Page 91 of The Shattered Rite
A pause. Then quieter: “My mother died the night before the trial guards came for me. The villagers saw to it that she suffered. Everyone believes me to be a sacrifice, and I—" She hesitated, her fingers curling tight against her thigh. "I burned my home down myself. I didn’t want to leave anything behind for them to scavenge.”
Her voice cracked. But she forced herself to keep speaking.
“There’s no place left for me that isn’t forward.”
Stonefell didn’t flinch.
He just nodded. Small. Solid.
“Then maybe this path was made for people like us.”
Eliryn blinked. She looked at him. Really looked this time.
“Maybe forward’s the only direction people like us get.”
He nodded again. Not as a warrior.
But as an equal.
She exhaled. Slowly. Feeling something behind her ribs shift. Loosen.
There is integrity in this one,Vaeronth murmured, approving.He walks in ruin without letting it claim him.
I like him too,she thought quietly.
Then, she stood, tilting her chin toward him.
“I’m Eliryn of Lirin’s Edge.” Her voice didn’t shake. Her pendant warmed against her chest as her eyes shimmered faintly—opalescent silver with a flicker of gold deep within, like flame banked but never extinguished. “My dragon is Vaeronth, the Endbringer.”
For the first time, speaking her name felt less like bleeding.
And more like becoming what was already foretold.
Stonefell turned fully toward her and rose. Something shifted behind his eyes—recognition. Not of who she had been.
But of who she was now.
He stepped forward, deliberate.
“Garic,” he said, voice quiet, steady. “Of Stonefell.”
They didn’t bow. They didn’t nod.
Instead, they clasped forearms.
Her wrist to his.
His scarred hand closing around her bond-marked skin.
A wordless pact. A comrades acknowledgement.
And for the first time, Eliryn felt like maybe she had an ally in this fight.
Vaeronth hummed his approval, deep as thunder.
And in that moment, something real settled between them.
Not quite trust.
