They found shelter in a cave on the edge of the Wastes, a hidden crevice shielded by heavy brush and ancient, forgotten wards. For three days, Jaden did nothing but sleep—a heavy, death-like slumber that made Alyssa check his pulse every ten minutes just to be sure he hadn't drifted back into the dark.
On the fourth morning, he woke up.
He was sitting up when she returned from hunting, his back against the damp stone wall. He looked like a specter, the dim light catching the translucent white of his hair. He was staring at his hands, watching his fingers tremble with a rhythmic, uncontrollable shaking.
"Jaden?" she said softly, dropping the small hare she had caught.
He didn't jump. He didn't even turn his head. His movements were slow, as if he were moving through deep water.
"The sky," he said.
His voice was a shock. It was low, raspy, and devoid of the melodic confidence it used to hold. It sounded like two stones grinding together.
"The sky?" Alyssa asked, moving to sit beside him.
"It's... blue," he whispered, his eyes fixed on the small patch of the outside world visible through the cave entrance. "I forgot. I thought everything was purple. I thought the light was a lie."
Alyssa felt a lump form in her throat. She reached out, tentatively placing her hand over his shaking ones. This time, he didn't recoil. His skin was still cold, but there was a faint hint of warmth returning.
"I missed you so much," she said, the words spilling out before she could stop them. "Four years, Jaden. Every day, I went to that bench in the gardens. At first, I thought you'd just... appear. I thought a genius like you would find a way back in a week. When a year passed, I stopped waiting and started searching."
Jaden finally turned his head. He looked at her, and for a fleeting second, she saw a spark of the boy he had been.
"You stayed," he said. It wasn't a question.
"I never left," she replied, her voice thick with emotion. "They tried to make me a General. They tried to give me your titles, your house, your medals. I burned the medals. I left the house to rot. I told them that if they wanted a hero, they should have kept the one they had."
She leaned her head against his shoulder. He felt so fragile, but he was there. "I used to talk to the air, Jaden. I'd tell you about the training sessions, about how the new recruits were clumsy, about how the King was getting fat and paranoid. I stayed alive because I knew you were out there, somewhere, fighting the dark. I knew you wouldn't give up."
Jaden was silent for a long time. Then, he let out a dry, hollowing laugh.
"I didn't fight," he said. "I just... endured. The Void doesn't give you anything to fight, Alyssa. It just sits on you. It whispers that you never existed. It whispers that the girl on the bench was just a dream you made up to keep from going mad."
He looked down at her hand on his. "In the end, I couldn't remember your face. I could only remember the feeling of the wooden sword hitting mine. The sound of the splinters. That was the only thing I knew was real."
"I'm real," she said, gripping his hand tighter. "I'm right here. And I'm never going to let them touch you again. We'll go far away. We'll find a place where the kingdom can't find us. I'll take care of you, Jaden. You don't have to be a genius anymore. You don't have to be a hero."
Jaden didn't respond. He just looked back at the blue sky, his expression unreadable. To Alyssa, this was the beginning of their healing. She thought she could love him back into the man he was. She thought that with enough time and enough safety, the "Sun" would rise again.
She spent the afternoon telling him stories of their childhood, trying to bridge the four-year gap with laughter and memories. She talked about the tournament, the secret training sessions, the way they used to steal apples from the Royal Orchards.
She was so happy to have him back that she didn't notice the way he watched her. He wasn't smiling. He wasn't crying. He was observing her—not as a friend, but as a subject. The "Genius" was still in there, but it was calculating something cold, something that had nothing to do with the warmth of her memories.