Page 91 of Fallen Stars
She stared at her friends, both nodding.
“Then I think it’s time we said goodbye here.”
She threw her arms around the wolf, who nuzzled her nose into Elara’s neck.
“Thank you,” she whispered into her fur. “Thank you for helping me through my darkest times. For letting me grieve. Thank you for giving me a purpose and my anger back. I know what it’s like to be a caged thing. So be free, Astra. Be free.”
She kissed the top of the wolf’s head, who whined again, licking the tears that fell from her cheeks.
“Come find me. You know where I am. And Sofia,” she said to the sky, “if you sent her, thank you.”
The wolf gave one last forlorn look, nuzzling Isra and Merissa’s palms before turning to the path to their left and loping down it.
Elara watched her leave, her heart cracking as she did so. But she had let Astra make her choice, and the wolf wanted to roam free.
She stood, weary, Merissa and Isra both hugging her.
“Thank you, both of you too,” she whispered, as they linked her arms and began walking again. “Without the two of you, I… I don’t deserve you.”
Isra tutted, pushing her gently. “What a load of shit. Elara, you would die for us.Killfor us.” She raised a brow at Elara as though she knew what Elara had nearly done to the doorman. “And we would for you too.”
The palace beckoned, the winding steep incline to the golden spires and gushing waterfall behind it a final hurdle.
That emotion that Elara had been trying to tamp down was rising, and she tried once more surreptitiously to call on her shadows. Perhaps in Enzo’s vicinity they would wake.
But alas, nothing.
She quelled her frustration, chiding herself for focusing on her slumbering power instead of her soulmate waiting beyond the gates.
“Are you ready?” Isra asked, her smile stretching from ear to ear.
“Go on,” Merissa smiled, nudging her. “We can meet you up there.”
Elara took a trembling step onto the palace path, feeling an incredible sense of déjà vu. Was it only half a year ago that she had first walked this path, daunted by the Helion palace?
She took another, Merissa and Isra behind her.
And then, that feeling began to engulf her—one of pure desperation—as she began to run, picking up pace as she traversed the path to the ornate palace gates.
Chapter Thirty-Two
It had been a month sinceElara had set foot in the palace, yet she barely took in her surroundings or the servants and workers that stood aghast, all watching the ascent of the Sun to its rightful place in the skies, a foreign, mystical body to them.
She veered through the main doors, the cool atrium air washing over her, before taking a hard left. Her eyes were scanning and searching for Enzo, only Enzo.
The stairs, she took two at a time, hauling herself up the grand staircase. She remembered the way to Enzo’s room, the map ingrained in her mind as she twisted down endless corridors to the lion’s knocker outside his door.
Her breath was ragged, both from exertion and hope. She flung it open, running into the room, the scent of amber engulfing her instantly. Enzo coated her as she searched wildly. The bed was rumpled, covers thrown off. And Elara nearly sank to her knees there as she saw it was empty.
She turned, her breaths nothing more than shallow gasps.
He was awake. He was awake and out of bed, wandering the palace somewhere. A disbelieving mixture of a laugh and a sob escaped her.
Oh gods, he was awake. She had done it, and he was awake.
She flung herself down the stairs again, catching a servant by the neck.
“Princess Elara,” the servant stammered.