"Not all who walk into the storm scream. Some are too broken to make a sound."
— Whispers from the Hollowed Brides
We walk hand in hand across the sea, as if it were storm-paved. The weather is still now. The sky, hushed. The coast, quiet. As if what he was waiting for was already in his hands. It is.
My gaze lingers behind me—on my mother's cold relief, Amery's wonder, Liora's heartbreak. I haven't turned away yet. Because once I do, I'll be truly gone. Ban to an eternity I never asked for.
A slight pressure on my palm draws me forward. I blink. A single tear slips loose—warm and quiet down my cheek—while something colder stirs beneath it.
Anger.
I wipe it away before he can see. Before he can notice the broken in me.
Without a word, he raises his hand. There's a flicker in his eyes. Sorrow in mine. Then, across the surface of the sea, a shape begins to form. A carriage forged from cloud and crowned in wind. Seats of vapor. Wheels of whirling air. Drawn by what can only be described as shadows with wings.
It comes from beyond the horizon. It's coming for me.
I step into the storm-carriage, gripping the edge as if it might vanish beneath me. There are no reins to hold. No wheels to steer. Just clouds and wind—and whatever lies between them. He still holds my hand. As if letting go would mean losing me altogether.
I sit, facing the endless sea ahead. Afraid that if I look back, I'll run. Afraid that if I move too soon, the sky will swallow me whole. He sits beside me. Too close. Silver eyes rake across my profile, carving out every sunspot and shadow. Every flinch. Every breath. As if he's memorizing them before I disappear entirely.
"You could sit in front," I mutter, voice low, brittle. "Could you not?"
"I cannot," he says simply.
His voice resonates through the wind. Not loud. Not apologetic. Just true.
I narrow my eyes at him.
The carriage jolts. Wind lifts us violently, sweeping the vessel from sea to sky. I'm thrown upward, nearly unseated—a scream tears from my throat. His arm wraps around me—strong, unyielding—pulling me back to the seat before I can even breathe again.
"This is why," he says, almost amused. A smirk threatens the corner of his mouth.
"You enjoy this," I snap—not a question.
"Why wouldn't I?"
"You do this every year. Bring girls into the sky and wait for them to fall. Not from the wind—but into your hands. Helpless. In love."
His grip loosens. Just enough for me to shake him off. I steady myself—one hand gripping the edge of the cloud-carved seat, the other braced against a wind-forged handle jutting from the side.
The sea is far behind now. Only wind surrounds us. Only darkness.
"It's not intentional," he says at last.
And for the first time, something shifts in his voice. A small crack. Barely there. But real.
I press.
"Not intentional," I echo. "But convenient."
He doesn't answer.
"You let them fall, don't you? The brides before me. You let them hope. Let them believe they could be the one who breaks the curse. And when they fail—when you fail them—you bury them in cloud and silence as if nothing ever touched you at all."
The wind howls louder, as if it doesn't like what I'm saying.
He doesn't look at me. Which is how I know I've struck something deeper than pride.
"How many have there been?" I ask. "Do you even know their names?"
His jaw tightens.
"You know mine," I add softly. "But how long until I'm just another face you can't remember?"
"I remember all of them," he says, and this time his voice is not calm. It is cold. Cut from something older than sorrow.
"Then why are they still in your sky?" I whisper. "Why do they still cry in the mist?"
Lightning flares behind the clouds. The wind stutters. The carriage tilts just slightly before steadying again. He turns to me. Slow. Deliberate. And when our eyes meet, it's not the Stormlord I see. It's the man beneath it. Wounded. Walled.
"I wish they could cry," he says, barely above a whisper.
The words land between us like lightning without thunder. His face is unreadable. But his silence is not. It roars louder than the wind.
"What does that mean?" I ask.
Before he can answer, a sudden jolt shudders through the carriage. We've stopped. I brace myself, hand gripping the edge.
Outside, rain drips from massive gates carved of cloudstone—pale and ancient, veins of light threading through them like lightning held in crystal. Beyond the gates: a castle. But not like any in the stories. It's not made of stone, but of sky—shaped glass and tempest.
The walls rise high, refracting every color of the storm. Not sunlight. No moonlight. But the strange, shimmering gleam of a world untouched by Earth. The night shines through its crystal bones—glowing. I swallow.
"Is this… where they all live?" I ask. "The others?"
His hand tightens slightly on the door.
"What others are you referring to?" he asks, though his voice is careful.
"Your harem of brides," I say, gaze unflinching. "And the ones so willing to leave their lives behind to make a deal with the Storm God—for eternity in the skies."
He doesn't flinch. But his answer is immediate.
"No."
"No?" I echo, narrowing my eyes.
He stands, holding out his hand for me. I rise on my own, without breaking eye contact.
He nods. Approving. Or maybe just accepting my hostility.
"I have no harem. And they weren't all willing." His voice hardens. Expression solemn.
I step down from the carriage. My steps are light as featherfall—as if the wrong one might send me slipping through the clouds to my death.
He follows.
"Some stay," he says, "as part of their deal. They work here. Others live in the storm-touched kingdom beyond the gates. Their lives changed—but not ended."
He pauses.
"This place... this castle... is only for you. And me."
His words strike harder than the wind. Not romantic. Not comforting. Just real.
I stare at him, searching for the lie. For softness. For a twist that will make it make sense.
"So... the others—your former brides—now work for you?" I ask, stunned.
"That's what my future holds?"
He looks at me. Unreadable.
"Being with you for a year is already work," I mutter under my breath.
But he hears it. A ghost of a smirk touches his lips.
"Then you'll be very well compensated. If you can bear it to the end."
"What, with immortality?" I snap.
He doesn't answer.
Which is, somehow, worse.
"Follow me," he commands.
No softness in his voice. Just authority. As if the sky itself might obey.
He turns from me, cloak billowing in a slow arc behind him—ink and lightning, trimmed in silver flame. I hesitate only a breath, then follow, each step measured like it might seal a vow I never made.
The gates sense him before his hands touch them. Cloudstone groans and parts, veined with silent thunder, spilling open like the mouth of something ancient and alive.
I step through. And the air changes. Not colder. Not warmer. Just strange. Like a dream remembered too late, or a promise you don't recall making.
The castle unfolds in crystalline spires and arches that stretch far beyond what the eye should see. Every surface reflects a different color of the storm—sometimes violet, sometimes gold, sometimes the palest blue before lightning breaks.
The floors shimmer beneath my feet, as if cloudstone had learned to breathe. And all around, wind moves like a living thing—brushing past, curling through the halls as if it's watching me. Testing me.
I glance sideways.
He doesn't look back. He walks like he owns this silence. Like the gods crowned him with it. The Stormlord moves half a step ahead—shoulders rigid beneath the black stormcloak, hands loose but ready at his sides.
He ascends the stairs. His steps say certainty. Mine says surrender.
The castle doors open as he takes the last step. And hundreds of eyes lock onto me. He glances back. Not coldly. Waiting.
He extends his hand again.
"You might want to take it this time," he says.
Men and women line the walls, cloaked in silver and black—faces shadowed, hidden—watching me with the stillness of statues. No one moves. No one speaks. Only his hand rises, higher now.
I stare at it. That hand—strong. Waiting. Dangerous.
Part of me wants to slap it away. Part of me wants to run into it like a drowning thing clinging to the last solid thing left.
I step forward. Place my hand in his.
And we walk in.
Whispers stir the air like blades through silk. Low at first.
Then, rising—too soft to catch words, but sharp enough to cut. The courtiers do not speak aloud. They murmur with their eyes. With their silence. With the tilt of their heads beneath silver-draped hoods.
I feel them watching—not just seeing, but studying. Measuring. Judging. My hand still locked in his, but the contact sends another jolt through me. Electricity coils through my skin—up my arm, into my chest, alive and burning. And then—the mark.
It ignites. A searing flare in the collarbone, beneath the fabric, as if someone pressed a brand into me from the inside. I flinch, just barely. But he feels it. His grip tightens—not painfully, but with awareness.
"They're only curious," he murmurs, without looking down.
I don't answer. Because curious isn't the right word. They look at me like I've already failed some test I was never told to study for. My heart hammers in my ears. I force myself not to pull away. Not to cry. Not to scream that this was never my choice.
I lift my chin.
The mark still burns. The whispers ripple. And then—I notice the change.
The storm is humming against the walls. A sound everyone else seems to have noticed but me. The columns rain within, water trailing down, crystal-like tears that have nowhere else to fall. Lightning spreads silently across the roof's arches—veins of light threading through cloudstone, blooming like fractured stars.
But I walk. I do not break.
The burning increases. A storm stirs within me. I don't understand what's happening—only that it's building. My body feels like it's breaking. Now literally.
A crack of heat runs down my spine. My knees falter. I stagger. He catches me instantly. One hand wraps around my waist, the other never leaving mine. Steadying. Bracing.
His eyes burn brighter now—silver cut with shadow. They weigh me. They know.
"What's wrong?" he whispers. "What are you feeling, Amarin?"
His tone—no longer distant. Serious. Sharp. Worried.
And the storm in me answers before I can.