Page 37 of The Crowned Queen

“I need some air.” He shoved past Maerin, refugees scrambling out of his path as he made for the door. Finn stepped forward like he might stop him—but the shadows whipped out, slamming into the wall by his head so hard splinters of wood rained down on them both. But Loren didn’t stop, not even when Thorne shouted his name. He just needed to get out⁠—

He walked blindly through the streets until black glass crunched under his boots, barely realizing where his feet had carried him before he was stumbling down the slope toward the shoreline. All he knew was he needed to get away—away from Finn’s concerned expression. Away from Maerin’s acerbic criticisms and all of the refugees suddenly counting on him to save them when he couldn’t even save the person who mattered most.

But he could never escape the shadows.

They swarmed around his feet, their frantic whispers drowning out even the crash of the waves against the shore.

—save her save her save her⁠—

—act, Lorendreal⁠—

—cannot leave her. Not there. Not with him⁠—

—you are their king. They do not command you⁠—

Loren dropped to his knees, shards of black glass digging into his skin through his trousers. The waves crashed against the shore just a few paces away, the cold wind knifing off the water showering his face with spray.

“There’s nothing I can do!” The words tore from his chest, immediately lost to the cruel wind. “I failed! I went in and I failed.” His voice broke. Loren pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes. People had died. Nyra had died.

The shadows hissed their displeasure, their judgement digging into him like claws.

Would you give up then? Their voices drew together, strengthening into an echo of the power that had nearly destroyed him. Will you lay down and die? Even your father fought to the end⁠—

“He killed everyone.” Loren laughed, the hollow sound immediately stolen by the wind. “He created the Shadowed Veil.”

And we protected the fae. As is our mandate.

Loren lifted his face, staring out over the dark water. Just months ago, the Shadowed Veil had loomed on the horizon, a churning darkness that devoured anything that drifted too close to its ravenous maw. It had stood between the fae on Eluneth and the New Dominion for over twenty years.

But not without cost.

The fae behind it had been free, yes. Free to struggle to coax crops from soil that never saw full daylight. Free to watch their children waste away, day after day, under a sky that never truly brightened. Free to be torn apart by the zal’vorr—the same creatures they had once hunted and lived alongside, now twisted into nightmares by that same dark power.

Araya had torn it down. She’d chosen him, and demanded that dara’el do the same.

Now she was gone. Ripped from his arms by the man who had stolen her magic and carved into his body. And instead of a wall of furious shadows guarding the horizon there was only open sky and the dark smudges of Arcanum ships—the New Dominion blockade, poised to crush the fae on Eluneth the moment the opportunity arose.

“Why couldn’t you do it?” he asked, his voice hoarse.

The shadows froze, their churning mass falling eerily still. Do what?

“Fight him.” The cold breeze tore the accusation from Loren’s lips, flinging it down the beach. “You swallowed a battlefield whole,” he continued, his voice rising. “Blotted out the sky. Tore ships from the sea⁠—”

We remember. Dark tendrils lashed the ground, sending up a spray of black glass. We were bound to your father. His grief. His rage. But now—they wrapped around him, a dark blanket drawing over him like a shroud—now we are bound to you. And he… Their voices faded, breaking apart and coming back together again. He wields your power. Commands with it. Bound to bone with blood and aether. We—you—are not strong enough. Not here. Not now. Without her.

Loren closed his eyes. The wind clawed at his face, cold and merciless, but it couldn’t touch the dull, expanding ache beneath his ribs. The greatest power known to fae in this world had chosen him. Bound itself to him. And now he wasn’t strong enough to use it to save the person he loved. He’d failed dara’el. Failed the fae—here and on Eluneth. And now he was failing her.

Loren?

“Araya?” His head snapped up. She was there—he was certain of it. He could feel her presence like a small sun in his chest, her mind stretching out to his. “Ael’sura.” Tears filled his eyes. “Tell me where you are⁠—”

And then she was gone, her mind torn away from his with so much violence he flinched. Some might argue that she’d never been there at all—but he’d heard her, felt her get ripped from his mind.

Loren shuddered, his skin crawling with his own memories of punishments endured at the hands of Arcanum inquisitors. What price had she paid to reach him just for those few moments?

“Loren?”

Serafina’s soft voice cut through the crash of the waves. She picked her way across the beach slowly, her bad leg making the uneven ground treacherous. Her breathing was ragged by the time she stopped beside him, careful not to come so near that the shadows bristled at her presence.