As I write this, it has been twenty-six days since I saw you last. Two months is, I fear, far too optimistic a timeline for my return, but I am determined to spend the time necessary to do this correctly, even though it keeps me away from you. I hope Alluin and Zhiolas aren't filling your ears with my most embarrassing secrets, unless such a thing would make you happy, in which case you may give them my permission.

And here is the final line, so—farewell. Yours, Dain

34. Welcome Home

Chapter 34

Welcome Home

Two months passed, and Dain didn't come home.

Snow fell and melted and fell again. I acquired a miserable cold from somewhere and got better, and Zhiolas had to take his battalion to the border to deal with reports of escalating hostilities from one of the marquesses. I still saw Alluin on a weekly basis, but he was a General and couldn't spend all his time with me, nor did I want to glue myself to his side. I didn't try and monopolize Kamharida, either, who had her own life, and my acquaintanceships with the courtiers were definitely not at the level of getting drunk together and having emotional breakdowns.

Thus, I proceeded to devolve into an anxious mess all by my lonesome. My daily countdown of days until I could leave Faery and tell my family I was alive became a dreaded part of my routine. It wasn't that I was upset at the thought of leaving Faery, which I disliked in a number of dramatic ways as a place to live. But by the time it hit Day Zero, I had to have figured my shit out, and it was a lot harder to do that when Dain was in another country, maybe suffering and maybe dying.

I had a panic attack on Day One Hundred, which sucked. I started having nightmares on almost a nightly basis, too. They were varied and horrible, ranging from receiving a third letter written the day before his execution, to Dain's body getting returned to Stag Court, to the Queen announcing at a banquet that she was making me her heir for having successfully sent my soulmated nemesis to die.

Dain had given me the key and his permission, and while I felt weird about going into his space I was straight-up melting down about his maybe-death. When I wasn't doing High Court things, spending time with Alluin, or exercising outdoors, I began to spend my time in Dain's rooms.