Page 4 of A Sky of Emerald Stars

“Fucking Moon.” I let out a shaking breath.

Hector kept his gaze focused on the shoreline. The boatman saw us and leapt from the gunnel of his boat to help us get Navin inside. “If the Silver Wolves really took Ora, Calla’s going to start a war to get them back,” Hector muttered.

“Good,” I said. “It’s about damn time.”

Calla

I dipped my hand into the turquoise water of the lake, so clear I could see the silt all the way at the bottom. Light filtered in through holes in the cave, making the golden treasure all around me glitter. Little iridescent fish danced around my hands, darting in and out of the craggy rocks below the surface.

I perched on the steps that led into the lake below the palace. Above me, holes in the ceiling tunneled upward to where I knew the dungeons sat. Only the gentle lap of water sounded, and yet I could still hear the screams, still remembered the feeling of biting into the ostekke’s tentacle, still gripped with the feeling that I’d come all this way only to die in the dungeons of my own palace.

I swirled my hand in the water as that day replayed over and over behind my eyes.

I’d killed my aunt... and she’d killed me.

Loosening the laces of my tunic, I traced a hand down the golden bolts of lightning bursting from my chest. Vellia’s light magic had stitched me back together, leaving this gilded mark that felt like skin but weighed so heavy on my soul. If I even still had a soul...

Dying wishes were made as a trade: a faery’s gift of magic in exchange for them taking one’s soul to its final resting place.Did that mean I was soulless? I’d already made my wish. Would my soul be reaped when I died again or was it already gone?

Everything felt jumbled and restless inside of me. I mourned for Malou and for all those who died trying to bring peace to Olmdere and for all those who suffered for so many years under Sawyn. I needed to make it right for them. I needed to bring this court back from the brink. I needed to make the second chance I was given count for something.

I needed to make it so that all this gold didn’t seem like it was still covered in blood and shadows.

“I thought I’d find you down here,” Grae said, his boots clicking down the steps. He perched beside me and dropped a kiss to my collarbone where the tip of one lightning bolt ended. “It is too early for such contemplation,” he murmured against my skin, smoothing away the tightness in my shoulders.

“I can’t stop thinking...”

His warm breath skittered across my neck. “Come back to bed and I’ll help with that.” When I let out a long sigh, he clearly knew my mind was still too far away, mate or no, and he threaded his fingers through my hand and squeezed. “Sawyn is gone, along with her ostekke.”

“How many of them do you think are left in the world?” I mused, lifting my hand from the water and wiping it on my trouser leg.

Grae shrugged. “I don’t think anyone will be volunteering to venture through the lakes of Lower Valta to count them.” He stared out at the treasures mounded upon the shores. Mountains of gold hugged the corners where the palace walls met the lake rock. “I hope not many.”

I let out a soft laugh. “Me too.” I hovered my hand over the lake water again, and Grae did the same with his own free hand. “How quickly this place came back to life without Sawyn’s dark magic.”

“And through the leadership of a certain Gold Wolf,” Grae reminded, squeezing our joined hands.

I pursed my lips, staring down at the little fish darting back and forth. “I don’t—”

“You do,” Grae cut in before I could even get started, already knowing all the doubts in my heart. “Seeds have been sown, villages have been rebuilt, families have been reunited...”

“It will be many seasons, if notyears, before those crops produce enough to sustain our court,” I said. “Decades before the towns are back to their old populations, generations before those families don’t fear that everyone they love will be taken from them again.”

Grae released our hold and gently cupped my cheeks with both hands, making me meet his endless umber eyes. “You cannot contain everyone’s suffering in your heart alone,” he said for what felt like the hundredth time. Still, we both knew I needed to hear it again. “You cannot carry the burden of every single citizen’s grief. You can only take another step forward each day. Breathing life back into this court will be the slowest sunrise, not the brightest lightning strike,” he said, dropping one hand to trace his fingers across my scars. I thought of Sawyn’s emerald bursts of lightning, the ones that flashed in the sky the night I found out Grae was my mate, that same emerald magic that claimed my life. “But the sun will rise on the Golden Court, little fox. Trust in that.”

A tight knot formed in my throat and I nodded. I wished I could leash the sun and hoist it into the sky faster, but Grae was right, itwasrising, the court was healing, I just needed to give it time.

“We should be turning our eyes south anyway,” I murmured.

“Ah,” Grae said, gesturing to my soldierly attire. “I should have guessed.”

“Damrienn has still made no moves,” I said. “Not a single peep from across their borders. It makes me feel like we’re walking a tightrope just waiting for a strong wind to blow us over.”

“Or a juvleck to yank us down,” Grae said, and we bothshuddered, remembering the monster from the gold mines of Sevelde.

“It feels like preparing to battle a shadow,” I muttered. “Will they attack through the treacherous waters of our coasts? Will they attack through our border with Taigos? Or will it be something far more insidious—will they attack us from within? And if Damrienn attacks, what do we do then? We have no pack and a fledgling army to fight them.”

“That army is growing every day,” Grae assured me. “Hector and Maez are already working hard to assemble a new retinue. They’re retraining the old palace guards and recruiting more soldiers. The smiths’ forges are always lit making new weapons. The tanners’ purses are heavy with gold making new battle leathers. All of Olmdere is coming together for their future.”

---