The Return

Kael stood frozen, the weight of years pressing against his chest. Before him, bathed in the silver glow of the mist, stood Seraphine—alive.

Her hair, once a cascade of moonlight, was tangled and unkempt. Her celestial robes, now tattered, clung to a body marked by time and suffering. But her eyes… they had not changed. They still carried the same fierce love, the same unshaken determination.

“Where is she?” Seraphine whispered, voice raw.

Kael clenched his fists. His throat tightened as he forced himself to breathe. “She’s scared,” he admitted, his voice barely above a growl. “She doesn’t understand. She only knows I raised her. That I protected her. She doesn’t know you.”

Seraphine flinched. A mother unknown to her child.

“I never wanted this,” she said. “I never wanted to leave her. I fought—”

“You died,” Kael interrupted, his golden eyes burning. “I watched Eldoria fall, Seraphine. I held our daughter while you vanished into the flames.”

A rustle behind Vareth caught their attention. The great dragon shifted his massive frame, his golden gaze flickering toward the child trembling beneath his wing.

Ash.

Small, fragile, her tiny hands gripping the dragon’s scales like a lifeline. She was curled into herself, heart pounding, her dark curls hiding her face.

Seraphine took a step forward, but Kael’s hand shot out. “No.”

Seraphine’s breath hitched. “Kael—”

“She doesn’t want to hear you,” Kael said, his voice like steel. “Not yet.”

Vareth exhaled, his great wings shielding the child further.

Seraphine swallowed the ache in her chest.

A mother returned.

A daughter who did not recognize her.

And a father caught between them.