Sewn & Scarred (The Fated Creations Trilogy #3)

Chapter Fifty-ThreeEvaline

Chapter Fifty-Three

Evaline

T he pain in my wrists was gone but the pain in my chest was profound as I kneeled down on Maddox’s other side and we both watched as Wyott wailed into Cora, as she dropped tears of her own into his hair.

I threw up a shield of Air around the lot of us, not wanting the Vasi to overhear any of this.

I shook my head and tried to think back to everything I knew about Broderick and every interaction we’d ever had.

He’d never mentioned that he was once a Kova, let alone that he was Wyott’s father and Kovarrin’s best friend. But it wasn’t as if we’d spent time getting to know one another.

But I remembered the moment I’d first seen him. When I’d known he seemed familiar but couldn’t place where I knew him from.

Now, I felt so stupid. How had I not noticed?

And, he was still back there. Gods knew what Vasier would do to him now that we’d gotten away. Vasier had already been treating him differently since Broderick hadn’t noticed I’d taken his dagger and taken Maeve’s blood—

I looked up to see Sage standing beside Dean, staring at us with wide eyes, and knew she hadn’t known Wyott’s relation to her father’s right-hand man, either.

“Sage!” I said, rising to my feet and running for her. “You have to take me back.”

Maddox was at my side in a breath. “What are you talking about?” he asked and I could hear the fear in his voice. “You can’t go back there.”

I shook my head, tears falling as I looked up at him. “I left her behind! I promised I wouldn’t, I promised I’d bring her back with me!”

He shook his head. “Who, sweetheart? Who is Maeve?”

“She’s one of his humans, she helped me get my magic back, and Vasier knew.” Sage gasped beside me but I was struggling to look at him, to see past the tears. “He promised if I didn’t cooperate that he’d turn her, that he’d lock her up in a dungeon, and torture her.” I looked to Sage. “You have to take me back, I can’t leave her back there.”

Maddox grabbed my hand and pulled me back. “You cannot go back there, Evaline, and we cannot ask Sage to take that risk again.”

Wyott stood and was beside us in a moment.

“Yes!” he said, clearing his throat and tears. “Sage, please. You can bring my father back here, and we can bring him back to us.” Wyott put his hand on Maddox’s shoulder. “We helped you come back, we can help him, too!”

Maddox opened his mouth but it was Cora at Wyott’s side telling him what Maddox had already told me.

There was no going back. There was no saving them.

I squeezed my eyes shut and willed the tears to stop. The guilt still wrenched through me, but I knew they were right. At this moment, there was nothing we could do. I just had to pray to the Gods that Vasier was more occupied with my escape, with his daughter’s betrayal, than his intent to follow through on his threat.

And when his words came back to me, his assurance that he always fulfilled his threats, I forced them away.

I looked up at Wyott, grabbed his arm.

“We will get them, someday.” His brows furrowed and I watched hope fill his eyes. “It may not be today, and it may not be through Sage’s portals, but we’ll get them back. We’ll get him back. War is still coming, and when we win, we will get them back.”

I didn’t care if I had to storm the castle myself, find her in the dungeon. I didn’t care if we had to search each and every Vasi on the battlefield to find Broderick. We would do whatever we needed to save them.

Wyott nodded and I knew that he wanted to believe me, to believe we had a chance to bring his father back, and I hoped I would be proven right.

I knew the pain of that loss, and if I could bring my father back, I would.

“I will help in any way I can,” Sage said, stepping forward. But as she did so her eyes widened and we watched as her legs buckled and she collapsed. Dean caught her, eyes wild with worry, and shook her gently.

“Sage?” he pleaded. “Sage, what’s wrong?”

She immediately came to, and shook her head, wiping a hand down her face and straightening, though she still didn’t seem able to stand on her own.

“Nothing I—” she took a deep breath. “I’ve never taken that many people through a portal at once. And fighting the compulsion,” she swallowed. “It was taxing on my magic.”

“You need rest,” Dean urged, and Rasa stepped forward.

“You all need rest,” she said, and her worried eyes fell to the blood that soaked my arms, down the front of my dress. Then to Wyott, who stood but still curled down into Cora beside him, her arms wrapped around his frame.

Cora nodded. “Let’s go back home, Wyott,” she said softly. “Let’s get you inside.”

He didn’t respond in the form of words, only a nod where his face was pressed against her neck, and she started to shuffle them away, throwing a sad look back to the rest of us.

I felt so sorry for my friends, my family. This moment was supposed to be a happy reunion, but instead trauma had followed us through the portal.

But that reminded me of the most important reunion, to me, right now.

As if Maddox and I thought of the same thing, at the same moment, we looked to each other.

And though the pain and guilt and sorrow was clear on his face, it started to fall away. I let the grief over Maeve go, at least for now, and looked up at him. At my mate, at the man I’d been told I’d never see again, here, with me.

Despite his parents who loomed behind him, and Sage and Dean and Charlotte behind me, a smile broke out on my face as we reached for each other.

As we grasped at each other, as his hands held my face, and mine grasped at his shoulders, and he kissed me.

I heard the others begin to leave, to give us privacy, but it didn’t matter. Because it wasn’t a second into the kiss before Maddox dipped to pull my legs out from under me, until he was sprinting for home.