The Fallen Princess: Unbound

Chapter Sixteen

Snow touched the windows in soft, soundless flurries, turning the world beyond the glass into a pale blur. Inside, the hearth kept the castle’s chill at bay, heat rolling through the sitting room in slow waves that smelled faintly of cedar and clean ash.

The children had finally settled. Sophie and Ava had been coaxed into bed with promises of more snow in the morning and stories that ended gently instead of sharply.

Cillian had fought sleep like it was a rival he could out-stubborn, until his lashes gave in, his small fist still curled around his wooden dragon toy. Zephira had dozed in her cradle, one tiny hand flexing now and then as though she dreamed of holding onto the world.

Zaria stood at the edge of the doorway for a moment longer than she needed to, watching the rise and fall of Zephira’s swaddle. Love sat in her chest like something living. And beneath it, that hollow place remained—quiet, patient, wrong.

Callen waited in the corridor, shoulders squared, hair still damp from the cold air outside. The moment Zaria stepped out, his gaze found her and held, not with scrutiny now, but with a careful steadiness.

He didn’t speak at first. He simply reached out and took her hand, warm palm closing around her fingers, thumb pressing once against her knuckles like a silent question. Zaria tightened her grip.

Callen guided her down the hall toward their sitting room, past carved stone and polished wood, past the quiet hum of a sleeping castle. Even the air felt as if it understood this was not a night for interruption.

Once inside, Callen shut the door and turned the latch. The sound was small. The effect was immediate. Privacy settled like a blanket. Zaria exhaled shakily, shoulders dropping a fraction as if she’d been holding herself upright for everyone else since the moment she returned.

Callen moved to the hearth, stoking it with a practiced hand. Flames leapt higher, licking at iron grate and stone, throwing gold and orange across the room. Then he turned back to her.

“You asked me to tell you," He murmured, voice low. Zaria nodded, throat tight. “I need you to.” Callen crossed the room and stopped close enough that she could feel the warmth of him.

His hands hovered again, caught between restraint and need, as if he still wasn’t sure whether touch would soothe her or break her open.

Zaria reached first. She slid her fingers into his tunic at his waist and anchored herself there, forehead lowering toward his chest.

He inhaled sharply, then let his hands come down at last, one at the back of her head, one between her shoulder blades, holding her like he’d been forced to learn patience and didn’t enjoy it.

“Tell me in pieces,” Zaria whispered. “Not all at once.” Callen’s breath ruffled her hair. “All right.” He guided her to the settee. Callen lowered himself beside her, close but not crowding, his knee angled toward hers like an unspoken promise of presence.

For a long moment, he stared into the fire as though the flames might shape the words for him. Then he began.

“River was… steady,” Callen started, and his mouth tightened like the word was too small for what it tried to hold. “Not loud. Not charming the way Christian can be. The kind of man who made you feel safe without demanding you notice how he did it.”

Zaria’s fingers curled into her cloak. Somewhere inside her, she waited for the name to c***k open feeling. Nothing came. Only that empty pressure, like a bruise without pain. Callen’s gaze stayed on the middle distance for a beat too long, and Zaria saw it, the struggle behind his control.

This wasn’t only grief. It was the old, bitter edge of jealousy and circumstance, the part of the story he’d rather never speak aloud because it belonged to a version of Zaria he hadn’t been allowed to touch.

“I’m not telling you this because it’s easy,” he murmured. “Or because it sits clean in my mouth.” Zaria shifted slightly, searching his face. “Then why?” “Because you asked,” he answered, voice rougher. “And because you deserve your own history, even if someone ripped the feeling out of it.”

He drew in a slow breath. Let it out like he was loosening a knot. “It was a political marriage,” he continued. “Arranged. Signed and sealed by the king with ink and expectation.” His eyes flicked to her at last. “You didn’t choose it.”

Zaria’s hand drifted down without thinking, fingers brushing the wedding ring Callen had made for her, familiar in a way River’s name wasn’t. “But I’m married to you.”

“I know.” Callen bent and pressed a kiss to her forehead, a gentle punctuation to a truth he didn’t want to argue with. “You married me first.” His mouth curved faintly. “I made sure of that.”

Zaria swallowed, throat tight. “If it was arranged, then—” Callen cut in softly, firmly, like he refused to let her turn it into something easy. “You still loved him. Or you came to love him.” A pause, then quieter, “And I won’t cheapen that just because it wasn’t my favorite chapter.”

Zaria’s breath trembled. “I just...” Her brows drew together, frustration sharpening into something raw. “I can’t feel it. I don’t know him and I hate that.” Callen’s jaw flexed, the restraint in him turning brittle at the edges. “I hate it too,” he admitted. “I hate that you’re sitting here trying to make room for someone you should already have in your bones.”

Callen’s hand slid over hers, fingers threading through gently, grounding. “But he’s a part of your story.” His thumb pressed once against her knuckles, deliberate. “Even if someone stole the part of you that can reach for him.”

Zaria’s shoulders slumped a fraction, like her body understood comfort before her mind could accept it. Callen’s voice softened, not in sentiment, but in detail, the way you soften when you stop fighting the truth and start describing it.

“He helped you grow,” he murmured. “He didn’t try to polish you into what people expected. He let you be… you.” His gaze dropped briefly, then returned to her face. “You wore what you wanted. You fished and hunted when you had the time.”

Zaria stared, trying to see River through his words. Callen continued, the memory sharpening with each piece. “River found you tutors for your light. Not because he wanted you to be dangerous, because he wanted you to be confident. He taught you about the Mystics-”

“He… knew about my mother’s homeland?” Zaria’s throat tightened. “Yes,” Callen replied. “He taught you what he could—stories, maps, names.” His mouth tightened again, as if he remembered exactly how much Zaria had clung to those lessons. “He wanted you to feel connected to something that was yours. Not borrowed. Not negotiated.”

Zaria’s gaze dropped to her lap, fingers twisting in the fabric. “What did he call me?” Callen’s expression softened with something that hurt. “My love,” he breathed. “Sometimes princess, when he had to. But when it was just you… it was always my love.”

Zaria swallowed. The words should have landed inside her like a bell, ringing with recognition. They fell into silence. Callen saw it immediately. The stillness, the emptiness where something should have answered. His throat worked like it hurt.

“I hate that you can’t feel it,” he repeated, quieter now, less anger and more grief. “I hate that you’re trying so hard and your own mind won’t meet you halfway.” Zaria’s eyes stung. “Keep going,” she whispered. “Even if I can’t… meet it. Keep going.”

Callen looked away, and when he spoke again, the warmth left his voice, replaced by something colder—reality.

“He died because of Gulshan,” he murmured, and the name sharpened the room like a blade drawn slowly. “Protecting his people. In a way people will call heroic because it makes them feel better.”

Zaria’s pulse quickened. “Where was I?” “In the western kingdom,” Callen answered, and something twisted in his expression. “On the coast. With the children.” Zaria went still. The word children hit differently. Her breath caught. “Sophie and Ava.”

Callen nodded once. “You took them with you. You wouldn’t leave them behind.” His gaze held hers. “They were River’s children, Zaria.” The room tilted slightly. Not because she remembered. Because the truth landed anyway.

Zaria stared at him, hollow and aching with the wrongness of her own calm. “Do they… look like him?” Callen’s gaze flicked toward the door, as if he could see the girls’ room from where he sat.

“Sophie especially,” he admitted. “It’s in the shape of her smile. Her eyes. Ava has his steadiness when she isn’t afraid.” A pause. “And both of them… both of them had a father who loved them.”

Zaria swallowed hard. “Why did I really go back to the Isles?” Callen’s breath left him slowly. “Because of him.” Zaria’s fingers clenched. “Tell me.”

Callen’s voice dipped, quieter. More intimate, more brutal. “You went back because you loved him enough to risk your life to save him. You wouldn’t accept the idea that he was gone until you saw it. Until you held it.”

Zaria stared into the space between them. “And he was already—” Callen’s jaw tightened. “Gone.” A shiver ran through Zaria, not memory, but the ghost of it. Her body responding to the outline of devastation even if her mind couldn’t supply the image.

“What did I do?” she whispered. “Tell me what I felt.” Callen’s fingers tightened around hers. “You were broken,” he murmured. “And you didn’t fall apart the way anyone would’ve forgiven you for falling apart.” His eyes burned in the low light. “You buried him on the Isles.”

Zaria’s breath hitched. “Where?” Callen’s mouth tightened. “You never told me.” Zaria stared at the ring on her hand like it might explain how she could have lived through that and still become the woman Callen loved.

“I can’t remember him,” she whispered again, smaller. Callen shifted closer, shoulder brushing hers, presence a wall at her side. “Because you paid,” he murmured. “And the book took what it wanted.” Zaria blinked, wet. Callen’s hand lifted to her cheek, thumb brushing the track of tears she hadn’t noticed.

“River wasn’t just love, Zaria. He was the moment you decided Gulshan would never get to take quietly again.” Zaria’s breath shuddered. That... that she could almost feel. Not River himself, but the outline of fury. The shape of a vow etched into her bones.

Her eyes lifted. “Do you remember him?” Callen exhaled slowly. “Yes.” His mouth tightened, honesty costing him. “And no, we weren’t friendly.” A flicker of something dark crossed his gaze. “We were more like adversaries than anything else. Two men who wanted the same thing.”

Zaria’s throat tightened. “But… you cared.” Callen’s gaze held hers. “There was a fondness,” he admitted. “A shared purpose. Loving you. Loving Cillian.” The words landed like a confession he hadn’t wanted to make. Zaria’s eyes widened slightly. “He took care of Cillian.”

Callen’s face tightened, pain cutting through. “He did. He treated him like his own son.” A pause, then the truth, steady and unflinching. “And that’s why I do the same for Sophie and Ava. Not out of charity. Out of respect. Out of love. Out of understanding what it means to raise a child that was never supposed to be yours and choosing them anyway.”

A sob tried to climb Zaria’s throat. It wasn’t grief. Or maybe it was, in the only way her body could still perform it. “I feel like there’s a door inside me that should open and it won’t.” she whispered, shaking.

Callen’s arm wrapped around her slowly, pulling her into his chest. “Then I’ll carry the grief,” he murmured against her hair. “Until you can.” Zaria’s fingers gripped his tunic. “That isn’t fair.” Callen’s breath hitched. “Nothing about this is fair.”

She stayed pressed to him, letting his steadiness do what memory refused. Then, slowly, she pulled back just enough to see him. Callen’s eyes were on her mouth, like he’d forgotten how to breathe anywhere else.

Zaria leaned in again and kissed him the way she wished she could fix things, by closing every distance, by pressing her broken places against his steadiness until they remembered how to hold. Deep. Unhurried. Devastating.

Her mouth moved with intention, not desperation, though the desperation lived underneath it, trembling in her chest. Their breaths tangled. The kiss turned molten, turned intimate, turned necessary.

And when she shifted, when she climbed into his lap and settled over him, Callen went rigid beneath her like his body knew exactly what was coming even if his mind was still trying to behave.

“Zaria… we can’t.” His voice came out rough, strained. “It’s too soon.” She didn’t answer with words. She kissed him again, harder this time, like she could drown the ache if she just went deep enough.

Because the emptiness in her wasn’t poetic. It was a hollow thing. A cavern that echoed with grief and fear and everything she couldn’t carry another minute longer. Her fingers found the hem of his shirt and tugged, impatient, trembling with need. Fabric lifted. Skin met air.

Callen’s gaze darkened, gold catching in the low light. His hands rose, caught her wrists, not harsh, only desperate with restraint. “Zaria,” he whispered, like a warning and a plea braided together.

She shook her head once, eyes shining. “Let me have this,” she breathed. “I need this.” His jaw flexed. A swallow worked down his throat like it hurt. Then his grip loosened. A slow nod. A quiet unraveling.

Zaria’s hands slid over him, learning and claiming in the same breath. Fingertips tracing lines she’d memorized. She let her nails graze lightly, just enough to make him suck in a sharp breath, just enough to remind him he was still a man who could be wanted, not only a prince who had to be careful.

She slipped from his lap to her knees between his legs, the move graceful and deliberate, like a vow spoken without ceremony. Callen stilled, every muscle taut, his hands braced on the edge of the cushion as if he didn’t trust himself not to reach too fast.

Zaria looked up once, checking his control, his eyes. He was watching her like she was holy and dangerous. Fabric rustled and then she held him, in both hands. She was slow at first, until she found his perfect rhythm. Up. down, again.

One of his hands lifted, hovering near her hair as if asking a question he couldn’t bring himself to voice. Zaria leaned into that touch at the nape of her neck, then threading upward, fingers weaving into her hair with steady intent.

Then her mouth claimed him. All breath and heat. Her fingers still working. Callen’s restraint slipping a fraction at a time, giving way to something darker, rawer. Something he only allowed himself when it was her.

His breathing turned rough. His head tipped back once, and a low sound left him—helpless, pleased, wrecked—like her name lived in the back of his throat and he couldn’t decide whether to pray or beg.

Zaria kept going, steady and patient, letting the moment stretch, letting him fall apart in pieces instead of all at once, like she was rebuilding him with every breath she stole. Callen’s hand tightened in her hair, then loosened again, the motion controlled, his only anchor.

His eyes found hers, golden and wicked. When he finally broke, it wasn’t messy. It was earned. A shudder that ran through him like lightning searching for ground.

A sharp inhale that turned into her name. His fingers flexed, not pulling, just holding her close as the last of it passed, as if he couldn’t stand the idea of her being anywhere else while he came undone.

When it was over, he leaned forward, breathing hard and Zaria stayed there a moment longer, catching her breath.

Then she rose slowly, wiping a thumb across the corner of her mouth without thinking. Eyes never leaving his. Callen tracked the motion with blatant hunger. “Now,” he murmured, voice low and promising, “it’s my turn.”

His hands slid to her waist, pulling her back into his lap as if he’d decided he was done pretending he could survive without her. Zaria’s breath hitched when his mouth found the sensitive place beneath her jaw.

He kissed there once. Then again, then lower. He laid her on the settee, making his way down her body. She let Callen’s hands, his mouth, his steady presence pull her into sensation, into need, into warmth, until the hollow inside her blurred at the edges and became something she could survive.