Lyra POV The hallway was quiet. The kind of quiet that clung to the walls like dust, untouched and heavy. Lyra stood still before the familiar door, her fingers curled loosely at her sides. Then, slowly, she pushed it open.The bedroom greeted her like a ghost.Her lungs tightened as she stepped inside. Kane’s scent was fading - still there, in the folds of the sheets and the shirt tossed on the edge of the bed, but not as strong as it had once been. Time, it seemed, didn’t wait for grief.She closed the door behind her and leaned against it for a moment, exhaling like the breath had been trapped in her ribs for days.Crossing to the sideboard, she poured herself a glass of wine - red and deep and bitter. She didn’t sit. Instead, she walked out onto the balcony, letting the night air wash over her like a balm.The city lay quiet beneath her. Peaceful, for now. Lights glittered like fireflies in the distance. The full moon hung low, brilliant and round, bathing everything in a silver
Nyxar POV The door closed with a soft thud behind him, and silence settled over the old stones like dust. Nyxar stood still for a while, breathing in the still air, letting the faint, distant scent of aged incense and cold ash wrap around him like a faded memory.And then he heard a breath. Barely audible, but there. He froze. Head turning, ears sharpening.Outside the door, just beyond the hallway, came the sound of a slow, deliberate inhale - like someone remembering how to breathe after forgetting for too long.Lyra.He didn’t move. Didn’t speak. He didn’t need to. She wasn’t crying, not really. Just… standing there. Breathing.Trying to stay upright.A few moments passed. Then soft footsteps - controlled but heavy - retreated down the corridor. A pause. A door creaked open, then closed gently behind her with a small click.And the silence returned.Nyxar sat down heavily on the edge of the bed, his hands dragging down his face. “Shit,” he muttered.He had forgotten. Forgott
Lyra POVThe shift came easier than she expected. No pain. No resistance. Just a rushing heat in her veins and then a spreading stillness, as if her body had always been waiting to become this.She landed on four paws. And blinked.White.She turned her head, catching the shimmer of pale fur in her peripheral vision. Her coat gleamed silver-white under the filtered sunlight of rising day - soft and wild, almost glowing against the cracked stones of the temple floor."White?" she asked silently."White," her wolf answered, proud and certain. "You are not what they made you, Lyra. You are what you were born to be. But the resurection changed few things in us. "A strange mix of awe and peace settled in her chest. Before she could dwell on it, Nyxar’s wolf bounded past her - a living shadow made of wind and storm. Powerful. Whole. And undeniably happy. He nudged her, circling like a restless orbit, and her heart lifted at the sight.The joy in his movements was contagious. She gave a qui
Nyxar POVThe wind whispered through the crumbling bones of the temple, stirring dust and leaves like forgotten prayers. Shadows clung to the corners of the broken sanctuary, quiet and still, as if holding their breath.Nyxar sat on the edge of the old altar, elbows resting on his knees, eyes cast toward the open ceiling where a single shaft of sunlight pierced through the cracked stone above. Lyra was nearby - silent, present. She didn’t fill the space with questions or noise. She simply was. Her stillness steadied him more than she likely realized.He drew a breath, deep and grounding. The scent of old stone, ash, and moss filled his lungs.This place had once been sacred. Once, his kind had come here to speak to the Moon. To pray. To transform. The divine had moved in these walls.Now it was dust and ruin.Like him.He tilted his head back, eyes slipping closed. The mark along his forearm - once the seal of his divinity - was dull now. No longer a flare of power. No longer a curse
Lyra didn’t speak.She stepped quietly to the side and settled onto a patch of moss, legs folded beneath her, spine straight as a sentinel. The moonlight slid in through the broken rafters above, painting her hair in silver. Her presence was steady - not pressing, not retreating. Just there. She could Nyxar stayed kneeling, fingers grazing the fractured stone where once an altar had stood tall and gleaming with divine light. His hand traced the worn runes, fingers slipping over grooves long eroded by wind and time.“This is where I fell,” he said after a while, voice low. “Not in battle. Not before a blade. Here. In the temple.”Lyra looked toward him, but said nothing. She didn’t need to.“I was given a choice.” His gaze fixed on the stones. “To let them die… or to fall. Become immortal. To give up the throne. My power. My life. My mortality. Everything.”His jaw tightened. “I didn’t hesitate. Not for one breath. I gave it all for them. For the ones who cried out in my name.”“And
Nyxar POV The corridor felt quieter than it had ever been. As if the walls themselves held their breath, watching the once-immortal god relearn the rhythm of mortality. Nyxar leaned slightly against Lyra as they moved - her arm steady beneath his, her touch warm and sure.He paused beside one of the archways, exhaling slow. The torchlight flickered over his face, casting golden highlights into the dark growth of stubble along his jaw.“I need to see it,” he murmured. “The old sanctuary. The ruins.”Lyra turned her face toward him, brows lifting. “Now?”Nyxar’s gaze was distant, tethered to memory and something deeper - pulling at him like the moon pulled at tides. But then hiis stomach growled. Loud and unmistakable.He blinked. She blinked. And then she laughed.Not the soft, guarded sound he’d grown used to, but a real laugh - light and almost surprised, like she hadn't expected it from herself.He glanced down at his own stomach and muttered, “Apparently, being mortal comes with i
Nyxar’s POVThere was no pain at first.No sound. No color. Only the hollow thrum of memory drifting through a void where even time dared not exist. Here, in this formless silence, everything Nyxar had been - god, warrior, monster - unraveled.His name echoed once, a ghost of thunder across a dark sea. Then it dissolved. Nyxar. Once a name that cracked mountains and bled stars. Now, meaningless.The world beyond had vanished. Only the impression of a face lingered, etched into the dying light of his thoughts. Lyra. Her warmth, her tears, the feel of her hand in his - real in a way nothing else had been in centuries. He’d given everything to protect her. To save her.He thought it had been the end. But something remained. A flicker. An ember buried beneath the ash.He reached for it - not with hands, but with the fragile echo of thought. There was no body here. No form. Just awareness stretched thin like dying flame. The divine part of him - once radiant and vengeful - was crumbling.
Lyra POV Ekreth was gone again. For a long moment, she simply sat there, the weight of the world pressing down on her shoulders. Duty waited outside that door. An entire kingdom will look to her now - broken, battered, but victorious. They had won the war. The Harbinger was gone. The seal was locked and nothing should get through to this world.And Kane… Kane was gone too.The thought carved another raw wound through her heart. She pressed a trembling hand against her chest, as if she could hold the pieces of herself together a little longer. She was Queen. There was no one else. She can't hide here.The heavy cloak of authority settled around her shoulders. She did not look at Nyxar. She couldn’t. Not yet.A soft knock stirred the heavy silence.Lyra blinked slowly, pulling herself out of the half-daze she'd sunk into. Her fingers still curled around Nyxar’s, reluctant to let go. She didn’t want to move. Didn’t want to face whatever waited beyond this quiet, broken moment.Th
Lyra POV The door clicked softly shut behind Ekreth, leaving her alone with Nyxar and the sound of her own heartbeat.For a long time, she didn't move.She sat there, hands folded on her lap, staring at the slow, steady rise and fall of his chest beneath the blanket. Each breath was a fragile miracle. A proof that he still lived - that he hadn't slipped away entirely into whatever place gods went when they died."You stayed", Thalia murmured inside her, voice warm and thick with emotion."I had to."Lyra answered numbly."No, Lyra. You chose to."Lyra's chest ached at the words.She hadn't thought about it. Not really. When Nyxar’s light began to break apart, when the world had turned inside out - she had moved without hesitation. Without calculation. As if something inside her had already decided long before she knew it herself.But that didn't mean she understood it. Or that she wanted to.A heavy silence filled her mind."He matters to you", Thalia said softly, without accusation.