Caer Valoria

he ocean moved without hurry and without end, folding itself upon the western shore in long white reaches that hissed over the sand before sliding back around black rock and drift-polished timber.

Salt lived in the air. Gulls wheeled overhead in sharp, quarrelsome arcs, and beyond them the waters of the western world stretched bright and immense beneath the morning sun, as though Aranthor itself had simply run out of land and yielded to light.

Behind the shore, Caer Valoria rose in pale magnificence. It did not cling to the island so much as crown it. White walls climbed the island in vast ascending tiers, broken by towers, domes, and silver falls that descended toward the harbor below. Sails crowded the water in such numbers that even the largest ships seemed small. Even Caerhaven, proud as it was, seemed almost intimate beside this.

Vrsalovich walked the wet edge of the shore with Dayna lumbering easily beside him.

The blue drake kept close to the line of surf, vast foreclaws sinking into the darkened sand as she moved. Her wings remained folded along her flanks, the leather of her harness shifting with the easy roll of her shoulders. Above them, gulls circled over the surf, her golden eyes tracking their flight.

Fittz drifted beside Vrsalovich without ever touching the ground.

The fae paladin’s blonde hair shifted in the sea wind, framing features that might have seemed delicate were it not for the steadiness in her eyes. She floated high enough that her gaze naturally fell toward him when she spoke, moving above broken shells, stones, and driftwood without altering her course. Light played through the translucent wings unfurled behind her, their delicate structure traced in the ocean sunlight. Her armor, rich purple worked through with gold, bore the unmistakable hand of Caer Valoria’s finest craft: fitted plates with elegant lines, bright trim, and a radiant starburst worked across the breast. She moved without sway or wasted motion, every part of her held in quiet control.

“No, nothing from the eastern routes, sir. The southern passages remain open, and the outer islands have sent no troubling word.” Fittz pulled her fingers down one by one as she continued. “There has been no unusual sickness, no disappearances, and no signs of corruption along the coast.”

Vrsalovich stepped around a length of driftwood half buried in the sand. Fittz passed above it without noticing. The wind shifted around them. He regarded her without speaking at once, taking in not only the report but the ease of her posture, the steadiness of her wings, the clarity of her eyes.

“And the villages north of the harbor?” he asked.

“All quiet, my king.”

“The watchtowers? The fisheries?”

“Still complaining about tariffs and gulls.” The hovering fae allowed herself the faintest suggestion of a smile. “And one another.”

Another wave rolled farther up the beach. Dayna had wandered close enough to the water that the foam curled around one foreclaw. She gave a low sound, more breath than rumble, and immediately drew the foot back. Sand clung wet between the scales around her claws.

Fittz glanced toward her, and the smile deepened for half a heartbeat. “She still disapproves of the ocean.”

“The sand, more than anything else. Gets between the claws.”

Dayna took several more steps along the shore, then stopped. Her head lowered toward the offending sand.

A moment later she opened her wings.

The first beat sent loose grains skittering across the beach. The second lifted her clear of the waterline, and with several heavy strokes she climbed above them, turned once over the surf, and continued along the coast from the air.

Fittz watched her go before looking back to Vrsalovich. “Whatever brought you west, it hasn’t reached us.”

They continued down the beach. Vrsalovich had heard what mattered. No strain colored Fittz’s voice. No darkness threaded beneath the Light around her. No subtle wrongness touched her face, her stance, or the familiar Light within her.

The knowledge loosened something in him, though only by a degree. His gaze drifted past her to the city again. From this farther stretch of shore, the upper walls appeared almost stacked against the sky. Down at the harbor, sails flashed white as they turned in and out among the piers. The kingdom behind her looked as it should have looked: immense, prosperous, untroubled. It was true: whatever had happened elsewhere, it had not happened here. Fittz’s Light burned clear and strong.

“It’s still so beautiful here,” Vrsalovich said.

Fittz lowered slightly as she moved beside him, not enough to touch the sand, only enough to show the words had mattered. “I can double the northern patrols if you wish?”

“No need,” Vrsalovich said, his voice drifting. “No need.”

They walked on. For several moments there was only the hiss of the sea beside them and the soft grind of Vrsalovich’s boots through the wet sand. Fittz moved beside him in silence, still floating easily above the shore.

A shadow swept over them. The sunlight disappeared for little more than a heartbeat. Both looked up.

Dayna circled high above the beach, moving in a slow, lazy turn over the water. Her blue wings held steady against the morning sky as she passed overhead and continued along the shoreline.

The formal quiet settled between them again before she looked at him more directly. She had been too long in his service to miss what lay beneath the shape of the visit itself, and too well trained to name it carelessly.

“You could have sent for a report,” she said.

“Mm.”

Nothing in his tone invited the conversation further, but neither was it cold. Fittz studied him with the careful intelligence he remembered from her youth, when she had learned that the safest way to question him was often to ask only once and listen to what he chose not to say.

“If I may ask,” she said, her toe dipping briefly into the sand before lifting again. “Why are you here?”

Vrsalovich stopped. Fittz continued another pace before realizing he was no longer beside her. She slowed in the air and turned back toward him.

“A report would... not have been enough.”

“Sir?”

He crossed the short distance between them and rested a hand against her forearm. At the touch, Fittz descended. Her boots settled into the wet sand. When she lifted her eyes again, she was looking up at him for the first time since he had arrived.

Vrsalovich spoke quieter now, just above the waves.

“Days ago, I could sense five of my children.” His voice lowered. “Now I can only find four.”

Fittz went still. The wind moved again, catching in the pale strands of her hair and in the long purple cloth at her hips. Behind her, Caer Valoria shone vast and immaculate, but Vrsalovich’s thoughts were already divided across the breadth of Aranthor. The fifth had not vanished so much as broken its shape. Something remained, spread too thin and wide for him to find its center, and the absence refused the simplicity of death.

The fae watched his silence and chose her next words with care.

“And you don’t know which one,” Fittz said, searching his eyes. “That’s why you’re here.”

The king looked to the sea. “I have lost too many of you.”

Fittz closed her hands around his. “You raised us.”

Vrsalovich rested a hand against her shoulder.

Fittz squeezed the other before letting go. “Do you want me to leave and search with you? If I had to wager, it’s probably the new one. You know how he—”

Without warning, Vrsalovich turned east.

A rush of air struck the beach.

Dayna came down beside him a heartbeat later. Her hind claws hit first, then her foreclaws, as her great wings beat once against the shore before folding tight along her sides. She had landed close enough that the displaced air sent Fittz’s pale hair whipping across her face.

Neither the king nor his drake looked at the other. Both were staring toward the same distant horizon.

For days, the altered Light had no location. But now, thin as a thread drawn through fog, something answered from far away. The presence remained faint and incomplete, little more than a spark catching beneath ash, but suddenly it had direction.

When Vrsalovich turned back to her, the king had returned.

“Maintain your watch,” he said. “If anything changes in Valoria, however small, word goes to Luminar immediately.”

Fittz straightened, her wings drawing still behind her. “Yes, sir.”

“No delay. No second-guessing.”

“There will be none.”

Vrsalovich stepped toward Dayna. The drake lowered one shoulder in silent readiness, harness creaking softly as she shifted to receive him.

Fittz dropped to one knee in the wet sand. “My liege.”

“Keep Valoria safe,” he said. “You are the Western Light.”

The paladin bowed her head. “With my life.”

He mounted, and Dayna straightened beneath him, vast wings opening into the sea wind.

The first downbeat threw sand and spray in a rushing burst across the beach. The second lifted them cleanly from the shore, and suddenly the western kingdom fell away beneath them: Fittz small in purple and gold upon the sand, the surf breaking bright around her; beyond her the terraced magnificence of Caer Valoria, all towers, banners, and sunstruck stone set against the brilliance of sea and sky.

Dayna climbed with easy power, banking out over the water, and gave a low rumble beneath him. Vrsalovich felt the distant spark once more, and his hand settled against her neck.

“To Caerhaven.”