HE WILL COME

Elaris's POV

I read the note three times

, not because I cannot read his meaning

but because with every reading it becomes more difficult to ignore the implications.

Averic has the full statement

Virelle is under guard

the medical records have been requested

and the resonance finding that was hidden from the council's previous inquiries is finally going to be looked at.

I pass the note to Neryss.

She reads it once and again.

"He actually knows."

"He has been given the information."

"That isn't what I mean."

I understand.

For weeks fragments of information came to the palace and were doled out like accusations, dismissed and retaken without care for who might believe them.

Now the puzzle is being put together.

The west-wing woman is being held.

The pregnancy records are being retrieved.

The suppressed medical finding isn't safely buried anymore.

The accepted story is beginning to unravel from within the palace itself.

I take the note back.

For the first time I allow myself to consider that someone might hold enough proof to finally see what I claimed all along.

I do not allow myself to consider the implications of that afterwards.

Not yet.

I do not celebrate.

There is nothing inside me to know how.

The man who now holds the truth is the same man who stood before me after his mother's death and decided that I could no longer be under his roof.

He did not have to hate me to send me away.

He only had to believe in the proof laid before him.

That makes a difference.

If he were to find out that the evidence had been manipulated it would not change what had happened.

It would not change the hours I sat wondering if he would ever look at me without suspicion.

It would not change the road I walked away with everything I owned.

Neryss asks quietly, "What do you think he will do?"

"I don't know."

"Do you want him to come?"

The answer is caught somewhere between my throat and my thoughts.

I look down at my hands.

"I want the truth to reach him."

"That wasn't the question."

"No."

I lift my eyes to meet hers.

"I don't what I want from him."

And for once it really is the honest answer.

Neryss asks if we should be ready to leave if Averic is coming.

It's a practical question really.

If someone inside the palace has finally begun peeling the truth from the palace's walls, there is no guarantee that the entire story has been revealed.

But I shake my head.

"No."

She waits.

"If I leave now, they can say I ran after the investigation turned against me."

"And if he comes?"

"Then he finds me here."

Neryss studies me.

"You're willing to face him?"

"I am willing to face whatever he brings."

There is a difference.

I will not run towards Averic simply because he might finally believe me.

I will not run away from the truth because I'm afraid of what he might say.

I chose to stay in this territory for the child.

I chose to stay because the truth deserved the chance to surface.

That choice belongs to me, not Averic, not the council, not whoever has been sending the notes.

I fold the message and put it with the rest.

"If he wants to speak to me, he knows where I am."

The rest of the day becomes preparation without becoming panic.

Neryss sweeps the floor.

I fold the spare blanket.

We move the table closer to the wall and clear the second chair.

The house still looks neglected, but it is orderly.

I rest whenever the child requires.

There is no speech I need to prepare.

No argument I need to memorize.

I told Averic the truth.

I told him when Maevra was alive.

I told him when the evidence was turned against me.

I told him when he stood outside my confinement room.

Repeating it won't make it any more true.

If he comes seeking answers I will give him facts.

If he comes seeking forgiveness that will be something else.

Neryss notices me staring at the door.

"You're nervous."

"Yes.“You don’t look nervous.”I've had practice hiding it."

She gives me a knowing look.

I almost smile.

Then the child shifts beneath my palm.

My attention is drawn back immediately.

Whatever happens when Averic arrives, I will not allow the conversation to be so important that I forget the life depending on me.

By afternoon Neryss returns from the market edge with more information.

This time she is not talking about rumors.

She listens to what she personally heard from several people who had been near the palace.

"Virelle is no longer moving through the public halls."

I remain still.

"She has guards outside her rooms?"

"Yes."

"Council guards?"

Neryss nods.

That makes a difference.

"Anything else?"

"The Alpha has spent most of the day in closed meetings with senior healers."

"Not council?"

"Mostly healers."

That catches my attention.

The medical records matter more than I first understood.

Neryss continues.

"And the council isn't speaking as one group anymore. Some members are demanding the original findings be reviewed."

I let that settle.

There is no triumphant feeling.

Only a quiet recognition that the walls around the old story are developing cracks.

Neryss sits across from me.

"If all of this is true, then the palace has changed."

"Maybe.“You don’t believe it?”I believe something has changed."

I touch the edge of the table.

"What I don't know is whether it has changed enough."

I receive each new fragment without allowing it to become hope.

That is harder than I expected.

For so long I wanted one person to stand up and say the truth plainly.

Now that possibility is approaching, and some part of me wants to reach for it.

I refuse.

Hope has already made me vulnerable.

It convinced me that sacrifice would be remembered.

That love would be enough.

That if I told the truth carefully enough someone would eventually hear it.

Those beliefs cost me too much.

So I return to what I can verify.

The child moves.

My breathing is steady.

The house remains secure.

Neryss is here.

The notes exist.

The information from the market matches parts of what the messages claimed.

Those are facts.

Everything else can wait.

Neryss asks if I am frightened of seeing Averic again.

I answer honestly.

"Yes."

"Of what he might do?"

I shake my head.

"Of what I might feel."

That answer silences both of us.

Because anger is manageable, disappointment is survivable, but love does not disappear simply because someone has wounded you.

I wish it did.

As evening approaches I change into the cleanest plain dress I still own.

There is nothing elegant about it.

That is exactly why I choose it.

I braid my own hair and let it fall simply.

No jewelry.

No palace fabric.

No attempt to look like the woman who once belonged in Averic's household.

I sit near the low fire with both hands resting over my stomach.

Neryss takes position near the door.

Her blade is within reach.

"You don't have to sit there like a guard."

"I know."

She does not move.

I look at her.

"What if he arrives with warriors?"

"Then I'll know before they reach the door."

"What if he comes alone?"

"Then I'll still know."

Her certainty makes me smile faintly.

Outside the evening deepens.

The road is empty.

I listen to every distant sound without allowing myself to imagine footsteps.

If Averic comes he will come when he chooses.

I will not spend the hours waiting for a particular sound.

So I close my eyes.

The child moves beneath my hand.

I whisper, "Whatever happens, you stay with me."

Full darkness settles over the outer house.

The palace lights appear faintly beyond the distant trees.

I can barely see them.

Once those lights represented warmth, safety, and a future I believed I might have.

Now they are simply proof that the world I left still exists.

I do not look at them for long.

Neryss keeps the fire low.

The hours pass.

I do not sleep.

Instead, I sit quietly and listen.

My body remembers locked rooms.

It remembers waiting for footsteps.

It remembers the uncertainty of not knowing if the person approaching will bring medicine, an accusation, or an order.

But this time there is one difference.

No one is holding the door closed from the outside.

If I want to leave, I can.

If I want to remain, I can.

That small freedom steadies me.

Near midnight the child shifts again.

I place my hand over the movement.

"I'm here."

Then I hear something beyond the house.

A horse.

Another.

Neryss immediately rises.

The waiting is over.

The sound grows clearer.

Not a procession.

Not a patrol.

Only a few mounts moving carefully along the road.

Neryss crosses to the shutter and peers through the narrow opening.

"How many?"

"Three."

She listens.

"Possibly only two riders. One horse may be carrying supplies."

I remain seated.

My heartbeat has quickened but I refuse to stand just because someone is approaching.

"Can you see their markings?"

"No."

The horses slow.

Then stop.

Not directly at the house.

A short distance away.

That is deliberate.

Neryss turns from the window.

"They're not surrounding us."

"Good."

She moves towards the door.

"Stay behind me."

I almost tell her I can protect myself.

Then I remember that protection is not weakness.

"Fine."

The horses remain silent.

No voices.

No orders.

Then one set of footsteps separates from the others.

One person is walking towards the house.

Alone.

The footsteps approach at an unhurried pace.

No attempt is made to conceal them.

The person stops outside the door.

There is a pause.

Then a firm knock.

Three measured strikes.

Neryss looks at me.

I rise slowly.

The child shifts beneath my ribs.

I place one hand against my stomach.

"Open it."

Neryss keeps her blade ready.

She moves the latch but does not immediately pull the door wide.

"Who is there?"

For several seconds no answer comes.

Then a familiar voice speaks from the other side.

"It's me."

Everything inside me goes still.

Averic.

Neryss looks at me again.

I nod.

She opens the door.

Cold night air enters first.

Then the man I have spent days refusing to imagine standing before me appears in the doorway.

Averic is not wearing formal Alpha colors.

There is no council delegation behind him.

No official escort steps forward.

The two or three riders remain at a distance.

He looks exhausted.

Not theatrically.

Not in a way meant to earn sympathy.

His clothes are creased from long hours of wear and there is something hollow about the way he carries himself.

He looks as though sleep has become optional.

His eyes find mine.

For a few seconds neither of us speaks.

I notice the smallest details because I cannot stop myself.

The roughness around his face.

The dust on his boots.

The absence of the insignia he normally wears.

He came without the symbols of authority.

I do not know if that means anything.

I refuse to decide that it does.

Neryss remains between us until Averic says quietly, "I came alone."

Neryss does not lower the blade.

Averic looks at her.

"You were right to be careful."

That surprises me.

He steps inside only after Neryss moves aside.

He looks around the small house.

The sparse furniture.

The low fire.

The bundle of belongings.

Then his eyes settle on me.

His expression changes when he sees my hands over my stomach.

Not anger.

Not suspicion.

Something heavier.

Regret.

Averic takes one step farther into the room.

Then he stops.

The distance between us is only a few paces now.

For a long moment neither of us speaks.

I will not rescue him from the silence.

If he has come here to explain himself, he can begin.

His eyes remain fixed on mine.

When he finally speaks his voice carries none of the authority I remember from the palace.

"I was wrong."

I say nothing.

He swallows.

"About the cups. About the notes. About you."

Neryss remains near the door.

Averic continues.

"Maevra died because I refused to see what was happening while it was in front of me."

My fingers curl lightly against my dress.

His next words are quieter.

"And I sent you out carrying my child while I protected the woman who killed her."

The fire shifts behind me.

A small piece of wood collapses into the embers.

I do not look away from him.

He has come.

The apology has begun.

But an apology cannot undo the road.

It cannot return Maevra.

It cannot erase the nights I spent locked away.

And it cannot automatically restore the trust he broke.

Averic takes another breath.

He looks ready to say more.

I raise one hand.

Not to forgive him.

Not to reject him.

Only to stop him for one moment.

Because before he finishes his apology, I need to know if he has finally come here as the Alpha who wants something from me—

or as the man who is prepared to face what he did.