Release and Connection
The weight of Dravik's presence still lingered, curling like smoke in the back of their minds. His memory pressed cold fingers to their spines, clung to their breath, made silence feel heavier than steel. But tonight, neither of them wanted to carry it.
Solace and Lyra walked through the dim corridors in silence, boots soft on polished stone. The air was too clean, too sterile — suffocating in its stillness. But beyond the heavy doors ahead was a different world. A space not of order and duty, but of release.
They reached the entrance to the training hall. Solace's hand hovered over the access panel for a moment before pressing it. The door hissed open.
The room was vast, the smooth stone floor polished to a mirror sheen, untouched. Rows of weapon racks lined the walls, but they ignored them. Above, lanterns flickered, casting long shadows across the open expanse.
Solace exhaled, slow and deliberate, feeling the tight coil in his chest ease just a fraction.
Lyra glanced at him. There was no teasing glint in her eyes, only understanding. A quiet gentleness that didn't need words.
"Let's just… let it all go," he murmured. His voice was rough, low, like gravel rolling beneath water.
She nodded.
Lyra raised her hands, and shadows slipped from her fingers like silk, flowing and curling across the floor, dark smoke alive with purpose. The air shifted with a soft hum.
Without thought, Solace's darkness answered — a rolling wave that poured from beneath his skin, deep and heavy. But tonight, it wasn't the suffocating force it became in battle. It was something freer, looser, without direction or weight. It simply was.
They didn't speak.
Lyra's shadows twisted and danced, spiraling around her, fluid and graceful, moving like ribbons caught in wind. Solace's darkness surged and rolled, slower, heavier, drawn by gravity, but alive — responding to hers, pushing against it, folding with it, swirling together.
They collided.
Not violently — not tonight.
Instead, the shadows met and parted, forming strange patterns in the air, pulsing like breath. The ground beneath them cracked, hairline fractures spiderwebbing out. The walls trembled softly. The room stretched — became vast, endless — as though the power they shared reshaped the space into something larger, something limitless.
Lyra spun, her hair fanning out, her feet light against the floor. Her shadows danced with her, coiling around her wrists, her ankles, her waist. Solace's power chased after her, rolling like a storm tide.
He pushed back, challenging her, his darkness rising in great sweeping arcs. Lyra ducked beneath them, laughing — soft, breathless laughter that trembled like sunlight piercing through storm clouds.
It felt… good.
For the first time in too long, they laughed. Not loudly, but quietly. Intimately.
Solace shifted his stance, trying to match her rhythm — all grace and speed — but his power rebelled, wild and raw. He was fire; she was water. But somehow, together, they moved as though they had trained like this for years.
His darkness surged forward again, and Lyra leapt, twisting midair, her shadows folding into wings that carried her just out of reach. She landed with a soft tap, her smile wide and breathless.
"You're slow," she teased.
He grinned, just a little. "I'm heavy."
They moved again, pushing their limits, shadows clashing and merging, until the room blurred at the edges. Until their skin was damp with sweat and their breathing turned ragged. Until there was nothing left of battlefields or blood or memory — only motion and release.
Finally, Lyra slowed, her shadows retreating into her skin, flickering briefly before fading. She dropped to sit on the cracked stone floor, breathing hard.
Solace followed, sitting beside her.
The silence between them was comfortable now.
Lyra's gaze drifted to his bare shoulder, where his tunic had slipped loose. Her eyes lingered on the intricate black tattoo that curved along his back — the dragon, wings unfurled, scales rendered in impossibly fine detail.
Without thinking, she reached out, fingertips brushing the tattoo. The skin was warm beneath her touch.
"What is this?" she whispered. Her voice was soft, reverent.
He was quiet for a moment.
"It's a connection," he said finally. His voice was lower than before, almost a murmur. "To my dragon."
Lyra blinked slowly, thinking back. "The egg… it hatched."
He nodded. "I named him Night." His hand absently drifted up to his shoulder, touching the mark. "He's small. He sleeps on me most of the time. But he's family."
She smiled, soft and genuine. "That's incredible."
Solace let out a breath that was almost a laugh. "I never thought… I'd care about something like that. But with him… it's different. He's part of me. I can feel his breath in mine."
They sat there, side by side, the aftershocks of their power still humming faintly in the air.
Lyra leaned back on her palms, tilting her head up to the high ceiling. "Do you think we'll ever have peace?"
Solace didn't answer immediately. He looked at her — really looked. The exhaustion in her eyes, but beneath it, something brighter. Quiet strength.
"With you?" he said softly. "I think… moments like this are enough."
She turned her head toward him. Their eyes met, and in that silence something deepened. An unspoken understanding, a bond forged not in battle, but in shared breath and stillness.
They didn't need to say more.
Minutes passed in quiet comfort. The world outside — heavy with duty, fear, and consequence — felt distant here. In this moment, there was only the quiet thrum of connection.
Lyra broke the silence with a light nudge to his arm. "Come on."
He raised an eyebrow.
She grinned. "Let's see if you can actually keep up with me."
He huffed out a breath that might have been a laugh. "You're on."
They rose together.
Once more, shadows surged around them, not as weapons — not tonight — but as extensions of themselves. They danced again, freer this time. No pressure. No purpose but to exist, to move, to feel.
The night wore on, and exhaustion eventually found them.
They collapsed side by side on the cold stone floor, breathless and spent.
Lyra turned her head toward him.
"Thank you," she whispered.
He didn't answer with words. Just reached out, gently brushing his fingers against hers.
The silence between them spoke loud enough.
In that quiet moment, they found what they both needed — not escape, but release.
Not distance, but connection.
And for tonight… that was enough.