I woke to an empty space beside me. Malvor's pillow was still warm, the blankets twisted where he'd been. For half a second, I reached for him before remembering. Thursday. Tairochi. Apparently Malvor had somewhere to be. My mocha waited on the nightstand, still impossibly warm. Beside it sat a folded piece of paper. My Forever, always yours.
I smiled. Ridiculous man. I took a sip. Perfect. Chocolate, espresso, too much whipped cream because Malvor considered reasonable proportions a personal attack. The house was quiet. Well. Arbor's version of quiet. Somewhere inside the walls, runes hummed. A constellation drifted lazily across the ceiling. One of the windows had decided the sunrise would look prettier purple and was slowly correcting itself now that I was awake. Six days. That was how long Malvor had been gone last time. Arbor had been so quiet. I smiled into my coffee. I loved him with every strange piece of myself. But gods, the man was loud even when he wasn't physically present.
I swung my legs out of bed. Something cold moved beneath my skin. I stopped. A presence. The mug went still halfway to my mouth. No. The rune on my leg pulsed. My stomach dropped. Aerion.
Present somewhere in the divine realms and aware. The sensation slid through me like pressure against an old bruise. Not his hand around my throat. The knowledge that the hand still existed. My breath caught. The coffee shook. I set it down before I dropped it. "No."
My heart kicked hard against my ribs. I knew where I was. Arbor. Our bedroom. Morning. I knew all of that. My body didn't care. The rune pulsed again. My lungs forgot the next breath. I stood too quickly. The room tilted. My hand caught the nightstand hard enough to rattle the mug.
Arbor reacted. Light bloomed across the walls. The floor warmed beneath my feet. Runes illuminated one after another, gold and violet and white. The ceiling cleared. Stars disappeared. The walls softened into something almost ordinary. The whole Realm was trying to soothe me because he would have. That somehow made it worse.
"Not now." My voice shook. "Please. Not now."
I pressed my hand against my sternum. My heart was too fast. Breaths too short. Aerion wasn't here. I knew that. He wasn't touching me. I knew that too. My body knew something else. Aerion was back. Aerion was angry. The bond stirred. Malvor. I closed it instinctively. He would feel me. He would tear through whatever he was doing, probably several walls and at least one innocent bystander, and appear in front of me already halfway to murder. I loved him for that. I didn't want him. That realization came without guilt. I didn't need Chaos. I needed ground. "Tairochi."
The name barely made it past my throat. The Realm answered. Stone replaced carpet beneath my feet. Cold air hit my face. The smell came next. Earth. Rain. Pine. My knees nearly gave out.
Tairochi stood several yards away. He had been doing something with a wall of stone, one hand pressed against it, cracks slowly knitting beneath his palm. He turned when I arrived. His eyes moved over me once. "Aerion?"
I nodded. That was all I could manage. Tairochi crossed the distance between us. "Come."
He didn't ask what happened. Didn't tell me I was safe. Didn't tell me to breathe. Thank the gods, he didn't tell me to breathe. His hand settled between my shoulder blades. The earth hummed beneath my feet. "You are afraid."
"I'm not ready." My voice broke anyway. "He's back and I'm not—"
"You are preparing."
"That's not enough."
"It is what you have today."
I squeezed my eyes shut. The rune still burned faintly beneath my skin. "I don't want to feel him."
"You don't have to."
"I can."
"That is different." I opened my eyes. Tairochi was watching me. "You feel him," he said. "You do not belong to the feeling."
Something in my chest twisted. He guided me toward the ground. "Sit." I sat. "Hands."
I placed them against the stone. Nothing happened. My pulse hammered. "I can't."
"You are."
"No, I'm not."
"You are touching stone."
I almost snapped at him. Then realized what he'd done. Not calm down. Not stop being afraid. Not even breathe. Touch stone. That I could do. My palms were against the ground. A narrow crack ran beneath my right thumb.
"Tell me what you feel."
"Stone."
"More."
I swallowed. "Cold and rough."
"More."
I pressed my fingers down. "There's a crack."
"Good."
My breathing was still too fast.
"Match the rhythm."
I searched for it. Nothing. The earth beneath me was just earth. My hands shook. "I can't find it."
"You have before."
"That's not helping."
"I know."
I looked up at him. Was that humor? His expression hadn't moved. Asshole. I looked down again. Waited. There it was, a pulse so deep I almost mistook it for imagination. Slow and ancient. Nothing like my heart. I tried to follow it. Failed. My lungs dragged in another shallow breath. Again. The earth didn't change itself to accommodate my panic. It just continued.
I breathed. Again. My shoulders dropped a fraction. Again. My fingers stopped trembling. The pressure around my throat loosened. Tairochi lowered himself onto the stone across from me. He said nothing. Minutes passed. Maybe more. I didn't know.
Eventually, I sat back. "I fought him. I beat him."
"Yes."
"I made his own Law turn against him."
"Yes."
My jaw tightened. "So why am I sitting here shaking because I can feel him?"
Tairochi considered me. "Do you believe defeating him erased what he did?"
"No."
"Then why should your body?" I looked away. Annoyingly reasonable mountain. "Your body will learn."
"When?"
"When it does." I glared at him. He stared back.
"You are profoundly unhelpful."
"I have been told."
I laughed. Tairochi's mouth moved. Barely. I pointed at him. "Was that a smile?"
"No."
"Liar."
"Match the rhythm."
"Oh, fuck you."
"Better."
That got another laugh out of me. The last of the panic began to loosen. I stretched my legs out across the stone. For a while, we sat without speaking. This was quiet. Nothing needed my attention. I understood something then that I hadn't been able to put into words. Malvor was home. Arbor was home. But home didn't have to be everything. I had spent too much of my life being taught that one thing should contain my entire existence. One doctrine. One purpose. One owner. I wasn't doing that again. Not even with love. Malvor gave me joy. Ahyona gave me permission to feel. Calavera gave me perspective. Tairochi gave me this. Ground beneath my feet that didn't move simply because I was frightened. I needed all of it. Maybe that was the point. "I think I understand why I keep coming here."
Tairochi looked at me. "You like rocks."
I stared. His expression remained perfectly blank. A laugh burst out of me. "You made a joke."
"No."
"You absolutely made a joke."
"The rocks are excellent."
"Oh my gods."
He stood. Apparently the conversation was over. I stayed where I was, smiling despite myself. After a moment, I asked, "Do you think he's afraid of me?"
Tairochi stopped. I hadn't meant to ask. The question had simply appeared. He looked back. "Yes."
That answer came too quickly. I frowned. "Why?"
"Because he broke you."
My smile disappeared. Tairochi turned fully toward me. "He expects you to remain the vessel he hurt."
"I'm not."
"No." His gaze dropped briefly to the rune hidden beneath my clothes. "You carry his power."
"I didn't ask for it. I don't want it to make me like him."
"It cannot."
Something in his certainty irritated me. "How do you know?"
"Because power is not character." I went still. Tairochi walked back toward me. "Aerion believes power gives him authority. He believes authority gives him permission. You had both." My throat tightened. "You returned his autonomy."
I looked down at my hands. I could still see him on the floor. Unable to move. Terrified. I had wanted him to feel it. For one terrible second, I had wanted him to know exactly what he'd done to me. Then I'd let him move. "I almost didn't."
"But you did."
"That doesn't erase the almost."
"No." His answer surprised me. "It means the choice mattered." I looked up. Tairochi held my gaze. "You are not good because cruelty never occurs to you, Asha. You are good when cruelty is available and you choose what you will become."
I breathed. The earth answered. Eventually Tairochi returned to his wall. I followed. Apparently Thursday with the God of Earth involved manual labor. "What are we doing?"
"Repairing."
I looked at the enormous stretch of cracked stone. "With magic?"
He handed me a chisel. I stared at it. He stared at me. "You are a god."
"Yes."
"You can move mountains, and we're doing this by hand."
"Yes."
I looked at the chisel. Then at him. "Malvor would hate this."
"Yes."
I grinned. "Give me the hammer."
We worked painfully slow. Tairochi showed me where to strike. How to feel weakness beneath the surface instead of simply forcing stone where I wanted it. When I hit too hard, the crack widened.
"Again," he said.
When I tried using magic
"No."
"I could fix this in thirty seconds."
"You spend too much time with Chaos."
I laughed. Hours passed that way. Stone dust coated my sweater. My arms began to ache. My hair escaped whatever pathetic knot I'd put it in. Somewhere along the way, I stopped checking for Aerion. That was the important part. If I reached for it, I could still find that faint pressure at the edge of awareness. I simply stopped reaching.
By the time Tairochi finally inspected our work and nodded, the sun had shifted across the mountains. "Acceptable."
I looked at the repaired section. "Acceptable? I have been doing divine masonry for hours."
"Poorly."
I shoved his arm. He didn't move. Obviously. "You're terrible for my self-esteem."
"No. You do not need me for that."
I stared at him. Then smiled. Fair. I opened the portal. Then hesitated. "You'll be there?" Tairochi looked at me. "If something happens."
His expression softened in that nearly imperceptible way I'd learned to recognize. "I am stone." The earth hummed beneath us. "I do not leave." My throat tightened. He rested one enormous hand over my sternum. "This does not crack today."
I covered his hand with mine. "No."
For the first time all morning, I believed it. I stepped through the portal. Grounded.