Your Shadow Is My Light

Chapter 48 - Your shadow is my light.

Normal text
Thinking
Onomatopoeia

Rayne's POV
The first thing I noticed when I woke up was the cold.

Not the winter kind—I've had enough of that to last three lifetimes—but the quiet kind. The kind that slips in during the early hours, before the sun has fully claimed the sky. The kind I haven't felt in ages... not since I started waking up beside Ahri.

Her warmth was gone.

My hand slid across the sheets, brushing over nothing but cool linen where her body should've been. No silky tails sprawled across my legs, no sleepy murmur when I shifted. Just empty space and the faint, lingering trace of her scent.

I pushed myself upright, blinking against the pale light seeping through the curtains. For the past two weeks, I'd been the one making sure she didn't overdo it. Yggdrasil's backlash had left her eyes tender—her vision blurred, every glint of light cutting like glass. Mrs Seria said it would be at least a month before they healed, and until then, Ahri wasn't supposed to strain herself.

Which meant I'd been doing... well, everything.

Meals. Baths. Walking her from room to room. Dressing her like the spoiled little princess she secretly is.

Not that I minded.

But now?

She wasn't here.

"Ahri?" I called, my voice still gravelly with sleep.

Silence.

A slow, unwelcome tension coiled in my chest. She knew better than to wander without me—especially in the mornings, when her sight was at its worst.

The blankets slipped from my shoulders as I swung my legs out of bed, the cold floor biting at my bare feet. I snatched my coat from the chair and headed for the door, mentally running through the list of places she could have gone. The kitchen. The sitting room.

Gods forbid... outside.

If she had, I'd be dragging her back in and cocooning her in blankets until she learnt her lesson.

I stepped out into the courtyard, the faint bite of morning air sharp enough to strip away the last haze of sleep.

Ashborn's castle loomed around me—its once-imposing towers still marred by cracks, scorch marks, and jagged holes punched clean through the stone. The war had left it half-ruin, half-monument, but little by little, it was being stitched back together. Fresh mortar sealed splintered walls, new obsidian replaced crumbled battlements, and the air smelled faintly of cut timber and wet plaster.

It wasn't glamorous. But it was home—for now.

As I crossed the main walkway, shadow soldiers and living citizens moved with purpose, hammers clanging somewhere in the distance while scaffolding creaked against the outer walls. Every day, another scar vanished, another gap closed.

They paused as I passed, offering bows or quick nods.

"Good morning, Your Grace," one of the masons called, leaning on his trowel, "out to find Her Highness again?"

I huffed, rubbing the back of my neck, "Yeah. She gave you the slip too?"

He chuckled knowingly, "Saw her heading towards the marketplace not too long ago."

Figures.

I thanked him and kept walking, boots crunching over frost-dusted stone.

It wasn't the first time I'd gone chasing her—Ahri had never been one to sit still, and being coddled drove her half mad.