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. ...