Wind Wielder

Chapter 20 - Dawn

Zara shut her eyes against it all, blocking it out and squeezing his hand tight in the darkness until her feet landed on solid ground, and Azriels hand physically evaporated from her grip.

Zara took an extra moment, steadying herself before she opened her eyes, breathing deeply through her nose, inhaling the wondrous scents of morning glories and fresh air.

Home.

The world seemed to slow down, every detail magnified and vibrant as Zara looked around, taking in the wondrous golden sunstone. Steps and balconies and archways and verandas and bridges linked the towers and gilded domes of the palace, periwinkle morning glories climbing the pillars and neatly cut blocks of stone to drink in the gilded mists wafting by.

It was perfect, it was exactly as she remembered it would be.

Standing here just outside the palace gates, it was as if nothing had changed. As if it were merely just another late night out for Kazia and Zara in the city below.

Dawn court. Tytria. The city she thought she would never return to. The city where Kazia would never leave again.

Zara looked around for Azriel seeing he was nowhere to be found, until her eyes settled on the deep dark shadow Zara cast from the moonlight above, sensing him there. He dwelled in every pocket of shadow, darting ahead and behind her. Zara's winds seemed to sense his presence, seemed to follow him into the dark.

Zara turned and walked towards the city below, her footsteps utterly soundless as she willed the winds to hide all noise.

Zara waited for that sense of euphoria to come, to rush into her as she walked the deserted streets of her city. Zara recognized these streets, lined with red roofed buildings. It was all she had thought about in every waking moment, to be able to walk these streets again. To run through them, laughing and drunk and careless as she had mere months ago.

Zara blinked rapidly, her eyes narrowing as she tried to make sense of the growing pit of despair deep in her chest. Standing there in her blood covered dress in the dead of night, Zara felt like a wraith, slipping through these quiet empty streets. Like a ghost of the past, trapped there as the future moved on without her. Left behind.

Zara stood in the center most square of the city, soaking it all in. Her eyes lined the great sunstone fountain that stood proud in its center, the water that rushed out of it. Kazia and her had jumped in once, on a far too drunken evening. Zara walked further down the side street, seeing the patio just outside one of their favorite nightclubs. Her eyes trailed the railing that separated the patio from the street, its chairs all folded up and turned over for the night.

It was the place Dante had first kissed her.

Zara ran a hand over the lips she was biting, leaving it at her throat as a burning sensation formed behind her eyes.

Memories of a life that were no longer hers.

Zara's steps were quicker now, walking through the streets silently, her head stopping to turn at every street, every building. Zara waited for something to bring her joy, for any sight to bring back that feeling of freeness, of weightlessness. But the memories were crushing. Suffocating.

Zara was painfully aware of Azriel behind her, ahead of her, in every shadow nearby. Zara stopped as she came upon the garden, the monument that stood in its center.

It was a statue of a cloaked figure, midrun, their shoulders back and chin upright in glorious triumph. The cloak they wore streaked powerfully behind their back, as if a great wind blew it back. It had been erected years ago, after they were freed from under the mountain.