The bed was made. The books we’d read had been returned to their homes on the shelves. The few dishes we’d last used were drying on the counter. Her honeyed scent lingered over everything.

I stalked outside, but her scent there was old. She hadn’t left the cottage via the door.

Which meant she’d warped.

Turning back inside, I discovered exactly where she’d left me. My fingers reached for thin air by the dining table where her gown had hung over the chair, my heart sitting in my throat.

The curse I’d known better than to believe was a blessing meant for me was just…

She was just gone.

“I wasn’t fond of the dumplings either,” Berk said, dropping with a groan into the armchair next to mine. “Too salty.”

I smirked. “They were fine.”

He hummed. I could feel his eyes upon me, but I kept staring at the fire, annoyed that I still couldn’t shake the cold that’d seeped inside my bones. “You’re acting stranger than usual. Care to share why?”

It clawed deep—just how much had changed since our family dinner last week.

I hadn’t seen her coming. Unexpectedly, I’d found something priceless, and before I could make sense of what it all was and what more I could do to keep it, I’d fucking lost it.

Gone.

Telling anyone was pointless. Not to mention more than I thought myself capable of enduring.

I said instead, “So you failed to convince Mariana to let you join Fang’s next assignment?”

Fang hadn’t shown up at dinner tonight, busy preparing for the journey northeast with his legion at first light.

Mariana was right to put her foot down.

Having spent the better part of the past three decades learning how to walk again, her war veteran husband and mate had no business going anywhere with our legions. After receiving a spinal injury and broken neck during the first war, there was only so much our blood and magic and time could do. Berk still had days when he could barely move at all.

Berk scoffed. “What do you think? And don’t change the subject. Just because I’m bored shitless doesn’t mean I’m patient. Spit it out. I’ve no interest in dancing.”

“Yet you wish to join your son and a legion of warriors in battle.” Feeling his ire, I looked over at him and sipped the water I’d been clutching, wishing it were something with enough bite to distract.

Nothing would be enough.

As predicted, Berk was glaring, but his jaw loosened when his eyes dipped over my face. “If I’d have known you’d end up being such a wiseass, I’d have left you to bleed on that beach.”

I grinned, as I always did whenever he spoke of things we both knew were bullshit.

His eye twitched, his glare softening. “Oh, fuck off.”