Page 275 of Gift from the Source
She laughed like it was the realm’s funniest joke, but then she grew serious. Her eyes fell out of focus like they always do when she reminisces.
When she blinked the tears away, she asked us to take some time away to enjoy one another to the fullest with no added responsibility from her. She said there were so many times she wished that she had been allowed to just run off with her Nexus and live for a little while.
I’d thought about that before then, but hearing her say it, it put into perspective how truly trapped she’d always been. She’s only ever really been allowed to leave that palace on duties to the realm. Never for pleasure with her Nexus.
She was giving us a gift she never received.
We were gone for nearly four years.
Nearly a year of it was spent with us hiding away at the cottage we built beside my mom’s. Lyker nor I have ever been able to bring ourselves to change it or really make it our own. I don’t think we ever will.
We’ll always cherish it as hers.
Granted, of course, in the time we were gone, we came back and visited, spent time with Aurora and my fathers-in-law. Oakly and her Nexus often came and spent time with us wherever we were. As did my brothers and Aria. Gaster, Keeper, and Tanith as well.
For the better part of those four years, though, it was just us.
And, of course, our little Prio when he wasn’t being so stubborn.
Calling him little is comical.
Like Tanith had warned us, he was about five when he started trying to do whatever he wanted. So much so, his instincts basically said, ‘Wait till eight to ten to fly? No, thank you.’
He took to the sky by six and we could barely get him down from there. He still isn’t fully grown. He’s sitting at around seventeen feet andgrowing. He’s an absolute handful. There’ve been many times Draken and I have had to go looking for him.
It isn’t easy either.
Yeah, our little dragon is different.
Beside his purple scales, he can, well…disappear.
Just poof right out of thin air.
We have no clue where he goes or where he ends up and he doesn’t tell us. Tanith laughs at us every time we sit him down and try to have a talk with him. She’s said many times, he’s an over-grown one-hundred-year-old dragon child. He’s not going to listen to anyone but himself.
He’s been such a blessing.
We returned from adventuring through our realm and all the others, aside from the Valorian Veil, right before my two hundredth birthday.
Aurora glowed as we told her about our adventures.
On my actual two hundredth birthday, she threw me a huge party.
I had to get a breath of fresh air from all the dancing, food, drinks, and people. So I snuck myself out to the gardens. She chuckled when she found me a little while later.
She asked me if I got everything I wanted for my birthday.
I had.
I had my men, my family, my friends, a letter from my mom, of course CC loudly sang me happy birthday. It was an amazing birthday, but I had one more request from her.
She said anything.
I told her on my two hundredth and twenty-sixth birthday, the two-hundred-year anniversary of my arrival, I wanted the realm.
The taste of freedom filled her eyes for a moment before she shook her head. She said she wouldn’t do that to me so soon.
I told her she had to.
