I can’t bear to think of any other possibilities. Of our history, our struggles, our love, just being…gone. Not to mention every other piece of him from the past three years he’s collected and fought for. The friends he’s lost.
When I reach my office, I lock the door behind me, sink to my knees, and sob. Full, shaking sobs that wreck my entire body, until my eyes and throat all the way down to my toes ache and burn. Until I’m wrung out and hollow, feeling my pulse in my palms and ears.
And then I get up, and get to work.