Something in Lyra’s words pressed against something older, deeper, like a hand laid over a scar that had never truly faded. Noah didn’t answer her right away. Instead, his gaze drifted from her face to the table, to the careful arrangement of supplies he had laid out with such deliberate precision, as if each item might anchor him against the pull of memory threatening to drag him under.
For a moment, he said nothing, and the silence stretched. It was heavy, like snowfall gathering weight before it finally breaks through the edge of a cloud, broken only by the cracks in the hearth behind him. "I know," he began at last, his voice a sigh, worn at the edges in a way it hadn’t been before. "And you’re right. People choose to step onto the tundra. They choose the risk." His fingers pressed into the wood of the table, grounding himself in the present even as he found himself slipping backward into a moment he could never outrun.
He drew in a slow breath, but it didn’t quite fill his lungs the way it should have. "My wife chose it too." Cordelia had been a hunter, experienced and dedicated and knowledgeable on the tundra as any. She was a fine attuned with many shifts, who could hold her own. "We were hunting luxere in the Greenwing," he continued, the memory sharp and merciless, every detail carved into him with cruel clarity. "It was routine. The kind of hunt you don’t think twice about."
His jaw tightened, the muscle feathering beneath his skin. "Then the herd bolted." He could see it again, could see the sudden panic, the flash of glowing antlers vanishing into the trees, the unnatural shift in the air that came just before everything unraveled. "The sky went dark and before I could even understand what was happening, before I could move, it was already on her." His throat tightened, but he forced the words out anyway. "A white dragon took her like she was nothing."
His hand curled slightly against the table now, not enough to tremble, but enough that the tension showed. "I tried to reach her." A breath, a shake of his head. "I couldn’t." Although this was not the first time he had recalled this tale, nearly two years in his history, the admission still felt like bile on his tongue. "It hit me before I could even shift, or use magic," he went on, gaze unfocused for a moment as if seeing the past layered over the present. "Threw me into the trees like I didn’t matter either." And he had been a demigod at the time, hardened and molded by war. Noah had killed dragons before this attack.
He exhaled slowly, the sound controlled, measured, as if he were trying to keep himself held together by the will of his own mind. "When I woke up, she was gone." The words hollowed something out in his chest even now, the ache so deep it made his spine feel like grains of sand. Silence settled again for a moment, but this time it was different. The Sentinel had closed himself off rfom the attuned bond. The guilt. The failure. The knowledge that all his strength, all his power, had amounted to nothing in the moment it mattered most, none if it reached Lyra. But he was sure she could see it on him. Finally, he lifted his eyes back to Lyra. "She chose to be there," he said, steady again, though it cost him. "But I was the one who led that hunt. I was the one who didn’t see it coming. Didn’t prepare for it. That’s not something I get to set down."
For a moment, he said nothing, and the silence stretched. It was heavy, like snowfall gathering weight before it finally breaks through the edge of a cloud, broken only by the cracks in the hearth behind him. "I know," he began at last, his voice a sigh, worn at the edges in a way it hadn’t been before. "And you’re right. People choose to step onto the tundra. They choose the risk." His fingers pressed into the wood of the table, grounding himself in the present even as he found himself slipping backward into a moment he could never outrun.
He drew in a slow breath, but it didn’t quite fill his lungs the way it should have. "My wife chose it too." Cordelia had been a hunter, experienced and dedicated and knowledgeable on the tundra as any. She was a fine attuned with many shifts, who could hold her own. "We were hunting luxere in the Greenwing," he continued, the memory sharp and merciless, every detail carved into him with cruel clarity. "It was routine. The kind of hunt you don’t think twice about."
His jaw tightened, the muscle feathering beneath his skin. "Then the herd bolted." He could see it again, could see the sudden panic, the flash of glowing antlers vanishing into the trees, the unnatural shift in the air that came just before everything unraveled. "The sky went dark and before I could even understand what was happening, before I could move, it was already on her." His throat tightened, but he forced the words out anyway. "A white dragon took her like she was nothing."
His hand curled slightly against the table now, not enough to tremble, but enough that the tension showed. "I tried to reach her." A breath, a shake of his head. "I couldn’t." Although this was not the first time he had recalled this tale, nearly two years in his history, the admission still felt like bile on his tongue. "It hit me before I could even shift, or use magic," he went on, gaze unfocused for a moment as if seeing the past layered over the present. "Threw me into the trees like I didn’t matter either." And he had been a demigod at the time, hardened and molded by war. Noah had killed dragons before this attack.
He exhaled slowly, the sound controlled, measured, as if he were trying to keep himself held together by the will of his own mind. "When I woke up, she was gone." The words hollowed something out in his chest even now, the ache so deep it made his spine feel like grains of sand. Silence settled again for a moment, but this time it was different. The Sentinel had closed himself off rfom the attuned bond. The guilt. The failure. The knowledge that all his strength, all his power, had amounted to nothing in the moment it mattered most, none if it reached Lyra. But he was sure she could see it on him. Finally, he lifted his eyes back to Lyra. "She chose to be there," he said, steady again, though it cost him. "But I was the one who led that hunt. I was the one who didn’t see it coming. Didn’t prepare for it. That’s not something I get to set down."
the sentinel of the north
