The tunnels' rumble shook the station, causing dust to fall from the roof. But Elara… she didn't budge.
Her eyes went unfocused — gold blooming in them like fire eating paper.
She's remembering.
Cael grabbed at her, instinctual, horrified—
With unexpected strength, her hand shot up and clasped his wrist.
And suddenly—
He was no longer in the station.
He hung in white sky—this sky had no horizon, no sin. Hymn-light bubbled through the air. His wings were complete now, colossal and incandescent, each feather spun from starlight.
Elara stood before him
but not the Elara of now.
She was dressed in celestial silk that adhered like moonlight on water. Hair brighter, eyes unburdened. Power had softened her edges— but never made her gentle.
She came towards him quite slowly.
Curiosity in every step.
Danger in her stillness.
"Watcher," she had whispered, back then.
"Why are you looking at me as if I'm holding something you can't put your hands on?"
Cael remembered how hollow it felt.
The one sin he bore for long before he fell.
He had answered her in silence — moving so close that their halos collided. Her breath caught. Her fingers hovered near his jaw, trembling slightly…
So close.
Too close.
He felt that moment all over again — desire sharpened by fear. Need pushing its way through obedience.
"If Heaven made you so you could be worshipped," he had whispered, his voice unsteady,
"then damn me for wanting more than that."
Her lips parted — a promise of a future that never came.
White sky cracked.
The memory shattered.
---
Elara gasped, ripping back into the dark station like someone thrown from paradise into a pit.
Her knees buckled
Cael caught her before she hit the ground, his hands firm on her shoulders — the very touch he once denied himself.
Elara's voice trembled with the aftershock:
"You loved me."
Cael didn't inhale.
"You loved me before the fall," she said again, nearly breaking.
And Heaven gave you the whips for craving something sacred in the wrong manner."
His grip tightened — a rare, unguarded vulnerability cutting through him.
"They punished me," he said softly,
"because you loved me back."
A new rumble shook the station. A scraping noise, metal on bone — the roar from the tunnel turned into a scraping noise, metal on bone, getting closer.
Elara gazed into the darkness, fear and power battling in her eyes.
"What is that?" she whispered.
Cael stepped forward, wings spreading wide, shadows poised to strike.
"A reminder," he said, voice like a blade unsheathed,
"that Heaven never lets its sins walk free for long."