Leaving them behind is easier than she expects. She takes her horse and abandons Giem without sparing a glance behind her. The further away from Talon she is, the less that bond throbs. He must know she's leaving if he can feel the distancing of that bond too and it won't be long before he figures out where exactly she's going. He'll come for Nura, but he'll be too late.

The White Dragon can't possibly allow his etnevu to run headlong into sure death. Which is why Nura won't give him the choice to save her, not anymore. Rephas has suffered for too long and these people have kept her away from him for long enough.

She's an Elf now, she's stronger and more resilient. And she doesn't have that demented bond with Rólin. She can kill him.

Nura fears for the future if she doesn't have the strength to kill him.

Through the snowy land she rides, the ache in her muscles something she finds easier to ignore. Exhaustion is a thing of the past and the cold doesn't slow her.

If it weren't for the immortality hanging over her head, she'd perhaps consider her Elven blood a blessing.

Nura avoids people and places, taking what supplies she can from the icy land and buying others with her hood up and her head down. She ignores the gossip, the word that spreads about Empress Lila Avarae gathering her army of Ice Elves. Rumours spread like wild fire in a drought and Nura decides she wants to hear none of them.

The days blur together, becoming little more than riding, caring for her horse, and sitting alone by the fire with her knees tucked beneath her chin.

She doesn't remember the last time she felt so alone. It makes her chest ache with renewed pain for Rephas.

Queasiness fills her as her sight lands once again upon Kepfew after seemingly endless travel.

Fate has led her here, led her to the doorstep of those she once called her enemies, those that took her father from her and continue to take. After the Abyssal War, she never wanted hate to fill her again, but how can she feel anything but hate for the people who have destroyed her?

She hopes such hate will make it easier to do what she needs to do.

Night has fallen by the time she rides through the gates of the Hold, soldiers watching her entrance with narrowed eyes. She doesn't look at them, just nudges her horse deeper into the city.

She has no plan, no course of action. All she has is her need to get her husband back, to escape this war before it truly begins.

But as she spies figures lurking in the shadows of the clustered buildings, she realises that need may not be an easy thing to obtain.

The weight of eyes prickle the back of her neck, sending the hairs on her arms standing up. On all sides of her, the slight scuffle of footsteps can be heard. They avoid the lanterns brightening the cobble street, slinking through the dark instead.

Nura directs the horse down a side street, the clopping of hooves bouncing off the brick buildings. She doesn't know these streets well enough to be able to make a quick escape and she can't possibly fight if it comes to that.

When a figure steps into her path, leather armour squeaking with movement, all Nura can do is tug on the reins and come to a halt. She eyes the soldier, waiting for them to make a move. Their hand rests on the hilt of the sword at their hip, not drawing it but prepared to.

"Nura Wolfire," the soldier speaks, not needing to speak very loud to be heard amongst the silence of the street. "Rólin wishes to see you."

Nura's spine straightens and she draws in a sharp breath.

A part of her anticipated this happening. She was only able to pass through Kepfew before because she had Talon by her side. Now she's a lone rider without a warrior guiding her. There's no one to save her.

Slipping off the horse's back, Nura starts as someone steps close to her, taking the reins from her hands. She wraps her fingers around the strap of her satchel across her chest to hide the way they tremble.

"This way," the soldier calls and Nura hesitates before walking towards him. He turns on his heel, his black cape swirling around him. Pointed ears jut out of light brown hair that curls around his pale features, but Nura sees little more of him beyond that as she lowers her chin and follows.

Through dark and desolate streets they walk until Nura comes to recognise them. They're moving towards Rólin's mansion. Nerves writhe in her gut, forcing her to swallow the bile that stings the back of her throat. But still she doesn't try to run. She has nowhere to run to besides the way she had come, and nothing but her trapped father and lying etnevu await.

Facing Rólin nearly seems like a mercy compared to that.

Nura shrinks under the gazes of the guards that stand by the open iron and brick gates to the manor, shadowed eyes following her towards that pale stone. Few lights flicker within the glass windows of the manor, most are dark.

She's led inside where her boots touch deep red carpet that crawls up a wide staircase. She's directed to the side, through heavy oak doors and down winding staircases and a long hall of dark stone.

A musty smell assaults her and Nura wrinkles her nose. The stale air only worsens the deeper they go into the dimly lit halls until they come upon dank cells.

Nura's gut plummets when the guard turns to her, eyes cold, features unreadable. She grits her teeth as he grabs her cloak and yanks it off her, tossing that thick material to the damp stone. Then he grips the strap of her satchel and pulls it over her head. He dumps that too, bottles and tools clattering within. Next his hands pat her down, searching for any weapons on her. He takes the knife tucked into her belt, then the belt too.

Through it all, Nura stands in silence, her lips pressed into a thin line, her knees threatening to buckle.

The guard throws open a cell door and shoves Nura within, following after her. The sudden darkness blinds her and Nura stumbles forward before being directed by a painful grip on her upper arm. Cold bites into her wrists, the clanking sound rising above her harsh breaths. Nura is shoved again and her shoulder hits a stone wall.

The guard moves towards the cell door and closes it behind him with a bang that echoes in the silence. He leaves her without a parting word, without anything to tell her why she's here.

Nura looks down at the manacles around her wrists, the chain linking her to a bolt in the floor, preventing her from moving in any direction more than a couple of steps.

That's when she hears the slight scape of iron on stone and she realises she's not in this cell alone. Turning as her breath leaves her in a shaky gasp, Nura eyes the figure in the corner of the room. They're curled on their side, shackled wrists laying limp before them, dirt and blood crusted under the nails. Loose hair clumped with knots covers their bruised and swollen face. So bruised and swollen that Nura almost doesn't recognise them.

"Rephas," she wheezes before stumbling towards him, her heart wrenching, her soul cracking in two. The chains stop her from reaching him, yanking her back when she fights against them.

Pressing her hands to her mouth to stop herself from weeping, Nura slips to the ground, her knees unable to hold her up anymore.

"Rephas," she whispers again, but it comes out as a croak.

She can't tell if he's breathing. She can't tell if he's alive or not. All she can do is stare at him, assess him. His collarbones poke through his shirtless skin and she can see his ribs. He's far too thin, too frail, no longer the large man who often held her through the night as she wept through her nightmares.

They've broken her husband.

She starts crying then, her tears blurring him from sight. He's been abandoned to this hollow darkness, left alone with his pain, left to wither away and fade into nothing. And Nura can't reach him, can't comfort him.

Is this how the Spirits wish to punish her? To remind her that though she witnessed horrible things in the war to better her skills as a healer, she's still helpless to heal the man she loves?

As she stares at him, tears wetting her cheeks, Nura sees it. The tiny puff of breath that stirs the dirt under his skin. She gasps, scrambling forward though her chains won't let her go far.

She whispers his name over and over, a mantra, a prayer, a plea to whatever Spirits watch. And she gets an answer when Rephas opens his left eye that isn't completely swollen shut. Deep brown greets her, the colour surrounded by a shock of red. His lips move, barely able to shift with how cracked and bloody they are.

"Don't speak," she says, stretching out her fingers though she can't move her wrists any further. "It's me, Rephas. It's Nura."

He shifts, pain twisting his gaunt features. Nura eyes the dark bruising along his ribs and fears that some of them may be broken.

"My love," Nura sobs, tears clogging in her throat, weighing down her tongue, making it difficult to speak or breathe.

Lips moving again, it takes Rephas a long moment to find his voice. "Go, Nura."

She draws in a breath, gaze flicking down to her wrists where the iron digs into her skin, but her pain is slight compared to what Rephas is enduring. She wouldn't leave even if she could. "I'm going to get you out of here, Rephas," she promises, the conviction in her voice surprising her.

She's going to get him out, even if it's the last thing she does.

Rephas groans, pressing his face to the dirty stone, his chains clinking as he moves his hands to touch his ribs.

Nura's hands itch to heal him, to do something other than remain helpless. But there's nothing she can do for him but try not to cry too openly.

"Rephas," she says as he continues to move, trying to get his knees under him, each breath wheezing past his lips. "Rephas, stop." He leans on his elbows, sweat dripping from his brow and onto the stone. Dragging his knees towards his chest, Rephas bares his teeth. "Stop moving."

"Nura," he rasps, turning his head, dirty strands of his long, chestnut hair sticking to his cheek. "Why?"

She blinks at him, not fully understanding the question. Is he asking her why she's here? Does she have to remind him that he's her husband and leaving him to rot in this cell will never be an option?

"Why didn't you listen to him?"

"To whom?"

"To Talon."

Tears sting Nura's eyes for a whole new reason as she's reminded of what Talon has done, what the fabled White Dragon has done. Nura lifts her chin, blinking rapidly. "If I listened to him, then no one would be coming for you. Ever."

With a pained grunt, Rephas sits with his back to the stone, his legs stretched out before him. "You should've listened to him," he huffs, tilting his head back to rest against the stone.

From the flickering light outside of the cell, Nura finally gets a good look at Rephas' face, and what she sees sends her stomach rolling. Beneath a nose crooked from being broken is crusted blood that has sunk into the dried cracks of his lips. His cheekbones are both split and swollen, sitting under dark purple circles. His right eye is a ball of swelling, red flesh, a laceration marring his brow that seeps with infection. Looking at it, Nura fears he might not see out of that eye again.

Nura desperately wants to look away from him, but she doesn't. She needs to see him, to see what they've done to the man she loves. Branding his broken body into her mind will make it easier to kill those who did this.

"Nura," he says, each breath he takes clearly causing him pain. "When you get the chance, I need you to run."

Before he's even finished talking, Nura is already shaking her head. "Not without you."

"He'll kill you just to get to me."

Nura lifts her chin but doesn't argue with him. She has nothing to bargain with, nothing that'll save her from Rólin. He might very well kill her the moment he sees her, but she refuses to sit idle while Rephas suffers.

"You shouldn't have come," he continues.

"I couldn't stop looking for you."

Rephas cringes as he shifts, pressing his shackled hands to his side. "I know, Nura. Your stubbornness is one of the many reasons I fell in love with you. I just hoped that Talon would be able to stop you considering..."

Nura swallows. "Considering he's my etnevu."

That bloodshot eye stares at her for a moment. "You know?"

"You know?" she replies.

"He told me at the Harvest Ceremony. It's how he... it's how he convinced me to turn myself over to Rólin." Nura closes her eyes with the reminder of what Talon did, but she lets Rephas continue. "I knew he would do everything in his power to protect you."

"I guess you underestimated my stubbornness."

Sighing, Rephas shakes his head. "He'll come for you, he'll get you out."

"Not without starting a civil war that Rólin may win."

A muscle in Rephas' jaw flutters and his gaze hardens. "If it means you're safe, I don't care."

Nura looks away from him then, her lips twisting. She won't let it come to that. She refuses to. She wants Rephas safe, but another war will destroy Humans, and she can't stomach that type of blood on her hands. There's too much staining them already.

She'll get him out and she'll find a way to stop Rólin. There's no other option anymore.