POV Selene
I collapsed at Ari’s bedside despite my broken ankle. Pain didn’t matter. Nothing mattered except the small, too-still figure before me.
“Ari,” I whispered. “My love, we’re back. Can you hear me?”
His eyelids fluttered. Gray eyes opened halfway, fighting for focus. “Mama?”
“I’m here. We both are.”
Casimir was beside me, uncorking the waterskin with shaking hands. The silver-gold dragon’s blood glowed faintly in the lamplight—otherworldly, impossible.
Doctor Saren stared. “What is that?”
“Dragon’s blood,” Casimir said flatly. “The cure.”
“Dragons don’t exist—” She stopped, seeing our faces, seeing the liquid glow. “How much do we give him?”
“One dose. Mixed with water. At moonrise.” Casimir glanced to the window where sunset was thinning. “Moonrise is perhaps an hour away. We wait.”
“We might not have an hour,” Doctor Saren said, checking Ari’s pulse. “His heart is weakening.”
“Then we pray we do.” Casimir’s voice was iron. “We came too far to fail now.”
We waited—the longest hour of my life. I held Ari’s hand and told him stories. Casimir sat opposite, one palm against our son’s chest, feeling that fragile beat.
Anya brought water in a crystal goblet. We waited.
At last, moonlight spilled through the window. Silver touched Ari’s bed.
“Now,” Casimir said.
He poured a spoonful of dragon’s blood into the water. The goblet turned silver-gold, softly luminous. The scent was indescribable—lightning and stone and something ancient. We lifted Ari carefully. He was barely conscious. Casimir set the rim to his lips.
“Drink, son. Please drink.”
Ari’s mouth parted. We tipped the liquid slowly. He swallowed once, twice, three times—finished the goblet.
For a breath, nothing happened.
Then he gasped. His back arched. His eyes flew wide.
“What’s happening?” I cried. “Is he dying?”
Light bloomed within him—actual light, gold and silver threading through his veins, illuminating him from the inside. Doctor Saren stepped back, awed. “I’ve never seen anything like—”
Ari convulsed. I held him, terrified we’d poisoned him.
But color surged into his face. The glassy pallor vanished, replaced by healthy pink. His breathing deepened, steadied. The bruises along his arms dimmed—then disappeared. The light brightened, almost blinding, before sinking back beneath his skin. When it faded, Ari lay still. Too still.
“No,” I whispered. “No, please—not after everything—”
His eyes opened—clear, bright, fully alert. He pushed himself upright.
“Mama? Father?” His voice was strong. “I feel strange. Good-strange. Like I’m warm inside.”
Doctor Saren hurried forward. Pulse—strong. Skin—warm. A quick lancet prick—blood that beaded and clotted perfectly.
“It’s gone,” she breathed. “The disorder—completely gone. His blood is…better than normal.”
I began to cry. Casimir pulled us both in, holding us as if he’d never let go.
“You did it,” Ari said, looking between us. “You found the dragon. A real dragon.”
“We did,” Casimir said, voice rough. “And it gave us a gift. You’re cured, son. Truly cured.”
The next days blurred into exhausted relief. Ari’s recovery was miraculous. Within hours he was out of bed. Within a day he was racing palace corridors with energy he’d never had.
Doctor Saren ran every test she could devise. Each confirmed the impossible: Ari’s blood was perfect. The disorder was simply gone.
“It’s as if he was never sick,” she told us. “The dragon’s blood rewrote his biology.”
Word spread like wildfire: the king and princess who flew on a dragon’s back; the legendary cure; the child-heir restored.
I spent the first two days off my feet while Doctor Saren set my ankle. Through the window I watched Ari play, still scarcely believing. Casimir split his hours between governing and family. Mostly family.
On the third evening, as Ari finally slept the ordinary, healthy sleep of children, Casimir and I sat by the fire.
“I keep expecting to wake up,” I admitted. “To find it was a fever dream.”
“It’s real.” He took my hand. “We did it. Against all odds, we saved him.”
“You saved him. You’re the one who refused to give up—who believed the legends—who climbed that mountain.” I touched his cheek. “You are the reason our son is alive.”
“We are the reason,” he corrected gently. “You came with me. You risked everything.”
Silence settled—warm, easy. Then Casimir spoke again, careful.
“I received word from Lysara today. Your uncle Aldous has been arrested for murder and treason. The Council demands a trial. They ask you to return to testify—and possibly to claim your throne.”
I absorbed it. “And if I go?”
“Then I go with you. We see justice done together. Then we come home.” He paused. “Unless you want to stay. To rule.”
I shook my head. “Lysara stopped being home years ago. My home is here—with you, with Ari. Let the Council choose a new ruler. I want peace.”
“Then peace is what you’ll have,” he promised.
Two weeks later we traveled to Lysara—Casimir, Ari (vibrant, marveling at everything on his first journey beyond Vespera), and me.
The trial of King Aldous Ardent was held in the grand hall where my father once sat. The same hall where Aldous had poisoned him seventeen years ago.
The evidence was overwhelming: servants’ confessions, physicians’ testimony, documents charting a conspiracy that spanned decades.
Aldous sat in chains, his wife and son already exiled. Without the throne, he looked small.
When I testified, my voice was steady. I told of my father’s murder, my brother’s assassination, the years of exile, the threats against my child.
The Council listened in horrified silence.
The verdict was unanimous: guilty of regicide, murder, conspiracy, treason. The sentence—execution at dawn.
I rose before they could formalize it. “I request clemency.”
Shocked gasps rippled through the hall. Aldous looked up, disbelieving.
“Not for his sake,” I said. “For mine. I will not let hatred define my life. He has already lost everything—throne, power, family honor. Let that be his punishment. Exile him to a monastery. Let him spend what remains in prayer and penance.”
The Council debated, then agreed. Aldous was sentenced to life in a remote mountain monastery.
As the guards led him away, he looked at me. For a heartbeat, something like shame crossed his face. Then he was gone.
“That was merciful,” Casimir said quietly.
“It was freedom,” I replied. “For me. I won’t carry that darkness anymore.”
The Council offered me the crown. I declined, recommending a cousin who had governed his province well. Two days later, Lysara had a new king.
We returned to Vespera to celebration. The streets flooded with voices, cheering their king, their princess, their miracle prince. Ari waved from the carriage, delighted. Casimir and I waved too—mostly we looked at each other.
That evening, after Ari was asleep, Casimir came to my chambers. He’d been distant all day—nervous.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“Nothing is wrong. Something is…” He drew a breath. “Will you come with me?”
He led me to Ari’s room. Our son slept peacefully, moonlight across his bed. Color in his cheeks. Breath even and strong.
Casimir knelt beside the bed and gestured for me to join him.
I did—confused, trusting.
He turned to me, took both my hands, and spoke in a voice that shook.
“Selene Ardent, seven years ago you gave me the best night of my life—under lantern light in a garden. Six years ago you gave me a son you raised alone with a courage I cannot fathom. These past months you’ve given me a reason to be more than a king. You’ve given me a family.” His eyes shone. “I love you. I have loved you since that first night. And I want to spend every day proving it.”
He drew out a ring—a simple silver band set with an emerald the exact shade of the ribbon we still carried.
“Will you marry me? Truly marry me—not for politics or duty, but because we choose each other? Will you be my wife, my queen, my partner in all things?”