At some point during the story, Callum took her hand. He still wore his gloves, but his warmth spread through the material, chasing the chill that came with unpacking so many secrets. Odella being chosen, her return in a fractured state, Ash's own desperation to help her, Roan's appearance, the plan they concocted, their execution of that plan.

Callum listened the entire time, his eyes fixed ahead, expression impassive. But his hand stayed. No matter how distant he appeared as he took blow over blow, that hand anchored him to her, a sign that he hadn't condemned her even though he should have.

When she finally finished, silence stretched between them like crumbling ground. They could test their weight, see if it would hold, but neither had the bravery to test it. Not yet.

She didn't know when she'd started counting her heartbeats, but she reached thirty-four before Callum finally spoke again.

"Ashlin."

She jolted at the sound of her name. Her heart beat much faster as she finally dared to face Callum again. He gazed down at her, his eyes searching. They were gentle caresses rather than critical cuts across her.

"Ashlin," he repeated, slowly, as if testing the name. Her confusion must have shown because he smiled softly. "I am trying to get used to the name, I suppose. Place it to you. It's not every day you learn you've been meeting with someone's secret twin."

Those words should have carried a bite, but he almost chuckled as he said them. Ash nearly laughed as well. "All of this sounds quite insane when laid out, doesn't it?" she mused.

"I'll admit, if you told the tale to someone not living it, I am sure they would find it farfetched."

Ash's mouth twitched in the start of a grin, but their reality settled on her again. She bit down on her lower lip. As much as she hated it, a question built within her, too close to bursting to ignore. "Callum, don't... Do you not despise me? I mean, I by no means want you to, but after what I've done... The trickery, whatever my part was in Roan's plan to kidnap you..."

Callum huffed out a humorless laugh and leaned his head back against the wall. "I suppose that's a fair question." He paused for long enough that she worried he would let it hang there, but then he sighed. "It is also one that is much more complicated to answer than you may think. But to put it simply, no, Ashlin, I do not despise you."

She didn't realize how much she needed to hear those words until they popped the pressure building in her chest. A couple tears of relief spilled from her eyes. She swiped them away with the hand that wasn't still clasped in his. He'd mentioned complications, and part of her knew she should pry into those, but for the moment, she was content allowing this to be enough. She'd had enough complications for the moment.

Because there were still many. Circumstances connected them, yes. Both kidnapped, both viewing Roan as an enemy. But that didn't change the outside world that had first set them on this path. Ash was still the twin sister of a Dreamwoven sent to murder the godsforsaken Tempest Serpent Terror; Callum was still the priest that worshipped it and saw her gods as false, evil deities. That was all still the same.

Her head dropped forward, the weight becoming too much. She never thought the day would come in which rising to tend to her mentally absent sister would seem simpler, but right then, she missed it.

"I'm sorry about your sister."

Ash widened her eyes in his direction. Had he read her mind? But he didn't even look her way. He stared down at his fist as it clenched around the cloth of his robe. The color had long since strayed from pure white between their earlier fight on the beach and the dirt on the cell floors.

"Sorry? Why are you sorry?" she asked.

"Because..." He took a deep breath. "Because you obviously love your sister deeply. You cared for her quite extensively, from the sounds of it. Which I am sure was painful almost every second. I cannot imagine enduring such a task. And how can I not be sorry when I feel like I am the cause of that?"

"Callum—" Ash began, but he squeezed her hand and shook his head, urging her to give him a moment more to speak.

"I know. I didn't have Roan do as he did nor did I play a part in that forsaken Dreamwoven's curse. I know I had no way to have known that I shouldn't have been drawn in by your twin." His voice caught at this. He closed his eyes and swallowed multiple times. "But my feelings of regret remain. Both you and Odella have suffered because of me."

He knew something. That fact settled like a stone in her gut. She had laid bare all her mistakes and wounds, and yet he continued to talk around some truth he seemed to find important. That weight broke through her voice as she asked, "What aren't you telling me, Callum?"

He stared at nothing for a long time before shaking his head. "I can't tell you."

The stone grew. "I... I don't understand," she said.

He finally found her eyes once again, and her desire to keep pushing shriveled. Not gone, but trying to escape the torment and resignation in that gaze. "There are some things about this world that you are safer not knowing," he said. "I'm not keeping it from you because of mistrust or revenge or whatever other notions you may have in your head. On the chance that Scion sticks to his word and returns you home, I cannot risk you having this knowledge, Ash."

His words hung over them like low-hanging dark clouds, casting deep shadows and stealing warmth. She shivered. As absurd as she wanted to find his words, she couldn't deny that so much of her life had stopped making sense. What was one more grand strangeness to add to the list?

All she could settle on was the truth she knew. "I still don't blame you."

"Just as I don't blame you." Callum squeezed her hand. A gentle, reassuring gesture.

"It seems we're back to where we were before then," she said. "Both of us feeling at fault, yet neither of us placing it on the other."

His lips rose in the barest of smiles. "What a duo we make."

They sat like that, both lost in their own thoughts, for untracked minutes before she finally found the courage to ask her next question. "Do you think anyone will find us?"

He blew out a long breath, and this time when he leaned his head, he did so against the bars separating them. For a stomach-fluttering moment, Ash debated pressing her own temple against the cool steel. It would leave only the bars separating them.

"I don't know," he admitted. "By now, they will know we are missing. Nobody except... Well, nobody will know what's happened to us. The Holy Guard will do what they can to investigate and track us down, but it's not as if they have the same resources or training as the Royal Knights."

She hadn't expected a hopeful situation, but the dreariness of it all still stole the wind from her. "What about..." She grimaced. The words stuck to her tongue, her beliefs fighting to keep them from getting out. But who else could she turn to when the gods had likely turned their back on her situation? "What about the Serpent?"

Surprise flashed across Callum's face at the suggestion. "Svenril? I didn't expect you to mention him."

She shrugged helplessly. "We have few options."

He conceded the point with a small grunt. "Svenril may be able to track me, but he must be cautious leaving Caeleria. Before you ask," he said, holding up his free hand as her mouth opened, "it pertains to that which I cannot explain."

Part of her wilted at the continued lack of explanation, but she still clung to hope. "Does cautious mean he won't?"

"I don't know this either. He has reasons to be invested in my safety, but there's just so many factors in play."

She knew it was petulant, but a huff still left her lips. Even more partial answers. Perhaps she could have accepted them if they didn't just further doom them to this fate.

"I'm sorry, but I ask that you trust me when I say I will share as much as I am safe to," Callum said. "I understand that you have little reason to, given what you have recently been through, but I swear I am being completely honest with you."

As foolish as it made her, Ash believed him. He could have been trying to fool her by revealing he left out bits, as if to appear more honest, but she couldn't find a reason for him to put forth that effort. All the retracted information did was frustrate and confuse her. And unless it was a useless revenge, what would the lies gain him? An ally? She had already shown how powerless she was to get either of them out.

"Callum." She twisted, nearly forcing herself on her knees to both keep hold of his hand and to face him. He mirrored her movement, though his head tilted to the side. She squeezed his hand. "Maybe I am a fool for it, but I trust you."

He took her in, eyes scanning her. Searching for any exaggeration, any hint that what she said may not be the truth. The edge of his mouth pulled up. "Perhaps we are both fools, then, because I trust you as well."

Someone had unleashed a flurry of pixies in Ash's stomach. They fluttered around, and she did her best not to let it show. She always found his gaze intense, but she now felt warm where he looked.

He swallowed. The bump on his neck visibly bobbed. "Ash—"

The door banged open, followed by a gleeful, "Grub time for da prisoners!"

Ash and Callum jerked apart. Her hand felt unbelievably cold without the contact of his, even if his glove wasn't quite as heated as skin. It had been the connection that provided a sense of warmth. Their eyes lingered on each other for a moment before they both turned to their new guest.

The pirate that descended the steps would give many knights pause. Despite the pudge of a gut sticking out, he was built like a wall. Broad shoulders led to large arms. Even without the toned muscles of a well-trained soldier, she had no doubt that any hit from him would pack a punch.

Because of his barrel-like arms, the man didn't have sleeves, which was the only reason she spotted the rocky patches encrusted on his biceps. It was as if layer upon layer of mud had dried and hardened upon his skin until it became part of him.

She thought back to the strange-eyed man and the animal-like ears protruding from his head. Was this man another unnatural crew member? Her instincts told her he wasn't just in dire need of a bath.

"Here ya prisoners go," the man said, shooting them a toothy grin. He stopped at Callum's cell, slid in a tray, and then did the same at Ash's.

The pirate stood proudly outside of her cell. She stared at him for a moment before the tantalizing smell of meat dragged a growl from her stomach. A delicious-looking stew sat beside a slice of dinner bread, and a deep blue liquid sloshed in a wooden mug.

"Not what we'd normally give prisoners," the man admitted, shrugging. "But Roan wants ya treated well, girlie, and we know ya would try ta share with the boyo should we not give him da same."

Ash's mouth watered as the stew and its delicious smell continued to beckon her, but a twisting in her core kept her still. This was food given to her by captors. Sent by Roan at that. Her hunger turned to dust on her tongue.

The pirate glanced between her and Callum, who also hadn't moved, and huffed. "It's not poisoned, if that's what ya's worried about!"

They remained stilled.

"Fine, do as ya please," the pirate said, throwing his hands in the air. "But if Roan comes ta find me 'cause ya starved, I hope ya don't have a peaceful Slumber, ya hear?"

He turned on his heel and marched to the door, muttering about ungrateful behavior the entire way. As he made his way up the steps, bits and pieces of the grey rubble flecked off his arms. He turned back to them once he reached the top, sniffed his nose in annoyance, and clicked the door shut behind him.

Ash gaped at the door. It didn't completely block the pirate's continued grumbles as he retreated.

"That," Callum said a full minute after the man's sounds had ceased, "has to be the furthest from how I imagined a pirate."

She couldn't help it. Despite the dire situation, or perhaps because of it, she let out a breath of laughter. It soon consumed her. Her arms encircled her waist as the force of it shook her body. Callum soon joined in.

This was silly. A pirate seeming overly offended by their hesitance to eat shouldn't have caused such a fit, but it felt amazing, as if a small weight had been lifted from the deepest part of her being.

"Have we gone mad already?" Ash asked between gasps of breath.

Callum pretended to be thinking, but his smile marred the act. "We just may have, but if so, I'll take it." His eyes fell on her, and the tenderness within them had heat creeping up the back of her neck. "I'm happy you can still laugh."

She attempted a grin, but all she managed was half of one. "Is it right for me to laugh?" A chill crept along her arms, and she rubbed her hands against them to keep herself warm. "It feels wrong given where we are, given..." She squeezed her eyes shut against the flash of Sanford in her mind. "Given all that has happened."

Callum reached through the bars and squeezed her hand. "It means you still have a spark of light in you, and you need to hold on to that light. From it, you can remember to hope."

She bit her lip. "I can try," she whispered.

He squeezed once more, tighter this time, before pulling his arm back to his side. "I promise you, Ashlin, I will do everything I can to protect you. To return you home."

The conviction in his voice summoned the pixies once more. She mentally swatted them away, but they stayed, fluttering in her stomach like the pesky things the stories claimed them to be. She shivered.

"Come, let's eat the food before it's cold. It may warm us as well," he said, mistaking the cause of her reaction. "The pirate was right. They'd have no reason to poison us."

With a little more nudging, Ash joined Callum in eating the meal. It wasn't until hours later, settled on the floor with a newly delivered blanket and a hand clasped with Callum's through the bars, his snores accompanying the beating waves, that a realization came to her.

Callum had said nothing about getting himself home as well.

*****

Callum is definitely a contrast to Roan, though it appears he's also keeping some secrets 😬 He's at least open about it though?  Just means everyone gets to know he has secrets and want to know them, though xD But at least he is there for Ash, worried about getting her home but not himself, because self sacrifice goes brrr :D (Unless that's not it and he has other reasons for not mentioning himself getting home >:D)

Let me know your thoughts on the chapter down below, and if you enjoyed it, don't forget to vote and comment! I also have a discord open to anyone who wants to join, and we have a section there to discuss the book :D Let me know if you want to join!