The Choice

(Paige’s POV)

Beyond the mountain's core, where breath hangs sharp and faint, seconds dissolve. Up there, clocks lose their grip. Cold stretches moments until they snap. Thinness rewires how long things feel. Meaning of time unravels like thread in wind.

A single minute passes. Then ten. After that, sixty more tick by. Slowly, the sun slips down, pushing shadowed shapes from the mountain tops so they crawl like dark fingers over the land beneath. Not a sound exists - just the hush of air whispering between cliffs far above.

Stillness grips me as I face the shadowed gap my boy vanished into. My body begs to bolt forward, pull him close again, shield him from whatever waits. Yet Kieran’s words lock me in place, tighter than iron cuffs. The path ahead belongs only to bloodline heirs.

Alex holds back, planted there like he’s bracing against a gust. Weight shifts among the guards - feet scuffing dirt, shoulders twitching. These ones thrive on motion, not silence thick with old echoes.

Down I go, landing hard, spine pressed to stone that bites through cloth. Shadows hold my gaze - no looking away. Images come anyway. Lysander small, red-faced, fingers curled tight around mine. Then wobbling forward in Blackstone's hall, legs unsure but moving. That focused look when reading, eyebrows low just like his father’s. Laughter bursting out sharp and warm, cutting winter silence.

Hold on. May he stay out of harm’s way.

Out in the open, fear moves like liquid inside me. Yet underneath, another sensation wakes - like an echo returning. Just like when he first came into the world, that deep pulse spreading wide. Not loud now, standing at this edge, still present though. Humming just below silence, already aware.

My eyelids drop shut while my pulse hammers loud. Not hunting pictures in the fog, just holding on to one thought - her face. A thread of warmth pulls downward through silence instead of answers. It carries everything I cannot say out loud.

He needs to return to me.

(Lysander’s POV)

A light glows deep within the peak. It shifts, but never fades.

From the walls comes a soft glow, somewhere between green and silver, almost like sun seen from far below the sea. Warmth fills the space, thick with the scent of wet pine needles following a storm. You can sense it breathing.

Down here, the path tilts slow. No bounce to my steps - just silence pulled tight. That quiet hum wraps close, eating noise whole. Fear doesn’t rise; it stays flat. Like resting deep in some vast creature's breath. One that means well.

Footsteps echo as I move without stopping. Suddenly, walls give way to open space - huge, hollow below.

A dark pool sits at the middle, glassy and unmoving. Floating above - no wires, no ropes - a shape hangs in silence. Not a child's drawing, nothing sweet or soft. Larger than a man, built from veins of stone that twist like branches, lit from within by something cold and bright. Light swells inside it, then fades. Again. A rhythm without sound, felt more than heard. Each glow stretches outward, brief, before pulling back into itself.

A pulse moves through me when I sleep.

Falling heavy, this quiet ache sits in my chest. Warmth around me does nothing to lift it. Tiredness wraps through the hours like smoke.

At the rim of the dark water, my feet stop. Above, the drifting Heart hovers. A soft sound leaves me - “Hello.” My voice does not bounce back.

A flicker brightens, almost too small to notice. Over me comes a rush - no speech, only images, textures.

From up high, the mountain appears again and again, across many cold seasons and hot ones. Above its ridges, the Hill Folk make their lives blend with the land. A glowing strand links the Heart to everyone - villagers, creatures, even bark and roots. That line pulls tighter when folks begin walking toward the southern edge. Now the glow along the strand fades, nearly gone. Torn at the edges. From here, I spot the filament linked - somehow - to myself. Just a small flare, a speck of brightness tied off. Distance stretches between us. This bond barely holds.

Far above, silence grew thick where voices once rose. Yet the one meant to return never did.

A hush arrives first. Then - curiosity. Weighted, it rests there, much like something small passed palm to palm.

Stay.

Clearly, it means something. Tied to this spot, fastened right here at the Heart. Not just called the Prince of the North - actually being him, deep down. Staying close by, maybe never really leaving. Holding things together somehow. A solid twist in the line that keeps going.

If I act, strength returns to the thread. Healing reaches the soil. Strong lambs arrive at birth. Clear water flows through streams.

Without me, the line breaks. Quiet emptiness grows. That spark inside the peak - what turns the North into something alive - fades away.

This isn’t danger. It’s decision. A hush settles around it - soft, given without force. Not pressure, just presence. Stillness handed forward like something fragile.

Nowhere else feels quite like that old house down south where they kept busy, tracing lines across big paper spreads of the realm. Sometimes I drift back to the stone-walled space up in the tower - chalk dust, books stacked high. Wind howling over open fields comes next, me and Gareth chasing cloth dragons through gusts. His grip firm around mine as he hoisted me up, world tilting beneath boots. Then her words at night, low and steady, painting pictures beside crackling flames.

Finding my place in the mountains means letting go of them, sometimes. It isn’t constant - yet the core of who I am settles into rock, distant from their growing world.

Fading comes when I pick them instead of holding on to the peak. The old pulse, so full of quiet grace, slips away.

Heat rushes into my cheeks before I feel the first drop fall. A kid like me wasn’t meant to stand at crossroads. The weight sits low in my chest, heavy without warning.

A quiet warmth brushes against me. Not rising from the chest, yet coming from some hidden place. From something else entirely. A slender strand appears - fine like webbing, glowing faint yellow. Almost like when she leaned down, lips touching skin just above my eyes. That steady presence - like Dad's hand resting there. Their care stretches across distance, quiet but sure.

Something stirs inside the mountain when it notices. Its crystal beat slows down - almost like it knows that warmth from a person is near.

A thought shows up, uninvited. Not entirely born from me. More like borrowed - Mother’s sharp wit folded into Father’s quiet grit, then left to rest under the weight of the mountain’s long silence.

I look up at the glowing Heart. “I can’t stay here always,” I say, my voice firmer now. “My place is with them. To learn how to protect everything, not just one place.”

A hush moves across the stone, sharp like frost at dawn. The air tightens without warning. Shadows seem to lean closer, listening. Breath slows in throats. Light flickers low, not from wind but something deeper. Silence follows, heavy on the skin.

“But,” I continue, stepping even closer, “I can come back. Often. And I can listen. I can learn your stories. I can teach my children, when I have them, to listen too.” I reach out, not touching the Heart, but holding my hand toward its light. “The thread doesn’t have to be short and tight. It can be long and strong. If we both hold on.”

Now the cave grows quieter. As the Heart beats, it thinks. Then stillness returns.

A shape begins to rise - thin, like a thread pulled from deep below. Light runs along its surface, soft but sure. This strand moves without rushing, pausing just short of contact. One inch away it holds, aligned perfectly with where my pulse beats beneath skin.

A sudden rush moves inside - clean, neutral, somehow breathing on its own. Not pain, just presence. Like stepping into a room you forgot existed. Glimpses rise: tangles of root beneath trees, water threading below soil, strength curled tight in ancient rock. Meaning arrives without sound, deeper than speech - a hum felt in bone, not heard.

A slow pull backward happens now. That decision settles without sound.

Free of chains, yet tied by choice. Held close, not held down. This link remade - tighter now, shaped by what we’ve learned. Not less, but more alive through change.

A weight in the air loosens, slightly. Not gone - just softer now, held at arm's length by something tired yet reaching.

A shape stirs in the dark liquid beneath me. Out of the ripples, her face appears - Mother, standing beyond the door, skin drained of color. There’s silence, then a tug deep in my chest pulling me toward her.

My head dips toward the Heart - something inside me says this is how it should be. “It stays with me,” I say.

Back I go, sprinting through the bright tunnel, heading for that glow, where Mom waits.

(Paige’s POV)

A breath of air, too mild for this place, slips from the crack in the rock. Then warmth moves through, quiet but wrong somehow. It flows without sound yet feels alive. Not a storm - just heat where cold belongs. The gap gives it up like a secret never meant to leave.

A shape appears, tiny, moving fast through the dim light. It trips forward, unsteady, as shadows stretch around it.

“Lysander!”

On my feet now, I move fast - then sink down, pulling him close. Shivers run through him, though the air isn’t chill. Wide eyes stare up, lit with something deep, like memories he shouldn’t carry.

Holding on tight, he whispers "Mama" into my skin. His scent clings - rock dust, storm air, warmth that's just him.

“You okay? What went wrong?” I step away, eyes scanning for injuries.

“It spoke to me,” he murmurs, face pressed into my cloak. Not loud - just a whisper through fabric. The Heart felt lonely, it didn’t want me to leave. His gaze lifts, soft brown locking onto mine. There, inside those eyes: my reckless hope, Noah’s quiet strength. Staying wasn’t possible, so I told it that instead - I’d return. That I’d hear what it had to say

Breath catches in the throat - such quiet sense. Not one path, not two, but he stepped sideways. Like something spoken by a kid, yet it cuts straight to the bone.

When he speaks, I sense it too. Underfoot, a change begins - slow, sure. It is not wind or weather shifting. Instead, the soft hum of sorrow thickens, settles. Now calm. Now certain. Like an old promise remembered. Equilibrium returns.

Holding on close, my arms lock around him as cold drops trace down my face. Proud echoes in every shaky breath I take - your dad would see it too

His body shifts away, a flash of urgency lighting up his eyes. "Is it possible - right now - to let him know? There's no time like this moment."

Midnight hangs heavy inside Blackstone, flames flickering across stone walls. With us near, Kieran listens close. Not pausing once, Lysander spills it all - voice bright, eyes alight, warmed by sweet tea. He speaks of caves lit from within, stones pulsing like breath. A moment forced one path over another. Then came the link, unbroken, now part of him.

A quiet settles over Kieran, lines deep on his skin. Once Lysander stops speaking, the chief turns - slow - from that eager boy toward me. His gaze holds steady now, different somehow, soft where it once was sharp.

“The heir has chosen,” he says, his voice thick with emotion. “And the Heart has accepted. The bond is not what it was. It is something new. A promise, not a chain.” He places his hand over his own heart and bows deeply to Lysander. “Welcome home, Prince of the North.”

Midnight folds over the camp. Lysander breathes slow, worn out from everything he's faced. Firelight flickers across the stone floor while I stay seated near the flames, cloth draped tight around me. Without Noah here, the silence cuts deep - like cold metal under skin. Seeing him now would mean more than words. Just once, hearing how he says my name. This quiet pause holds departure behind it - and something else creeping forward.

A warmth rises, pulled from somewhere deep - like smoke curling into night. This one comes alive on its own, glowing like embers under ash. Not some dreamy glimpse, yet still sharp, real - the way sunlight hit the courtyard that morning we stayed too long near the fountain. Our footsteps echoed there once, slow and careless.

Night had fallen. The meeting left everyone drained. There stood Noah, out on the ledge, eyes lost somewhere past the skyline. Silence came easier than words. Slowly I moved close, slipped my hands around his middle, rested my face against the tightness along his spine. A weight shifted in his chest, letting out a deep quiet breath. Still facing away, he laid his palms over mine, gently moving across the bones of my fingers.

“They see the crown,” he’d murmured, his voice a low vibration against my ear. “They see the ring. They see the power. They don’t see the cost.”

Fine, I saw it too,” came my quiet reply.

Turning away at first, he looked back, his gaze moving across my face under the pale light. Not alone anymore - the burden stayed heavy, yet somehow lighter now, split between us. His hands rose, holding my cheeks with care so soft it felt like breath on skin. Words came quiet: you make every loss mean something. Then his lips met mine - long, low, full of unspoken words, tiredness spilling out, courage seeping in, our bond tightening without sound. This wasn’t love shown through petals or lines from books - it lived in silence, in standing together. A shelter made just wide enough for both.

Still, there's a glow - soft and slow - from what we had. Here he stays, not gone at all. Through the boy who stands tall like he did. Because love? That’s where I find home.

A quiet breath escapes him, Lysander lying still - once burdened like stone beneath earth, yet somehow learning how to rest while holding everything together.

The mountain is healed.

Footsteps at the door - there he stands, back where he belongs.

Still, my heart stretches over distances yet stays bound to him - the duke who stepped in, stood by me, then stayed as lover and shield both.

Facing down prophecies first, then dodging assassins next. Armies showed up after that, yet politics lingered longest of all.

Facing it now - the raw core of the earth beneath our feet.

Each one picked it, chose to care for it - side by side, without saying a word.