Hello all!

I am so excited to share this chapter, and hear what you lovelies think of it. A long time in coming, as we move quickly towards the end of this story.

I hope you all enjoy!


Never Let Go


Stones clattered off the platforms that Mel and her companions walked, before falling over the edge into the star-studded darkness below.

"Be careful!" Nox called from below.

Mel only grunted in answer as she adjusted her hold on the rough stone grips. The staircase that was supposed to be here was so broken and covered with fallen rock that it was impossible to use, so Mel had been forced to resort to creative measures.

There were high healing tonics up there, left by whichever unfortunate being last was down here. They were near impossible to make and far too expensive to buy in the quantities Mel and her companions were needing. Thus, they were forced to raid the old hiding places within these thrice damned caves. So far they had found two other deposits of tonics, alongside wrapped bundles of what would have once been food.

Carefully she grabbed the sack of three tonics and braced her other arm on the edge of the dip of the wall, before slowly lowering the sack back down to the others.

"We have it, now come down before you fall." Gyendal snapped.

Mel rolled her eyes at the concern before starting her descent.

"You know, the more you say that, the more likely you'll jinx me-"

Mel should have just bit her tongue, for the moment those words left her lips the caves began to shake with the distant roaring of something powerful and angry. One of the many many demons to inhabit the depths of the fiery lakes that marked other areas of these caves. These tremors would come and go every once and a while, and it was just Mel's luck one would strike while she was holding onto the wall.

She felt the crack before she heard it, as the stone she held onto with her dominant hand shuddered before breaking clean off the cave wall with her still attached. Mel wasn't particularly proud of the yelp that escaped her as she was sent flying backwards, and in time to the alarmed shouts of her companions she fell the unpleasant distance to the ground.

"Mistress!" Yemite shrieked, rushing forward with a fluttering of bat-like wings.

Four faces all hovered over Mel, who stared wide eyed above her as she fought to suck in the breath that had been knocked completely out of her lungs.

The string of curses that escaped her when she gasped in for air could have turned the air blue, as Mel made the terrible decision to try and push herself upright with her landing hand.

Oh, hell.

Her wrist shrieked in agony, that Mel had to bite her cheek to keep from vocalizing. That was very broken.

"Are you okay?!" Nox demanded, looking surprisingly concerned.

"I'm fine." Mel gritted out, before ducking away from an outstretched hand. "But the first person to touch me isn't going to be."

There was a snort and a sigh, but the arm retracted and left Mel to stand to her feet without help. Carefully she tucked the damaged wrist and hand into her pocket, before looking around at those gathered.

"Let's go find somewhere to eat and recharge before the next leg of this." Mel said, straining to keep her voice normal.

She could feel Gyendal's eyes on her, but refused to turn and look. He'd see right through her, which would be extremely inconvenient.

Then, a soft hand settled on her arm and Uma spoke up.

"You three go ahead, I want to check to make sure Mel doesn't have any deep bruising from the fall that will make her too stiff to fight tomorrow. We'll catch up." The healer said, their other three companions reluctantly obeying.

The two of them waited for a few minutes while the others moved around the bend, before guiding Mel over to the bottom stair of the broken staircase.

"I can feel the heat of an injury from here, sit down and show me." Uma ordered, tone no-nonsense.

Mel grumbled under her breath at the order, but did as she was told and pulled her arm out to offer the wrist to Uma.

"Mel! Were you going to try and continue on with this? You can't hide something like this from me!" Uma scolded, the seriousness of her tone reminding Mel of a certain other healer.

She couldn't help the slight laugh that escaped her and she shook her head.

"Not from you, just from the others until I could get you alone. I don't need reprimands on my climbing technique. And you know full well I'd get that from Nox and Gyendal both." Mel snorted and rolled her eyes. "Those two need to work on their ego."

The comment made Uma giggle and she nodded.

As the healing magic began to settle below Mel's skin, she let out a sudden hiss of discomfort.

"Why is that burning more than usual?" She muttered under her breath before looking to Uma. "Are you using a different technique?"

Uma looked up at Mel in surprise and shook her head.

"No, but Gyendal said something similar to me when I healed him yesterday. Then I did the same healing on Nox and she said it felt the same. Perhaps your new magic is simply adjusting and impacting Gyendal even through the suppressed bond?"

Mel shrugged her other arm in answer.

"I guess that's possible. Speaking of the bond, I actually have kind of a strange question for you." Mel ventured. "You and Nox seem closer than average siblings, communicating without a word and somehow here when your presence makes no sense." Mel paused and gave the healer a once over. "And I'm not even going to touch on that weird matching glow. Are you fatebound too?"

The question seemed to surprise Uma, but she giggled at the comment about the glow.

"Bound? No no, we're close but we don't play that kind of role to the fates. Twins are linked in a different way in Aia, we can just understand each other without needing to speak, but it is nothing like what the fatebound have. Fatebound are close in a way no other being can understand. We're just close in a twin way, we have always been." Uma explained.

Mel nodded in understanding.

"You know, I've always wondered about you and Nox's childhood. No offense, but you're both strange. Not that being strange is bad, you're both great to travel with, it just intrigues me." Mel admitted, wincing again as Uma's magic probed deeper.

There was something intrinsically familiar about her magic, deeper than the healing qualities. Mel didn't understand it, but she somehow recognized it.

Uma was silent for a moment as she pondered Mel's question, and she started to think that the healer simply wasn't going to reply. Then Uma cleared her throat and began to speak.

"Our whole family is strange, especially our parents." Uma shot Mel a wicked smile before continuing, "Nox and I got into so much trouble as kids. We stay with our aunt and uncle whenever we want to, and the amount of rare magical items our family owns is kind of terrifying, to be honest. One time Nox and I got our hands on this amulet from around the time of Rhen Pendragon and…"

As Uma continued healing Mel's break, she regaled the dark mage with tales of the antics that Nox and her would get up to. Mel found herself in near stitches at some of them, and through fits of laughter admitted that the three of them would have gotten along famously outside of this orb fiasco.

Uma laughed and nodded, her eyes twinkling with some sort of secret she wasn't quite willing to share.

"Those are just a couple of the things we did. That's not even including all the chaos that Nox and I got up to with Sp-... with our brother." Uma seemed to catch herself on the name, but Mel was far more distracted by the latest revelation.

"You have a brother?" Mel asked in surprise.

Uma winced slightly, as if mad at her own slip-up before nodding.

"An older brother by two years. He'd kill us for coming over here like this." Uma admitted.

Mel stared in surprise at Uma before shrugging.

"Huh, I wasn't expecting that. Wouldn't mind being a fly on the wall for some of these antics though."

Uma giggled before lapsing into silence as she finished up the healing. It left Mel a few moments to ponder the conversation she had just had with Uma. There were so many mysteries around the twins, that left Mel imagining every possibility under the sun. It was nice to hear about their past, the reminder that no matter who these girls were, they came from a childhood and family just like everyone else.

"There we go, you're healed up." Uma announced, letting go of Mel's arm. "I checked for bruising while I was already in there and took care of it."

Experimentally Mel rolled her wrist around before grinning and nodding at Uma in appreciation.

"Hey, this feels better than it did before I fell, thanks!"

With that the two women rose to their feet and started down the path the rest of their companions had departed down. Just a blip in the face of this quest, but one Mel appreciated. The twins were so guarded, and it was nice to see Uma smiling so genuinely as she recalled playful memories.


Sparks crackled and popped in the air as their campfire burned cheerily on the side of their cliffside camp. Far below on the planes Mel could see the dim glow of the winding river of lava reflecting into the dull night of the Demon realm.

Uma and Nox had gone off in search for some of the rare Burnblooms that only came out in the night for a tonic Uma wanted to make, and Yemite had been dragged along with them for protection. Leaving Mel and Gyendal alone to guard camp and the wardstones placed all around it.

There was another crackle as Mel absently poked the fire with the butt of her staff, the metal unaffected by the flames.

"I've been pondering what will happen at the end of this chase for the staff." Gyendal said abruptly from where he sat across the fire, leaned back against a large boulder.

Mel looked up at him and nodded tiredly.

"Me too."

"We're like rats in a maze right now, running the race that Mordred set for us. We have only one chance to take him down, and we both know that we'll probably end up dead by the end." Gyendal said, his tone low.

The words left her with nothing more than a dull ache, not even enough impact to make her flinch any longer.

"It feels like the only way we'll ever be able to stop running. I used to be afraid of that ending, but now…" Mel swallowed, staring back down into the flames. "Now I'm resigned, it's like nothing more than a faint dread that clings to my thoughts. I wonder what the afterlife will look like for us."

Gyendal made a quiet sound of agreement.

"Me too. It has me thinking about everything I have not done that I want to." He admitted.

Mel shot him a half smile, thinking on all the plans they had made before this.

"Like that hunting trip around Aia we wanted to do after I graduated?" She asked.

"Goddess above, that feels like a lifetime ago we arranged that. Everything has changed from then, especially us." Gyendal commented.

At the comment about the change in them, her mind flashed unbidden to the moment in the inn room. Instantly Mel pushed the thought aside, focusing on the topic at hand.

"It's a shame we won't have the chance to explore as we had hoped. There were places in the fairie realm I wanted to take you to." Mel said.

Gyendal nodded and leaned forward slightly with a focused look in his eye that confused Mel.

"There is a lot we've left unseen." He paused then, before meeting her gaze directly. "And left unsaid."

Mel blinked in surprise as the statement and sudden shift in his tone.

"We're bound Gyendal, there's no way to keep things of any weight from each other. What secrets could possibly be left unsaid?" Mel questioned.

There was a faint twitch of his lips and he raised a brow pointedly.

"I never called them secrets, simply things between us we have yet to vocalize."

There was a faint humming in her head as she stared at him, shaken by the piercing gaze directed at her. Every time they came close to this line one of them backed away, so close they were touching but never directly addressing.

"Why would you think I have something I've left unsaid." Mel said with a forced shrug.

Her mind was racing, sorting between the things she hoped and all the possible things that could go wrong if she truly dared to be honest.

A low chuckle broke through her churning thoughts as Gyendal made a point of tapping his chin in mock thought.

"Your nervousness might be a rather clear indicator." He pointed out in amusement.

She scoffed at that under her breath before rising to her feet and starting towards the logpile near the edge of their camp.

"I'm going to go get more firewood."

There was no answer, but before Mel could get more than a few steps away there was the sound of movement behind her, as a hand gripped her arm and spun her around. Forest green eyes met dark blue, and Mel stilled at the sudden lack of space between them.

She didn't need a bond to read him in that moment, his gaze unexpectedly unguarded as he stared down at her. There was darkness in his eyes, woven from the layers of pain and anger at the situation they were so deeply tangled in. But there was also warmth, that bled through every other emotion and reminded Mel so strongly of the night in Sedona.

Reactions warred within her. A corner of her mind called for her to pull away, but something deeper held her in place. If she walked away this time… there might not be another opportunity. She wanted answers, a selfish wish considering what ending awaited them in Aia.

But she wasn't going to stop him this time.

"Are you planning to pull back this time, just as you did the last time you had something to say?" Mel questioned quietly, gaze filled with challenge.

His eyes flashed at the reminder.

"We were still holding back then." He leaned in slightly then. "And this time, Galahad is not here to interrupt."

Mel's pulse was erratic, the cumulation of every moment of closeness building together into this night.

"Tell me what you held back on then."

A black-gloved hand settled on her waist, guiding her towards him until they stood mere inches apart.

"You know what." He murmured.

"I want to hear you say it. There is no room to speak through the bond here, to say it without words." Mel said.

A smirk flickered across his lips at that statement.

"I can think of a few ways." He said lowly, before his smile faded into a serious intensity Mel had only seen a handful of times.

She could feel his thumb rubbing absent circles against her size as he paused for a moment, gathering his thoughts.

"This isn't about the bond anymore lamb, and I dare say it hasn't been for some time now. It stretches further than that, to something more complex. Even if we were to exit this realm without the magic that ties us to one another, we walk this path together. To whatever end it takes us." Gyendal said, voice unwavering.

Mel opened her mouth to answer, but found herself without a reply. There was nothing she could add, he was right.

His eyes searched hers for something, before he presented her a question.

"If you had the chance to save yourself from this prophecy right now, and all you had to do is walk away from this life the fates set for you, would you take it?"

The question stopped Mel up short, and for a moment she had a crystal clear image of a life with a family that hadn't been destroyed by Mordred and a life that didn't end with abrupt death. The life she had wanted as a child, but had been taken away from her by the goddess.

Then, she looked up into Gyendal's face. Features she had memorized in the years they had spent together, from the times they faced each other in battle to the quiet moments in that jungle cabin as they tried to piece back together their hearts alongside one another.

"No."

There was no hesitation in her answer, no waver or question. No she would not walk away from this life.

She would not walk away from him.

Gyendal let out a slightly shaking breath at her answer, and reached up his free hand to trail over her cheek and down to her lips. There he paused, and in response Mel reached up with both hands to grip the edges of his cloak.

"I'm not walking into this battle with Mordred with a single regret, Gyendal. When we return to Aia, we do so together, and we do so with it all out on the table." Mel said.

The corners of his lips curved upwards into a small smile, as his hand moved from her cheek to brace around the back of her neck.

"Good. Because once I have you, I am never letting you go."

With that whispered declaration he leaned in, pulling her against him as he pressed his lips on hers.

Cold and darkness wrapped around her, the faint scent of ancient magic that he never fully lost after being turned back to a human. His power sang within him, reaching out to her own magic that reacted in kind. She could feel the dust on his cloak as she tightened her grip to pull him closer still, and taste the coppery air of this realm on his mouth. His lips moved over hers with fervor, every emotion poured into the kiss that had been too long in coming. She could feel the electricity that crackled in his touch, the dark magic that formed his soul responding to the dark fire that burned out of control within her.

From vampire and human, tied to one another against their will, then companions on a shadowed path. Enemies, fighting over a relic born of her nightmares, until her success stripped him of the identity he had worn for centuries.

Yet somehow through all that, they were drawn back together once more, allies and friends as they faced down the biggest threat to their lives and home. Every step they had taken was a step closer to each other, every encounter stacked atop the other as they sought solace from a destiny hellbent on destruction.

He was her anchor when the world fell out from under her, the one person she'd give anything to protect.

Bound by fate, the one gift given to them in a lifetime of loss.

And now, fully and truly, beyond even the red thread that linked their souls, she had been given the heart of Gyendal Ravenfoot.