The wind off the Sinthian cliffs was sharper than I remembered.
It cut through my cloak, through my armor, through the thin composure I’d managed to hold together since leaving the palace. The sea below churned in slow, heavy waves, not frozen, not still, but moving with a strange, deliberate rhythm.
Bir stood beside me, staring at the water like it might give him back the years he’d lost.
“She was here,” he whispered. “I know she was.”
I nodded, though the truth was more complicated. The cliffs hummed with something old, something that made the bond in my chest throb like a bruise.
Kathera.
Sahora.
Both.
Neither.
I pressed a hand to my sternum, steadying myself.
Bir didn’t notice. His eyes were fixed on the rocks below.
“She used to climb down there,” he said. “Said the sea sounded different from the bottom. Like it was singing.”
His voice cracked.
“She was twelve then.”
I swallowed. “And now she could be anyone.”
He nodded once, jaw trembling. “I don’t know who she is anymore.”
But the world did.
The sea had woken first.
The rivers next.
The shards stirred.
The bond pulsed.
And somewhere on these cliffs, a woman shaped by the stillness was walking through a world that had forgotten her.
I stepped closer to the edge.
“Bir,” I said quietly, “tell me everything you remember about the day the stillness took you.”
He closed his eyes. “We were fishing on the docks. She was laughing. The waves were calm. Too calm. Then… everything stopped. The water froze mid‑splash. The gulls froze mid‑cry. She reached for my hand and—”
He broke off, breath shuddering.
“When I woke,” he whispered, “the boat was gone. The sea was moving again. And she was gone.”
A chill slid down my spine.
“Bir,” I said slowly, “did you see anything else? Anything unusual?”
He hesitated.
“There was… a light.”
My pulse quickened. “What kind of light?”
“Blue,” he said. “Bright. Like lightning trapped underwater. It was coming from the cliffs.”
The bond slammed into me so hard I staggered.
Kathera’s voice, faint, distant, strained, brushed the edge of my mind.
Find her.
I gripped the rock wall to steady myself.
Bir stepped toward me. “Your Majesty?”
“I’m fine,” I lied.
I wasn’t.
The bond was splitting.
The world was waking.
And something, someone, was calling.
I forced myself upright.
“We search the cliffs,” I said. “Every cave. Every ledge. Every path.”
Bir nodded, hope flickering in his eyes for the first time.
I turned toward the sea.
The waves crashed harder now, as if answering a question I hadn’t asked.
A shadow moved beneath the surface, too large, too slow, too deliberate to be a fish.
My breath caught.
“Bir,” I said quietly, “did your daughter ever speak of the sea?”
He nodded. “She said it listened to her.”
The shadow beneath the waves shifted again.
Not a creature.
A presence.
A pulse.
A call.
The bond throbbed in my chest, sharp and urgent.
Kathera’s voice whispered again, clearer this time.
She is not lost.
I exhaled shakily.
“Bir,” I said, “your daughter is alive.”
He stared at me, eyes wide, breath caught in his throat.
“How do you know?”
I looked out at the sea, at the cliffs, at the shadow moving beneath the waves.
Because the world was waking.
Because the shards were stirring.
Because the bond was pulling me toward her.
And because the sea itself was answering her.
“She is alive,” I repeated. “And she is not alone.”