A Baron of Bonds (Conduit of Light #2)

83. Saelyn

Chapter 83

Saelyn

I barely noticed how far we trekked up the long, winding staircase that I had loved to run up and down as a child. Pah-Pah led the way, passing all the alcoves, the portraits, including the one of my parents, both Barons, both very obviously in love when it was painted just months before my father’s death.

I glanced as I always did at the portrait to meet his eyes, the same ocean blue as mine. His black, wavy hair was mine, his smile was mine. It had always been uncanny to me, looking at my own face in my father’s features.

We reached the top, entering the first door on the right as my mother addressed Pah-Pah.

“Thank you, Pompeii. Please begin to pack. I will help Saelyn with her things. Inform Talon and Ilyenna, we leave in the morning. Sae will want to tell Thevin, I’m sure.”

I watched Pah-Pah turn to leave me with my mother in the tallest tower, in the room she had told me she once occupied when she was first brought to Felgren, many years ago.

“Of course, Baron Karus.” He glanced at my frown, then looked back to her. “Let me know if you need anything more.”

My mother nodded without turning, knowing her Overseer left without needing to see him go.

She stood on the balcony that faced north, cut into the slanted wall of the room. She’d commissioned the balcony years ago, and it had become her usual place of dwelling, especially on moonless nights when she said she just wanted to see the stars.

I knew what she was really doing out here all those times. I knew my father had died in the northern forest and that she found comfort looking out over the spread of trees, seeing through the great shield of misty green power that protected us in Felgren.

Her stark white hair billowed in the storm’s arrival, as rain drops began to pelt on the stone landing where she stood.

“Why does Pah-Pah pack? Where are we going?”

I reached her side, and she brushed a hand over my head as she still gazed north. She inhaled, filling her lungs fully before slowly exhaling and finally turning to face me.

Her eyes, typically black, filled with the most brilliant emerald green I’d ever seen, and I smiled in awe of her beauty. “I wish my father could have been here, Mama. I wish he had been here to celebrate with us tonight. I wish he had not died, and I wish…” My voice trailed as I imagined what it would have been like to have a father to run to on this night, my heart broken by the friend I loved.

She grinned and leaned toward me. I caught her scent on the wind. Earth, pine, lavender. Her hand tucked my black wayward hair behind my ear.

“Saelyn, my Little Love, your father lives .” She lifted my chin as I frowned. “And our time has come to save him.”