Chapter 5 — Where Free Stars Cast Iron Shadows

People talk about them like they're chains.

Something permanent. Something unbreakable. Words heavy enough to hold two people together no matter what happens.

I used to believe that.

Back then, a promise felt more like a door left open.

A choice.

A way of saying, Whatever comes next, I'll still be here.

Maybe that's why I remember that campfire so clearly.

We'd been travelling for four days when Cassian finally admitted we were lost.

“We're not lost.”

Seris looked up from the map.

“You've said that six times.”

“Because it's true.”

“You took us past the same broken watchtower this morning.”

Cassian pointed toward the dark hills.

“There are lots of broken watchtowers.”

“That one has your name carved into it.”

Silence.

I looked at him.

He looked at me.

Seris slowly smiled.

Cassian sighed.

“Fine. We're slightly lost.”

I laughed so hard I nearly dropped the kettle into the fire.

We'd finished escorting a group of healers through the northern valleys. The mission itself had been boring, which was something I'd learned to appreciate after Lareth.

No primordial beasts.

No collapsing buildings.

Nobody trying to stab me.

A successful week.

Our squad had camped farther down the slope, leaving the three of us beside a smaller fire overlooking the valley.

The sky was clear.

Thousands of stars hung above us.

No temple bells.

No crowds.

No Council.

Just wind moving through the grass and Seris trying to rescue dinner from me.

“Give me that.”

“I know how to cook.”

“You burned water once.”

“That isn't possible.”

“And yet you managed it.”

Cassian held out his bowl.

“I'll eat whatever survives.”

“Coward.”

“Hungry coward.”

Seris took the pot from my hands.

I let her.

Mostly because whatever was stuck to the bottom had started smoking.

We sat there for a while without talking.

Those were some of my favourite moments.

Nobody needed anything from me.

I didn't need to save anyone.

Cassian didn't need a strategy.

Seris didn't need an answer hidden in some ancient book.

We could just exist.

I stared at the stars.

“What do you think you'll do?”

Seris stirred the pot.

“With dinner?”

“With your life.”

She looked at me.

“That came out of nowhere.”

Cassian leaned back against a fallen log.

“He's feeling philosophical. Dangerous.”

“I'm serious.”

“That makes it worse.”

I threw a twig at him.

He caught it.

Seris laughed.

Then she looked out over the valley.

“I want an archive.”

Cassian blinked.

“You already spend your life in archives.”

“My archive.”

She pointed the wooden spoon at us.

“One nobody can lock because a king decided a document makes him look bad.”

“That sounds expensive.”

“I'll steal the money.”

“Reasonable,” I said.

Cassian nodded.

“Very scholarly.”

Seris ignored us.

“I want somewhere anyone can bring records. War reports. Letters. Family stories. Old magic. Even embarrassing things rulers would rather bury.”

Her voice softened.

“People shouldn't get to decide the truth stopped happening just because it's inconvenient.”

Something about that stayed with me.

It still does.

“What would you call it?” I asked.

She thought about it.

“I wouldn't.”

“No name?”

“Names attract important people.”

Cassian looked offended.

“I'm important.”

“Exactly.”

I laughed.

Seris nudged my boot with hers.

“What about you, Commander Vale?”

Cassian's expression changed immediately.

Not much.

Just enough.

Back then, nobody called him commander very often.

He liked how it sounded.

“I'll have my own army.”

Seris raised an eyebrow.

“Planning to conquer somewhere?”

“No.”

“Disappointing.”

“I mean a real command.”

He sat forward.

“Not somebody else's unit. Not temporary authority because Zyrion happens to be standing nearby.”

I glanced at him.

Cassian kept looking into the fire.

“I want soldiers to know my name because I earned it. When a battle goes well, I don't want some historian writing that the Star-Chosen saved everyone again.”

“That isn't what I want either.”

“I know.”

His answer came quickly.

He looked at me and smiled.

“I know, Zyr.”

That old nickname.

He hadn't used it in months.

The tension disappeared almost as quickly as it came.

Almost.

Seris handed him a bowl.

“Commander Vale.”

Cassian accepted it with ridiculous dignity.

“Archivist Elowen.”

Then both looked at me.

I already knew what was coming.

“No.”

Seris grinned.

“We answered.”

Cassian pointed his spoon at me.

“Your turn.”

“You know what I want.”

“No,” Seris said. “We know what everyone else wants for you.”

That shut me up.

The fire cracked between us.

I looked toward the distant lights of Caeloria.

Even from here, the highest towers were visible against the horizon.

My home.

My cage.

I hadn't started calling it that yet.

“I think I'd leave.”

Cassian stopped eating.

Seris didn't look surprised.

“Where?”

“Somewhere boring.”

“Very specific.”

“A village, maybe.”

I shrugged.

“A cottage near the woods. No palace. No guards. No ceremonies.”

Cassian stared at me like I'd confessed to murder.

“You?”

“Yes.”

“You'd last three days.”

“Why?”

“You'd hear someone yelling for help ten miles away and come home carrying six injured strangers and a cursed wolf.”

Seris nodded.

“He's right.”

“That happened once.”

“Twice,” Cassian said.

I pointed at him.

“Stop keeping count.”

They laughed.

I did too.

Then I looked back at the stars.

“I'd like to wake up one morning and have nobody know who I am.”

Neither of them laughed that time.

“No Star-Chosen,” I continued. “No prophecy. No Council deciding which war needs me next.”

Seris watched me quietly.

“Just Zyrion?”

“Just Zyrion.”

I smiled.

“Maybe I could learn to cook.”

“No,” they said together.

I stared at them.

Seris nearly choked laughing.

“Fine. Someone else can cook.”

“Much safer,” Cassian said.

For a while, that cottage became real.

Seris decided it needed an archive room.

Cassian demanded a training yard.

I pointed out that they'd somehow invited themselves to live there.

Neither cared.

Cassian wanted a tower.

Seris banned the tower.

I requested a kitchen.

They banned me from that.

By the time dinner was gone, we'd built an entire imaginary home under the stars.

Funny.

I thought my dream was being alone.

But when I pictured freedom, somehow they were always there.

Seris eventually grew quiet.

“What if they don't let you?”

I looked at her.

“The Council.”

Cassian's smile faded.

She continued.

“You know what they're like. If they decide your power belongs to Caeloria, what happens when you say no?”

“Then I say it louder.”

Seris didn't smile.

“I'm serious.”

“So am I.”

Cassian put his bowl down.

“They won't force him.”

“You sure?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

“Because they'd have to get through me first.”

I laughed.

Cassian didn't.

He held out his arm.

I stared at it.

“What's this?”

“A promise.”

“That's dramatic.”

“Take the damn arm.”

I did.

His hand closed around my forearm.

Mine closed around his.

We'd done it hundreds of times after battles.

This felt different.

“If they build your cage,” Cassian said, “I'll break the door.”

The fire reflected in his eyes.

He meant it.

That's important.

Whatever else happened later, I know he meant it then.

Seris placed her hand over ours.

“And if they rewrite either of you into idiots after you're dead, I'll fix the record.”

Cassian frowned.

“Either of us?”

“Zyrion's already an idiot.”

“Fair.”

I sighed.

“Beautiful moment ruined.”

Seris smiled.

“No Council choosing our lives.”

Cassian nodded.

“No crowns.”

I looked between them.

“No cages.”

I believed us completely. That's what I remember most. Not the fire, not the stars, not even the promise itself. I remember how easy trust felt. Like breathing. Like opening my wings and knowing the air would always be there to catch me.

Three hands.

Three futures.

One promise beneath an open sky.

The memory should've ended there.

Sometimes I wish it did.

Instead, I remember the fire burning lower.

I remember Cassian sleeping nearby.

Seris leaning against my shoulder.

And me looking toward Caeloria's distant towers while thinking I'd somehow beaten destiny simply because two people had promised to stand beside me.

Years later, Seris would fight to keep history from swallowing the truth.

Cassian would command armies beneath his own name.

And I would get my wish too.

No crowds.

No ceremonies.

No one asking anything from me.

Just stone.

Silence.

And a room so far beneath the world that nobody remembered it existed.

That's the ugly thing about wishes.

Sometimes the world gives you exactly what you asked for.

Just not in the way you meant.

Seven days before everything fell apart, Cassian still carried that promise with him.

I know because I saw it whenever the Council spoke about my future.

His jaw would tighten.

His hand would close.

For the smallest moment, he'd look exactly like the boy beside that fire.

Maybe part of him still wanted to break the cage.

Maybe that's why what happened next hurt so much.

He'd once promised he'd break the door.

In the end...

he helped close it.