Spellforged Scion

The currents were restless that morning.

Even in Submareth, where the sea itself bent to the will of its queen, the waters trembled with a strange reluctance.

Columns of coral leaned as though bowing, the ever-present glow of abyssal lantern-fish dimmed, and the very palace of Thalassaria seemed to pulse with unease.

It mirrored her mood.

Thalassaria stood at the base of her throne, coils wound loosely upon the marble dais, her hair a black tide floating in all directions.

Those vast, abyssal eyes never left him, unblinking, dark and fever-bright.

Caedrion stood on the opposite side of the chamber, draped in a robe of woven kelp-thread, skin still bearing faint marks from where her coils had held him through sleepless nights.

His chest tightened with every beat of his heart.

He had convinced her, barely, that he must return.

But as the moment of parting approached, her hunger filled the water like a current dragging him back toward the depths.

Her fingers played across the artifact.

A shard of violet crystal framed in coral, pulsing faintly with spatial power.

The same relic that had plucked him from Dawnhaven's bath, stolen him away without warning, and kept him here ever since.

"I despise this," she murmured, her voice sharp enough to cut steel.

The echo carried strangely in the water, as if the entire sea itself spoke with her.

"The sea never gives back what it claims. You are mine, guppy. My consort. My king."

Caedrion drew in a slow, careful breath, tasting salt, forcing his voice steady.

"And I will return. I swore it. You need me as much as I…" He stopped, adjusted the words, softened them. "…as much as my people need me."

Her coils lashed, striking the marble with a crack that echoed like thunder.

The chamber shook, barnacles raining from the ceiling in tiny bursts of grit.

"Do not speak of need. I want you."

She leaned close, her hair drifting like banners of night, her lips so close to his cheek he felt warmth despite the water.

"But if you must go, then know this: you go not as a free man, but on my leash."

Her hand lifted the shard, and the glow stained her pale fingers violet. She turned it over, caressing it with something like hatred, something like longing.

"This trinket will carry you back. But it answers to me. If six moons pass and you have not returned, I will use it again. I will take you back into my arms, and this time I will not let you leave."

Her gaze bore into him, her voice trembling with madness.

"Understand, Caedrion. The sea remembers its debts. And you are my greatest treasure."

The words settled like a chain around his throat. But he had long since grown accustomed to the suffocating feeling of her love.

"Then six months it will be," he said at last, voice iron though his stomach twisted. "I will not betray my oath."

For a long moment, silence stretched.

Then Thalassaria's coils loosened. Her hand rose, cupping his face with terrifying tenderness, claws grazing his jaw without drawing blood. Her thumb stroked his cheek.

"So fragile," she whispered. "So brave. So foolish."

She pressed her lips to his forehead. A kiss both blessing and brand.

And then, with a flick of her wrist, she thrust the shard against his chest.

The world tore.

Light devoured the water, pressure dissolved into weightlessness, the abyss twisted into impossible geometry. His stomach lurched, his lungs seized—

And then he was falling.

Stone struck his knees.

Air, sweet and choking, filled his lungs.

Caedrion coughed, gasped, blinked against rising steam.

The marble walls of Dawnhaven's bath swam into view, the same chamber from which he had vanished weeks before.

Steam curled lazily, innocent, ordinary. As though nothing at all had happened.

He stared at the pool. Its surface rippled once, then stilled, serene and mocking.

The artifact lay beside him, still glowing faintly violet.

Its pulse slowed, dimmed, and then settled into silence.

Caedrion sank back on his hands, chest heaving.

His skin burned with the phantom touch of her coils. His lips still tingled with the memory of her kiss.

And though he stood alone, her voice lingered in his ears, echoing through his skull like the tide itself:

"Six months, my guppy. Do not test me."

He sat there, trembling, steam rising around him. His mind spun, panic and relief, triumph and despair. He was free. He was home. And yet chains heavier than iron bound him still.

He closed his eyes, raking a hand through his damp hair.

Six months.

Six months to hold his world together. Six months to prepare. Six months before the sea claimed him again.

His thoughts turned to Aelindria, to her hand clutching his as he departed for war, to the promise of their child.

Guilt slammed into him, raw and merciless. What would she see in his eyes when he told her? Could he even tell her?

And yet, another thought gnawed at him: Thalassaria's armies, her dominion, her command of the sea.

A power unlike anything the Magi houses could summon.

She had bent her madness toward him, and in that madness was strength.

If he could direct it.

If he could survive it.

The water in the pool rippled again, faintly, as though mocking him anew. He half-expected her coils to rise, to drag him back at once.

But nothing came. Only the silence of his bath, the faint drip of condensation, the weight of air against his chest.

Caedrion pulled the artifact closer. Its glow was faint, but he swore it pulsed in time with his heartbeat.

A leash, she had called it.

He closed his fingers around it, eyes narrowing. "So be it," he whispered.

Then he rose, robe clinging to his frame, steam wreathing him like mist off the battlefield.

The marble doors loomed ahead. Beyond them, his people, his family, his empire awaited.

They could not know the truth. Not yet.

Six months.

That was all the time the sea had given him.

The marble doors groaned as they swung open.

Steam billowed out into the hall, curling around the figures who had gathered in vigil.

Aelindria was the first to see him.

Her scream of joy cut through the silence, echoing down the corridors of Dawnhaven. She was on him in an instant, her arms around his shoulders, her face pressed into his chest. "Caedrion, by the Architect, Caedrion, you're alive!"

Behind her, Sylene staggered back, relief breaking the iron composure of her face.

Malveris leaned against his staff, eyes wide, as though beholding a ghost.

Servants gaped, some weeping openly, their lord returned from nowhere.

Caedrion held Aelindria close, closing his eyes as her trembling shook them both.

For the first time in months, he felt her warmth instead of the cold, suffocating grip of the sea.

"I told you," she whispered against his chest, her voice breaking. "I told you he would come back. I felt it."

He stroked her hair, forcing a steady smile. "And you were right."

Sylene recovered first.

She stepped forward, grasping his shoulder, her eyes blazing with a thousand questions. "How? Caedrion, you vanished before our very eyes. No portal, no spell, no trace! Where—"

He raised a hand, silencing her gently. "Later. I will explain later."

But the look in his eyes said clearly: not everything.

Malveris studied him, eyes narrowing, as if trying to peer past the veil of words he had not yet spoken.

Yet even he, sharp as ever, could not hide the tremor in his lips.

"We feared the worst. The void itself whispered when you were taken. To see you returned…" He exhaled. "It is no less than a miracle."

Caedrion gave him a wry smile. "Miracle or not, I am here. And I intend to remain."

Aelindria pulled back, tears glistening on her cheeks, her hands roaming his shoulders, his face, as though to assure herself he was no dream.

"Tell me it wasn't suffering," she pleaded. "Tell me you weren't in pain."

His throat tightened.

Images surged: coils constricting his ribs, the abyss pressing from every side, lips branding him with a kiss both tender and suffocating.

He forced them down.

"No pain," he lied softly. "I was… detained. But I am whole. And now I am here, where I belong."

She searched his eyes, uncertain, but clung to him all the same.

The hall stirred around them.

Servants rushed to spread word, guards saluted with tears of relief, the palace itself seemed to breathe easier.

Dawnhaven's lord had returned, and with him the beating heart of its people.

Caedrion let the tide of their joy wash over him, even as a shadow coiled in his chest.

Six months. That was all the leash Thalassaria had given him.

Six months before the sea came calling once again.

For now, he smiled, holding Aelindria as though nothing had changed.

But he knew.

Everything had.