Total pages in book: 100
Estimated words: 93948 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 470(@200wpm)___ 376(@250wpm)___ 313(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 93948 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 470(@200wpm)___ 376(@250wpm)___ 313(@300wpm)
We reach the docks at the same time the hound does. I was sure I hadn’t forgotten her size, but I’m still staggered by it as Siobhan—because it must be Siobhan—stumbles off the surface of the water and onto the dock. Between one step and the next, she shifts, a shimmering veil lowering and rising, revealing a naked woman.
Bastian gets to her first, pulling her into his arms. I’m there a moment later, needing to touch her, to ensure that she’s truly here. She’s thinner than she was a year ago, but not dangerously so. She’s here.
Siobhan blinks down at us as if waking up from a dream. “Bastian? Nox?” Her voice is rough and gravelly, nearly identical to how it had been when she spoke in hound form after the creature did…whatever they did to her.
“You’re here.” Bastian kisses her and then she’s kissing me and, gods, I missed her so much I think I might die from it. “You’re safe.”
“Safe,” she repeats slowly. “It feels like a dream. How long?”
“A year,” I whisper.
“So long.” Siobhan frowns and shakes her head as if trying to clear it. “You called me home.”
“Bastian did.” Tears streak his face, or maybe it’s me who’s crying. I don’t know. I truly thought she was gone forever and now she’s here in our arms and I don’t know how to process it. I don’t think any of us do. “Let’s go home.”
“Home.” Siobhan smiles, some of the strangeness fading from her expression. In that moment, she looks less like an uncanny creature accidentally wandering into civilization and more like the woman we both fell in love with. She looks at Lyari and then back at us. “Tell me everything.”
Bastian pulls off his tunic and tucks her into it. She’s taller than him, so it barely covers her nudity, but it’s better than walking through the streets without. This city has seen some shit, but Siobhan is a force of nature, even looking slightly bewildered at the rapid change of events.
We fill her in on the new Council, on the effort to save those stranded by the Wild Hunt, on all the changes we’ve fought for, as we make our slow way to the harbor house Bastian keeps. He intentionally picked a place where he’s accessible to people, rather than being tucked behind the gated communities the nobles occupy—or what’s left of the nobles. Their purge wasn’t as thorough as that of the Cŵn Annwn, but it was enough to ensure they haven’t done more than grumble about the new government.
She showers and dresses in clean clothes, and while we feed her, exchanging wild looks because neither of us can believe this is happening, we tell her about the programs we’re getting set into motion—courtesy of the wealth the old Council had spent generations hoarding.
“It really worked.” She reaches out and takes each of our hands, pulling us down into the chairs on either side of her. “You’ve both worked so hard.” A single tear slips free. “Things are working. And you still called me home.”
“Siobhan.” I wait for her to look at me to squeeze her hand. “Of course we did—well, Bastian has done most of the work, but the point remains. We love you.” Even after a year, it feels so strange to say aloud. “We were never going to stop trying to bring you home.”
Another tear slips free. She looks at me and then Bastian. “I love you both, too. So much. I don’t think anyone else’s voice could have reached me, could have given me pause.”
“You know I love you. I never stopped. I never will stop. None of this would have been possible without you,” Bastian says softly. “The revolution, yes, but all that came before. You put a decade’s worth of work into making Threshold a better place. We’ve just been continuing the work you started.”
“And doing a damn good job of it.” She smiles slowly. “I know it’s selfish, but I’m grateful I don’t have to be the face of the new future. It sounds like you have it well in hand.”
“There’s nothing stopping you from—”
“I’m stopping me.” But she’s smiling as she says it. “There’s still so much work to be done, and I’m happy to be there, working hard alongside you—both of you.”
Fuck, now I’m going to cry. “I want that. More than anything.”
“Me, too.”
I’m not sure who moves first, but we end up on our feet, our arms wrapped around one another. Siobhan hiccups. “I’m so glad to be home. To be with you both.”
Now, with Siobhan back, it truly will be a home.