Chapter 5- The edge of waiting

MAERWYNN POV

Later that night, I stood alone on the balcony, watching the glasslike city below glimmer like a constellation spilled across the mountainside.

The wind was gentle, cool against my skin, threading through the slit in my gown, tugging at the ends of my hair softly. The city felt alive beneath me—veins of light winding through buildings, magic twinkling in shades I wouldn't have guessed to name existed before now. It was breathtaking. Unnatural. A kind of beauty that felt both eternal and entirely removed from time.

But I wasn’t thinking about beauty.

I was thinking about Edina.

Was she cold? Was she afraid? Was she still… her?

Rhaenan mentioned, Kyante could turn anyone and anything that crossed her path into a demon.

I leaned into the railing and closed my eyes for a moment. The air tasted like frost and starlight, but I couldn’t shake the ache in my chest. Valen had said we’d wait. That we’d regroup and plan before going after her. That charging into Kyante’s jaws now would only get us all killed. He was right.

But every second we waited, I felt like I was losing my sister. One breath at a time.

Even in the Twilight Court—where time didn’t move the same way, where everything shimmered like an endless dream—I could feel it slipping.

Her slipping.

“You’re too quiet,” Valen murmured behind me, his voice low and warm.

I didn’t turn.

His arms slid around my waist, strong and sure, anchoring me back to the present. He pressed a slow kiss to the back of my neck, just below my ear. My breath hitched slightly—not from surprise, but from how easily he knew where to touch, how to steady me.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” I said, voice soft but edged. “Back in court.”

He didn’t answer at first. Just held me a little tighter, brushing another kiss to my shoulder.

“We don’t need more enemies, Valen,” I said. “You turned the whole room against us with a single move. That wasn’t strategy. That was spectacle.”

“You’re wrong,” he said quietly, against my skin. “I didn’t turn them. I exposed them.”

I let out a breath. It came shakier than I wanted it to. “That’s the problem. We need allies. Not exposure. Not war inside our walls before the real one even starts.”

He rested his chin on my shoulder now, the gold of his cape brushing my back. “They were never going to accept you quietly. Not all of them. You’d sit beside me in silence, and they’d still whisper. Still doubt. Still plot.”

“And now?” I asked, turning my head just enough to meet his gaze. “Now they just do it louder.”

He was quiet again, watching me. “I made a choice today. To stand beside you, not just behind closed doors. To give them no room to pretend otherwise. You are mine. But more than that… you are theirs. Whether they like it or not.”

A silence stretched between us, taut and thick with everything we hadn't said yet.

I looked away first, back to the city.

“I’m scared I’ll be too late,” I whispered. “I’m scared when we finally reach her… she won’t be Edina anymore.”

He didn’t give me empty comfort. No soft lie. Just his arms tightening around me again.

“If you start falling apart,” he said, “then I’ll be the one who holds you together.”

I closed my eyes.

I didn’t want to need him like this. But I did.

And I hated how much comfort I found in the strength of his arms, the calm in his voice, the steadiness I couldn’t find in myself.

“I can’t lose her, Valen.”

“We won’t.”

Another kiss, this one lingering against the curve of my jaw. “But we don’t go blind. We don’t charge. We strike when she doesn’t see it coming.”

I nodded against him, though it still felt like swallowing fire.

He turned me gently to face him, his hands cupping my face now.

“I will not let her go,” he said. “But I won’t let them take you either. And if we burn for it, Maerwynn—then we burn together.”

His lips met mine before I could answer—fierce, grounding, filled with emotions and promises.

I kissed him back, my arms circling around his neck. He tasted like heat and winter—sharp, familiar, and  only mine. The charge between us snapped like a bowstring, and I didn’t care that the world outside was still existing. Not right now. Not with his hands slipping into my hair and his mouth claiming mine like I was oxygen.

He pressed me gently but firmly against the cool stone wall of the balcony, the stars above glinting like a thousand quiet witnesses. The city glowed below us, unaware, or maybe simply not caring, that its High Lord was unraveling for a woman wrapped in midnight. For me.

His hand slid down my spine, pulling me flush against him, and I gasped into his mouth. Valen growled low in his throat—a sound that sent a ripple down my back.

“I need you,” he murmured, voice raw against my skin. “Now.”

I didn’t say a word. My fingers were already working at the clasps of his tunic, dragging the fabric down his shoulders to reveal skin and scars. He made quick work of my gown, pushing the silk aside to reveal the bare line of my thigh, the vines on my skin glowing faintly.

Every time we touched like this, I felt the aether more alive inside me.

He lifted me into his arms as if I weighed nothing, carrying me back into the room, lips never leaving mine. When he laid me down onto the velvet sheets, I saw the hunger in his eyes—but also the reverence. Like he was still stunned that I was his.

And gods, I was.

He worshipped me with his hands. His mouth. Every inch of him. His power rippled beneath his skin like it was trying to get out, trying to reach me. And when we finally moved together—bodies aligned, breath syncing like a song—the bond between us roared to life.

I felt it as he did: a flush of searing energy crackling under our skin. My chest burned, not from pain, but from power, energy, desire, pleasure. His eyes darkened as the raw force surged through him, veins lighting up like starfire as we fused again—not just as lovers, but as mates.

Valen buried his face in the crook of my neck with a rough sound—half-moan, half-prayer. The magic threaded between us twisted tighter, deeper. It wrapped around our souls, tugging, binding, pulling everything we were into one.

“I feel it,” he breathed. “Every time. Like the realm itself bends toward you.”

He moved inside me with a rhythm that made my leg wobbble, and I clung to him, to the feeling that we were together, suspended from time, for now.

“Maerwynn—”

My name on his lips undid me.

The bond snapped taut, like a cord pulled too tight, and then it spilled open between us in a burst of blinding sensation. It was more than climax—it was convergence. A claiming. A fusion that left us breathless and blinking in the stillness that followed.

He collapsed beside me, pulling me into his chest as his breath slowed. His heartbeat was wild against my ear.

After a while, he whispered, “It’s stronger now. The bond. Every time… I feel more.”

“So do I.”

And it was terrifying.

Because I didn’t know how much of me was still just me. And how much of me was now his.

We lay in silence, limbs tangled, wrapped in the faint golden afterglow of mating magic.

“It feels so good every time,” I murmured, breathless, my fingers curling at the back of his neck. “Like I’m drunk on faerie wine.”

Valen chuckled, low and rough. “It’s a high,” he said against my skin. “The pleasure... and the magic.”

He kissed me again—slow, deep—then pulled back just enough to breathe. “Rhaenan and I are riding out to check the borders tomorrow. Taking a few guards.”

“I’m coming with you.”

His brow furrowed, just slightly. “It’s dangerous.”

“I know.” I met his gaze without flinching. “But I’ll be fine... as long as we go together.”