CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
The Prince Who Ran
They left Thornhaven on a morning bright with spring sunlight.
Half the city seemed to have turned out to see them off—a gathering that would have been unthinkable a year ago, when they'd arrived as anonymous strangers seeking a place to disappear. Now they were leaving as friends, as neighbors, as the prince and his mysterious wife who had somehow become part of Thornhaven's strange, tight-knit community.
Helga pressed a package of provisions into Nera's hands. "For the road. My best traveling bread—it'll keep for weeks."
"Thank you, Helga. For everything."
"Don't thank me. Just come back." The dwarf's gruff voice softened. "This city's gotten used to you two. Be a shame to lose you to some fancy southern palace."
"We'll be back," Orion promised. "This is home now."
"See that you remember that."
Crag offered a brief nod and a handshake that said more than words. Thordak had completed their commemorative weapons early—a matched pair of daggers, beautifully forged, with the Thornhaven frost-and-mountain emblem worked into the pommels.
"Something to remember us by," the dwarf blacksmith said. "And something to stick in anyone who gives you trouble down south."
Sanna was the hardest farewell. The girl clung to Nera's waist, tears streaming down her face.
"You promised you'd come back," she said. "You promise."
Nera knelt—human-sized, as she had been since the messenger arrived—and cupped the girl's face in her hands. "I promise, and I meant it. We'll come back, Sanna. And when we do, I'll have so many stories to tell you."
"About the palace? And the king?"
"About everything. I'll tell you everything." She kissed the girl's forehead. "Now be good. Take care of the flowers while I'm gone?"
"I will. I'll sing to them every night."
"That's my girl."
They mounted the horses that Aldwin had arranged—good northern breeds, sturdy enough for the Frostmarch and fast enough for the southern roads. The messenger would travel with them as far as the first major city, then return to report their coming.
Orion looked back one last time as they rode through the Lower Gate. Thornhaven rose behind them, carved into its frozen cliff, steam rising from a dozen vents, improbable and beautiful and utterly, completely theirs.
"We'll be back," he said quietly.
Nera reached over and squeezed his hand. "We'll be back," she agreed.
Then they turned south, toward the Frostmarch and the kingdom that waited beyond.
* * *
The Frostmarch was easier going south than it had been coming north.
Spring had opened the passes, melting the worst of the snow and revealing paths that had been buried for months. The journey that had nearly killed them two years ago was now merely difficult—cold and treacherous, but manageable with proper preparation and daylight hours that grew longer with each passing day.
It was during the crossing, huddled together in a mountain shelter while wind howled outside, that Nera finally asked the question she'd been holding back.
"Tell me," she said. "Everything. About your family, your kingdom, why you left. I need to understand what we're walking into."
Orion stared into the fire for a long moment. When he spoke, his voice was distant—reaching back across years and miles to a life he'd tried to bury.
"Valdris is old," he began. "One of the oldest human kingdoms, founded before most of the current nations existed. We trace our lineage back eighteen generations—nearly a thousand years of unbroken rule."
"That's impressive. For humans."
"For anyone, really. Most dynasties last a few centuries at best before they're overthrown or die out." He shifted, pulling his cloak tighter. "My father is King Aldric the Third. He's ruled for forty years—took the throne young, when his own father died in a border skirmish. He's... a good king. Harsh when he needs to be, but fair. The kingdom has prospered under him."
"And your mother?"
"Queen Margret. She died when I was twelve." His voice softened. "She was the gentle one. Father handled the kingdom; Mother handled us. When she passed, everything got... harder."
"I'm sorry."
"It was a long time ago." But the old grief was still there, buried deep. "After she died, Father threw himself into preparing us for our roles. Marcus for the throne. Helena for a political marriage—she was promised to the Crown Prince of Thessmar before she turned fifteen. Darius for the military. And me..."
"The spare."
"The flexible asset." Bitterness crept into his tone. "That's what the advisors called me. Useful for whatever opportunity arose. A second son to trade for alliance, a backup heir in case Marcus died, a piece to be moved wherever the board required."
"That sounds lonely."
"It was." He met her eyes across the fire. "Marcus always knew his purpose. Helena had her duty, even if she hated it. Darius found meaning in command. But I was never anything in my own right—always defined by what I might become, what I might be needed for."
Nera moved closer, pressing against his side. She was warm and solid in her human form, a comfort he hadn't known he needed.
"What about Elara?" she asked.
"Elara came late—a surprise, Mother called her. The last gift." A genuine smile crossed his face. "She was ten when I left. Bright, curious, always following me around asking questions. She was the only one I regretted leaving."
"Not your father?"
"I regretted hurting him. But I didn't regret leaving him. There's a difference." He sighed. "Father loved us in his way, but his way was... demanding. Everything was about the kingdom, the legacy, the family honor. Individual happiness didn't factor into his calculations."
"Until now, apparently."
"People change. Maybe losing a son taught him something." Orion shook his head. "Or maybe he just got old enough to see past his own ambitions. I don't know. I haven't spoken to him in almost a decade."
"What made you leave? The final moment, I mean."
The question hung in the air. Outside, the wind continued its assault on the shelter, but inside, everything was still.
"They found a match for me," Orion said finally. "A princess from the Eastern Reach. Young, wealthy, strategically valuable. The negotiations had been going on for months without my knowledge. One day, Father simply summoned me and informed me that I would be married within the year."
"Without asking you."
"Without even pretending to ask. It was presented as a fait accompli—a done deal, my opinion irrelevant." His hands clenched in his lap. "I'd spent my whole life being moved around like a game piece. But that moment... that was when I realized it would never stop. I would never be allowed to choose my own path. My entire existence would be determined by what was useful to the kingdom."
"So you ran."
"I ran." He laughed humorlessly. "Left in the night, like a thief. Took nothing but my sword and the clothes on my back. I had some money saved—enough to get far away, to start over. I became an adventurer because it was the opposite of everything I'd been raised to be. No politics, no alliances, no marriages arranged by committee. Just me, my skills, and the freedom to go wherever I wanted."
"And eventually, you ended up dying in a forest."
"The romantic conclusion to my rebellion, yes." But he was smiling now, the old bitterness fading. "And then a fairy saved my life and made me the happiest man alive. So perhaps it all worked out."
"Perhaps it did." Nera kissed his cheek. "Thank you for telling me."
"You needed to know. If we're walking into this together, you deserve to understand the history."
"I understand. And for what it's worth..." She pulled back to look at him properly. "I'm glad you ran. If you hadn't, we never would have met."
"The universe has strange ways of working out."
"Doesn't it?"
They sat together as the fire burned low, two runaways from different worlds, preparing to face the past that one of them had fled.
* * *
The days turned into weeks as they traveled south.
Nera maintained her human form throughout—a conscious choice that Orion questioned only once.
"You don't have to stay like this," he said as they rode through a mountain valley, three weeks into their journey. "I know it's not your natural state."
"It's fine." But she shifted slightly in her saddle, a movement that suggested discomfort. "If I'm going to meet your family as your wife, I should look the part. Showing up as a pixie might send the wrong message."
"The wrong message?"
"That I'm not... substantial. Real." She grimaced. "Human nobility values presence. Stature. A tiny glowing creature on your shoulder would be seen as a curiosity, not a princess."
"You're more than a curiosity in any form."
"I know that. You know that. But your family doesn't know me at all. First impressions matter." She managed a smile. "Besides, it's good practice. I can't exactly flutter around the palace as a pixie without raising questions we don't want to answer."
"Are you sure you're alright? Being human-sized this long?"
"It's... different." She considered the question seriously. "I feel heavier. More grounded. The world seems smaller somehow, even though I know it's the same." A pause. "But it's not unpleasant. Just unfamiliar."
"You could change when we're alone. At night, in private."
"Maybe sometimes." She reached over and squeezed his hand. "But I want to get used to this. To being your human wife, with all that entails. It's part of who we're going to be for the next year or more."
"You're doing this for me."
"I'm doing this for us." Her eyes met his, warm and steady. "We're in this together, remember? Your world, my world—it's all our world now."
He raised her hand to his lips and kissed it. "Have I mentioned lately that I love you?"
"Not since breakfast. I was starting to worry."
"I love you."
"I know." She grinned. "Say it again anyway."
"I love you, Nera Stargrass. Wife of a runaway prince, queen of nothing in particular, most stubborn woman I've ever met."
"That's better." She laughed, and the sound echoed off the mountain walls. "Now come on. Aldwin says we'll reach the lowlands by tomorrow. I want to see what your kingdom looks like when it's not covered in snow."
They rode on, descending from the frozen heights toward the green lands below.
* * *
The lowlands were a revelation.
After months in Thornhaven's eternal winter, the sight of actual grass—green, growing, alive—made Nera gasp with delight. She dismounted at the first meadow they reached and simply stood in it, running her fingers through the blades, her face alight with joy.
"It's so GREEN," she said. "I'd forgotten how green things could be."
"You grew impossible flowers in frozen ground."
"That's different. That's magic. This is just... life. Growing naturally, without anyone having to coax it." She knelt, pressing her palm to the earth. "I can feel it. The vitality. It's everywhere."
Orion watched her with quiet pleasure. This was a side of Nera he rarely saw—the ancient nature spirit, connected to the living world in ways he could never fully understand. In Thornhaven, she'd been magnificent but constrained, working against the environment rather than with it. Here, in the green and growing south, she seemed to come alive in a different way.
"We should keep moving," Aldwin said apologetically. "We're still weeks from Valdris."
"A moment more." Nera closed her eyes, breathing deeply. When she opened them again, something had shifted in her expression—a settling, a grounding. "Okay. I'm ready."
She mounted her horse with new energy, and they continued south.
The landscape changed as they traveled—mountains giving way to hills, hills to plains, plains to the cultivated farmland that marked the approach to major civilization. They passed through villages and towns, staying at inns when available, camping when not.
Aldwin had been instructed to be discreet, so they traveled as ordinary merchants rather than royal visitors. It was easier, Orion found, to move without the weight of his title. Easier, and strangely nostalgic—this was how he'd traveled for years, anonymous and free.
"You seem more relaxed," Nera observed one evening, as they shared a meal at a roadside tavern. "More like yourself."
"This is how I lived. Before Silverbrook, before everything. Just a wanderer with a sword and no obligations."
"Do you miss it?"
"Sometimes." He considered the question. "The simplicity of it. The freedom. But I wouldn't go back. What I have now is better."
"Even with the complications?"
"Especially with the complications." He smiled at her. "Complications mean you have something worth complicating."
"That's surprisingly philosophical."
"I have my moments."
"Rare ones."
"Quality over quantity."
She laughed, and the other patrons glanced their way—drawn by the sound, by the obvious warmth between them. Just a young couple in love, traveling south for reasons unknown. Nothing special.
If only they knew.
* * *
Two months into the journey, they began to see the signs.
Banners in different colors flying from estates and manor houses. Groups of soldiers wearing varied livery. Conversations in taverns that fell silent when strangers entered.
"The succession," Aldwin explained quietly. "It's gotten worse since I left to find you. Prince Marcus has the support of the old nobility. Princess Helena has the merchant guilds. Prince Darius has the military. They're not fighting—not yet—but the kingdom is choosing sides."
"And my father allows this?"
"The King is... diminished. His health has been failing. He still rules, but his grip is less firm than it was." Aldwin looked uncomfortable. "There are those who say he should name an heir and be done with it. Others say he's waiting for something."
"Waiting for what?"
"No one knows, Your—" He caught himself. "Sir."
Nera and Orion exchanged glances. The political situation was more volatile than they'd expected. Walking into the capital might be walking into a powder keg.
"We could turn back," Nera said that night, when they were alone. "If it's too dangerous—"
"No." Orion's voice was firm. "My father asked to see me. Whatever else is happening, I won't let fear stop me from honoring that."
"Even if your siblings see you as a threat?"
"I'll make it clear I'm not interested in the throne. I never was."
"And if they don't believe you?"
"Then they don't believe me. But I have to try." He pulled her close, human-sized and warm against him. "I've spent almost a decade running from this family. Maybe it's time to face them properly. Show them who I actually am, instead of who they assumed I'd become."
"Who are you, then? Who do you want them to see?"
"A man who found his own path. Who built his own life. Who married for love, not politics." He kissed her forehead. "A man who doesn't want their throne, but does want their respect. If that's possible."
"It's possible." She traced his jaw with her fingertips. "You're a good man, Orion. They'll see that, if they're willing to look."
"And if they're not?"
"Then we go home to Thornhaven and never look back." Her voice was matter-of-fact. "We don't need them. We have each other, and we have the life we built. Everything else is optional."
He laughed—a sound of genuine relief. "You make it sound so simple."
"It is simple. Complicated, but simple." She smiled. "Now get some sleep. We have another long day tomorrow, and you need to rest that philosophical brain of yours."
"Yes, dear."
"That's better."
They slept wrapped around each other, while outside, the kingdom of Valdris drew ever closer—with all its politics, its tensions, and its uncertain welcome for the prince who had run away.
* * *
On the last night before they would reach the border, Orion found himself unable to sleep.
He stood outside their inn, staring south at a sky full of stars. Somewhere beyond the horizon, his father waited. His siblings waited. The life he'd fled waited, patient and inevitable.
"You're brooding again."
Nera appeared beside him, wrapped in a cloak against the cool night air. Even in the darkness, her green hair seemed to glow faintly—a reminder of what she truly was, beneath the human guise she wore.
"I'm contemplating."
"Same thing, different word." She slipped her arm through his. "Tell me."
"I'm afraid," he admitted. "Not of danger. Not of politics. I'm afraid of..."
"Of what?"
"Of who I'll be when I'm there." He struggled to articulate it. "For years, I've been Orion the adventurer. Orion the husband. Orion who builds his own life. But the moment I step into that palace, I become Prince Orion again. The fourth son. The one who ran."
"You don't have to become anything. You can be who you are, regardless of where you are."
"Can I? That place... it has a way of shaping people. Of pressing them into molds whether they want it or not." He shook his head. "What if I go back and become the person I was running from?"
Nera was quiet for a moment. Then she stepped in front of him, taking both his hands, making him look at her.
"Listen to me," she said. "I am over a thousand years old. I ruled a realm that spans dimensions. I have seen empires rise and fall, watched civilizations bloom and wither. And in all that time, I have never met anyone more stubbornly, immovably himself than you."
"Nera—"
"I'm not finished." Her eyes held his, ancient and certain. "You are not a mold that can be reshaped by a palace. You are not clay that can be pressed into a prince. You are Orion—the man who chose his own path, who saved my life with a wish, who built a home in a frozen city and faced down a commander of the fairy realm without flinching."
"That's a lot of adjectives."
"You deserve a lot of adjectives." She squeezed his hands. "No palace can change who you are. No family can unmake what you've become. You will walk in there as yourself, and you will walk out as yourself, and anyone who can't see your worth doesn't deserve your worry."
He stared at her—this impossible woman, this ancient queen, this partner who believed in him with a ferocity that took his breath away.
"What did I do to deserve you?" he asked.
"You wished for someone to share your life with." She smiled. "And I answered. That's all there is to it."
"That's everything."
"Yes." She rose on her toes and kissed him. "It is."
They stood together under the stars, on the border of his past and their future.
Tomorrow, they would enter Valdris.
Tomorrow, the prince who ran would finally come home.
But tonight, he was simply Orion—husband, adventurer, survivor. A man who had found his own path and the woman who walked it beside him.
And that, he was beginning to understand, was more than enough.
— End of Chapter Twenty-Three —