19 Chapter 19 – Aurora Vigil
Dust drifted in sunbeams. The crown sat untouched on a velvet cushion, where Cyr had left it.
“I’ve broken oaths. Killed enemies. Abandoned duties. But not this.”
He recited supply lists. Read weather reports. Described how the southern border had ceased fire for the first time in years.
Her eyes opened.
His voice cracked.
He swallowed.
She reached up, barely strong enough to touch his cheek.
And overhead, the auroras danced across the sky like a promise kept.
Then the music box on the bedside table began to turn.
“I don’t want a steward,” Cyr muttered. “I want *her.*”
He leaned close.
And began to hum the tune she once sang to him.
Cyr stayed anyway.
Because she wasn’t there to see it.
He looked down at her still form.
Not once.
She mouthed:
Each morning, he brushed her hair and told her the news.
hapter
Aurora Vigil
“She might never wake.”
“So if you’re lost inside… follow my voice.”
“Then let me rule in your place-until she wakes.”
“You never left,” he whispered. “I waited.”
Cyr chuckled bitterly. “I already gave my heart away.”
Weeks passed.
Tears fell like rain, noiseless and shaking.
At dawn, lightning cracked over the cliffs.
*You already saved me.*
Was the only one he ever listened to.
Just once.
He took her hand gently.
He slept beside a silent bed in the Frostfall infirmary, head often bowed beside her motionless hand.
He turned back to her.
The nobles never questioned the prince’s absence again.
And every night, he whispered into her palm:
But real.
She smiled faintly. *I heard you.*
That night, as storms gathered over Frostfall, Cyr leaned back in his chair beside her and spoke softly.
Not as a legend.
Later, when the healers arrived, they found the prince asleep-his head resting beside her hip, hand still wrapped in hers.
Cyr didn’t look up. “I have a vow to keep.”
Her lips moved.
And she had returned-
“I lied,” he murmured. “I remember everything from that fire.”
“You were crying. Holding that music box. I told you to run, but you wouldn’t let go of my hand.”
He kissed her palm.
Her gift had turned inward, cocooned behind the wounds it had once mended.
Not fully.
“I know,” Cyr whispered. “But if I leave now… what if she opens her eyes to nothing?”
“Come back.”
Snow fell and melted. Banners shifted. Ministers squabbled. But the prince did not speak in court.
The melody played-slow, warped, but there.
He closed his eyes.
“You have a kingdom to rebuild.”
On the twenty-first day, Varek knocked on the infirmary door.
Every healer said the same: *Her body lives. Her voice does not.*
The snow outside had stopped.
–
Just enough to see him.
He had not returned.
And he broke.
Because the girl who had no voice…
Inside, her finger twitched.
–
Cyr didn’t notice-at first.
Varek sighed. “The nobles are pressuring you to marry. For alliance. For heir”
“I thought I lost you.”
Eileen lay beneath layers of moonwoven blankets, breath faint, heartbeat a flickering rhythm.
The throne room stood empty.
But as *his world.*
He sat upright.
“And I made a promise. I said: *I will never let go.*
Cracked. Off-key. Raw with grief.
*”
