Chapter 185

• Freya‘s pov.
• Sleep was a war I couldn’t win.
• When my eyes finally shut, Arius was there. Not as he had been in life—sharp-tongued, smirking, maddening—but as he had been in the last instant: giving everything. The dream replayed it in cruel detail. The shimmer of the valley swallowing him whole, his eyes burning with some secret conviction, his mouth tilting in that last reckless smile before it all went dark. I reached for him, but in dreams my hands were bound, useless. I screamed until my throat broke, but no sound carried. Just silence. His sacrifice crushed me again and again, each time heavier than the last.