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The sun had dipped behind the clouds, casting the palace in a sudden hush of grey-gold shadow.
The celebration roared in the courtyard behind us, but I didn't hear it.
All I heard was the echo of my heartbeat, pounding in my chest like war drums as my heels struck the marble corridor in hurried steps.
I didn't know where I was going.
I only knew I had to run.
My gown tangled around my legs as I turned corner after corner — the edges catching on stone and doors — but I didn't care.
My hands ripped the veil from my head. The crown still sat like iron above my brow, heavy and suffocating.
Tears blurred everything.
My breath hitched.
I hated how fast my heart beat.
Hated how seeing him again made me feel like a girl.
Rowen.
How dare he come back like that?
How dare he… look at me like I still belonged to him?
My chest cracked open, breath shaking.
I turned one last corridor and pushed open the tall wooden doors to the abandoned east garden, where no one but I and Rowen used to hide when we were little.
The scent of roses and damp stone greeted me.
And there, beneath the arched trellis, behind the fountain—my knees finally gave way.
I collapsed onto the grass.
Hands to my face.
And cried.
Ugly, gasping sobs I hadn't allowed myself in years.
All the strength I'd worn as armor shattered.
The crown slipped sideways. My gloves were soaked with tears.
I didn't hear the footsteps until they were very close.
"Evelynne…"
His voice was deep. Rough. Hoarse.
My body stiffened—but I didn't turn.
He came closer. Slowly. Like he was afraid I might vanish.
"Please," Rowen said again, quietly. "Look at me."
I didn't.
Instead, I choked, "Why now…?"
It wasn't a question of time.
It was a scream of everything I'd felt—Where were you when I needed you? When I was breaking? When Rye stood where you should've been?
"I'm sorry," Rowen whispered, closer now. "I never meant to—"
I stood suddenly, fists clenched.
My tear-stained cheeks were red, eyes wild.
"You never meant to what, Rowen? Leave me? Let me grieve you while the world forced me to forget?!"
His breath caught.
My voice cracked again.
"Do you have any idea what it did to me to not know if you were alive or dead? Do you?!"
He didn't answer.
Instead—
He stepped forward and pulled me into his arms.
Tight.
Tighter than he ever had.
Like he was holding the last piece of something sacred.
I didn't fight it.
I collapsed into him.
My fists beat weakly against his chest once, then again, until my fingers curled into his uniform and my body shook with sobs.
The velvet of my gown clung to his uniform, my crown falling into the grass.
His hand cradled the back of my head, the other curled around my waist.
"I missed you," he whispered into my hair. His voice was hoarse.
"I missed you so much, I forgot how to breathe."
I cried harder.
And when my knees buckled again, he fell with me, down to the soft grass, still holding me, his face buried in my neck.
His voice cracked, barely audible.
"They told me not to come back until it was safe. I wanted to write. I tried. But they… I didn't even know if I'd make it out."
"I hated you," I whispered, my voice shaking.
"I hated you every day you weren't here."
"I hated myself too."
I clutched him tighter. "Then don't let go now…"
His grip didn't loosen.
"I won't," he said softly. "Not this time."
The garden was quiet. The fountain trickled nearby.
But in that moment, beneath the falling petals, wrapped in each other's arms like time had never moved, two souls broke apart to be whole again.