Page 80 of Broken Star

She wants to believe we have control. That what we saw—the throne, the loneliness, the emptiness—can be undone. That it’s not already burned into my bones, waiting for me like a slow, inevitable death.

I shake my head, staring at the starry, celestial waters swirling around us, frost curling across my skin.

“Some currents are too strong to be changed,” I say, and I expect her to hesitate. To waver in the face of what we both know is coming.

But she doesn’t.

“Not for me,” she says, and she lifts a hand, drawing her magic into an orb of water before us.

It’s shimmering, beautiful, and undeniablyhers. I’d want to see it—to feel it—even if she was hurling it at me like a tidal wave.

Because if she’s trying to hurt me, at least it means she’shere.

“Water is my element,” she continues, watching the water as her magic bends to her will. “And I won’t let this be your fate. I can’t. Not after seeing you like you were back then, and right now, and…”

She motions to the hollowed-out version of me sitting on the throne.

Something inside me fractures.

Because even after everything—after all the ways I’ve hurt her, after all the cruel things I’ve said to push her away—she cares.

“But why?” The words slip out before I can stop them, softer than I intended, and far too desperate. “After everything I’ve done to you—after all the ways I’ve hurt you—why would you still care?”

Riven

Sapphire flinches.

It’s slight, almost imperceptible, but I see it. Like she wasn’t expecting the question. Like she doesn’t know how to answer it.

For a moment, I think she won’t.

I think she’ll turn away. That she’ll let the silence be my answer, and let me drown in it the way I deserve.

But then?—

She looks at me. And she’s beautiful. Not just in the way she’s always been—the impossible symmetry of her features, the way her blonde hair catches the celestial light of the Tides, and the way her skin glows beneath the shifting magic surrounding us.

It’s the way she’s still standing here, fighting for something neither of us fully understand, holding onto something neither of us can name.

And when she speaks, it wrecks me.

“The Riven I saw in those visions—the boy who couldn’t hide his tears, who found companionship when he was most alone—deserves better than that emptiness. And because?—”

Her magic flickers, the water trembling between her fingers, as if she’s struggling to hold it together.

I step closer, my body coiled tight, waiting for the rest of her answer.

“Because what?” I push, my voice dropping lower.

I need her to finish. I need her tosayit.

She swallows hard, and when she looks at me, it’s like she’s seeing something I don’t. Like she’s looking at someone worth saving, even though I’msofar past saving.

“Because I’ve seen what you’re like when you drop the ice prince act and are justyou,”she whispers, her voice trembling with something too fragile to name. “And that Riven is worth fighting for, even if he’s buried so deep I can barely find him anymore.”

The words hit me like a slow, brutal ache sinking into my chest.

She still sees me.

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