Daughter of Tide and Illusion

Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Lyv's smile widened as she jumped up from the dock's edge and rushed for him. As soon as her arms were around him, Gideon's secured around her, too, as he pressed his face into the crook of her neck to breath her in. Gods above, did she miss him.

"What are you doing here?" she asked, laughing. "Not that I wasn't anticipating it, but still. It's been too long..."

"It's been over six months now, Lyv," he told her, his tone sharp. "Six months and no word from you other than from what Bridget and Alberich tell us."

"Gideon," she said slowly, pulling back to look at him.

He looked mad. Pissed. But he was still holding her close as he couldn't believe she was actually there. His eyes searched her face, looking for any signs of her being hurt. He wouldn't see anything, though, because she wasn't.

And he had a right to be mad, especially when she sent him off after a month in Asturia with her. Part of that reason had been to send him back to Jai, but the other...

At the time, she was still trying to make sense of everything, learning as much as she could about Bridget and Alberich, and working on her magic. The week before she sent him off was the start of her finding out there was so much more to their world than she'd realized...which included her curiosity of the female locked up in the dungeon cell beside Guinevere.

"You're mad at me, aren't you?"

"Of course, I am, Lyv," Gideon argued. "Mother above, you don't just disappear to a foreign land without letting us know."

"But you apparently knew since you're here."

"Because your parents told us. And we actually just got here this morning. We were going to head up to Filwey since that's where your last message home came from."

"I actually wasn't in Filwey, but a village just to the south of the lake that borders it..."

He let out a frustrated sigh as he closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Honestly. I would have come with you. I'm oath-sworn to you and, even though you stopped writing to him as well, Jai would have let me take leave from his guard just to make sure you were all right..."

Lyv swallowed hard at the mention of Jai. "I needed to do this myself, Gideon. I needed time to sort through everything, especially with what happened in Asturia with Guinevere, Destan dying, and the truth about Jai. And I had to find someone here." She shook her head. "We were planning on coming home in a few weeks, though. We had a few more places to go before we did, but Elys..."

The name had him furrowing his eyebrows in confusion. "Who's Elys?"

And at the question, small, pounding bootsteps started running down the length of the dock toward them. When Gideon turned, letting go of his hold on Lyv, he was finally able to see the little boy who had made his own place in her heart. Posy, who had been on Elys's shoulder, jumped into the air and flew toward Gideon in excitement when she recognized him. She didn't stop until she landed on his shoulder, excitedly hugging and kissing his cheek.

Elys was still grinning when he reached them and Lyv opened her arms right as he launched himself at her. She couldn't help but laugh at his excitement of being right. She did find Gideon in Ajolak, just as he'd seen.

Gideon's eyes were wide when he looked at the little boy in her arms, who she moved to prop on her hip. He was taking in the scars all over him and, most specifically, the one that cut across his right eye.