CHAPTER 17

Aria's POV 

Kael was still walking toward it. The sky was bleeding with shadows making the surroundings darkened, and the forest below rumbled like something had been woken too soon. I was in a confusing mood when I stood frozen, trying to refresh my memories, my breath caught in my chest, and I stared across the ridge where Kael had landed. At That moment, I thought it was a trick of the light. A dream, maybe. But my bond knew before my mind did.

He was real.

He had come.

And he was walking straight toward whatever had crawled out of that tear in the sky.

I didn’t sleep that night. The others returned to the inner post, but I stayed outside, watching the sky, my heart beat increase than the wind.

Elias tried to speak to me, but I shook my head.

“I need space,” I said and frowned.

He understood. He always did.

In the morning, Dorian found me.

He was pale and quiet, holding something wrapped in old, dark velvet. His hands were careful, almost reverent.

“This came from the ruins,” he said. “We found it buried beneath the stone altar. Elias thinks it’s meant for you.”

I unwrapped the cloth. There was a sword laying inside, its silver edge lined with ancient runes. The hilt was shaped like a crescent moon, I touched it, and the air shifted. The runes shimmered faintly under my fingers.

“What is it?” I asked softly.

Dorian’s voice lowered. “It once belonged to the Moon Queen. Legend says only she could lift it.”

My throat tightened. “And if someone else tries?”

“No one’s ever managed.”

I looked at the blade. I wasn’t sure what scared me more—lifting it or failing to.

But my hand shifted before I could decide.

As soon as my fingers wrapped around the hilt, heat pulsed through my skin, and the sword was lifted like it doesn't weighed something. The moment it left the velvet—

Light exploded.

I cried out, falling to my knees as images slammed into my skull.

Flames. Screams. The clash of metal. A woman’s voice echoing, my voice shouting orders in a forgotten language.

I stood silently on a battlefield, cloaked in silver armor, a crown of stars on my head. My hands gripped this same sword—only its runes were glowing blue then, not silver.

Arrows rained from the sky. My warriors were dying. And in front of me…

A man. Not Kael. But he wore his face. His eyes were the same.

He smiled—and drove a blade through my chest.

I collapsed, the sword falling from my fingers as blood spread across my armor. I reached toward him.

“Why?” I whispered.

But he was already walking away.

I gasped and fell back, the vision shattering. The blade clattered beside me. My heart was racing. I felt cold and hollow like something ancient had been torn out of me.

Dorian knelt beside me. “Aria? Are you—”

“I saw her. Me. The Moon Queen.”

“You remembered?”

“I died,” I whispered. “I was betrayed.”

Dorian went still.

“By a man who looks like Magnus.”

After the next few hours in a blur. I kept seeing that face—the traitor with Kael’s repeated eyes—and every time, my chest twisted with rage and sorrow.

But I didn’t have time to unravel what it meant.

Because Cato’s men returned from the Crimson border.

They weren’t alone.

“We captured a trespasser,” one of the guards said. “He crossed through the cursed woods. Said he was looking for someone.”

I stood up quickly. “Who?”

The soldier frowned. “He didn’t give a name. But he had a mark—a bond mark.”

My knees nearly gave out.

The bond inside me burned. It wasn’t gentle or warm. It was wild and sharp like lightning crackling through my blood.

He was here.

Kael.

I walked away from the campfire and ducked into the trees.

My body was shaking. My heart pounded against my ribs as if it wasn’t longing, not anymore. It was fear. Panic. Something deeper.

And he was close. Too close.

I couldn’t breathe. My hands went numb. My legs wanted to run in opposite directions. I didn’t understand it. Part of me wanted to see him. To touch him. But the other part—

The part that remembered that silver blade in my chest—

Wanted to scream.

I pressed my back against a tree and tried to steady my breathing.

“What is happening to me?” I whispered.

“You’re remembering,” a voice said behind me. I turned sharply, and it was Elias.

His face was serious. Sad.

“I saw him in the past,” I said. “He killed me.”

Elias didn’t look surprised.

“Do you trust your visions?” he asked.

“I don’t know what to trust anymore.”

He took a slow step toward me. “There are many kinds of betrayal. But not all of them are what they seem.”

I frowned. “You think I’m wrong?”

“I think there’s more to the story. Past lives echo, but they aren’t perfect mirrors.”

I clenched my jaw. “I don’t want to see him.”

“Then don’t. But if he’s here… he’s not here to hurt you.”

“How can you know that?”

“Because if he wanted to hurt you, he wouldn’t have come alone. And he wouldn’t have come through cursed lands.”

Later that night, standing near the barracks where Kael was being held.

I didn’t want to go inside, and I didn't want anyone to see my face.

I stood in the shadows, watching the door, hand on the hilt of the Moon Queen’s blade. My bond burned inside me is hot and pulsing. It felt like my skin was too tight. Like I would tear them apart if he got any closer.

I wanted to run. But I couldn’t move. I could feel him now. Not just his presence—his pain.

His regret.

And something else.

Guilt.

I turned away from the door, my heart thundering.

I didn’t need to see him. I already knew.

Kael was breaking, and I was the only one who could feel it.

But just as I took a step toward the woods, a voice reached my ears.

Soft, low, and familiar.

“Aria.” I froze. My whole body was locked in place. Then I turned slowly.

Kael stood just beyond the barrack door. The guards had left. Maybe Elias had done it. Maybe fate.

His face was pale and bruised. And I saw that his hair was longer than I remembered. His clothes were torn and bloodied.

But it was him, my Kael. And not.

My knees wobbled, but I didn’t fall. I decided to draw my sword. Not to fight. But to protect myself from whatever this was. And for whoever *he* had become.

He took one slow step toward me.

“I didn’t come to hurt you,” he said.

I lifted the blade between us.

“Then why are you here?”

Kael’s eyes met mine. Raw. Broken. Full of something I didn’t have a name for, and his face showed an unreadable expression.

“To remember,” he said. “And to undo what was done.”

And in that moment—

I saw it again. Not a vision. Not a past life. The present. Then a shadow moved behind Kael, fast and silent.

Not human and not even alive.

I screamed his name—

But it was already reaching for him.