Married My Enemy To Save My Family
Chapter 55.Truce of Embers

Chapter 55: 55.Truce of Embers

The sea had quieted by morning, but the estate was a ruin of echoes and unanswered questions. Smoke still curled from a scorched section of the east wing, where Kael had vanished into darkness after triggering the power collapse. Emergency lighting flickered, the estate’s once-grand systems running on backup cores. Silence had settled again, but it wasn’t peace. It was the breath held between battles.

In the aftermath, they had split into silence.

Elara found herself back in the sitting room, now stripped of elegance, glass cracked from plasma bursts, soot clinging to drapes. She sat on the edge of the chaise, her eyes on the blood-dark stain left where Nova had taken a grazing hit to the arm. Nova had insisted she was fine.

Valen stood across the room, arms folded, watching the sea through the cracked windows. Aeron had disappeared sometime before dawn, saying he needed air. No one stopped him.

Elara broke the silence first. "So this is what survival feels like."

Valen didn’t turn. "Feels more like a draw."

"I’m not sure we even tied," she said, voice hoarse.

A soft knock at the door made her look up.

It was Damien. He entered quietly, holding a datapad and a grim expression. "System scans show no life signs in the outer perimeter anymore. Kael’s gone. For now."

Valen finally turned. "And the estate?"

"Damaged, but holding. I’ve sealed off the old tunnels. Rewired comms. We’re invisible again."

Elara raised an eyebrow. "For how long?"

Damien sighed. "Depends on how badly he wants to find you again."

Her. Not us.

The weight of it pressed on her chest.

They gathered at noon in the central solarium, its glass canopy mostly intact, the light casting fractured shadows across the table. Nova had her arm in a sling. Damien’s fingers were still stained with machine grease. Aeron returned mid-meeting, face pale, lips pressed tight. No one asked where he’d gone.

"I don’t like it," Nova said, pacing behind her chair. "He could be watching us even now."

"He’s not just watching," Damien muttered. "He’s studying."

"And waiting," Aeron added, finally speaking. "He won’t stop until one of us is dead."

Valen’s voice was calm, cool. "Then we need a plan. But for that, we need each other."

Elara studied his expression. He was offering a rare thing: honesty.

Nova sat, finally. "So we call it what it is. A truce. No secrets. No backdoors."

Valen looked directly at Aeron. "Even from you."

Aeron’s gaze was unreadable. "You think I’m still compromised."

Valen shrugged. "Aren’t you?"

"Not by them," Aeron said, then glanced at Elara. "Not anymore."

The silence that followed was sharp.

Elara exhaled. "Then let’s do it. A truce. Until we figure out our next move."

They all nodded. But trust, true trust, was still far off.

That night, the estate was still. The kind of quiet that wasn’t safe, just tired.

Elara stood in the hallway outside the guest rooms, her footsteps muffled by the thick carpet. She found herself pausing near Aeron’s door. Her hand hovered near the frame. But she didn’t knock.

She turned and walked away.

Not far down the hall, Valen was already standing in the moonlit sitting room, a drink in his hand, half-gone. When he saw her, he said nothing—just gestured to the seat across from him.

She took it.

They sat for a while in silence, listening to the sea thrum against the cliffs.

Then Valen finally said, "You looked scared last night."

Elara didn’t deny it. "I was."

"Of him?"

"No," she said quietly. "Of losing him."

Valen’s jaw clenched. "You love him."

She didn’t look away. "I don’t know what I feel. He’s part of something I didn’t choose. But he sees me. And he still stays."

Valen took a slow sip. "And what do I do?"

"You protect me," she whispered. "Even when I don’t ask. Even when I hurt you."

He gave a half-laugh, bitter and soft. "That’s the curse, isn’t it? Loving someone who doesn’t need saving."

Elara leaned back, staring up at the broken stars through the shattered skylight.

"You asked me once if I saw a future with you," she said.

Valen turned to her sharply. "And?"

"I don’t know if I see any future at all," she murmured. "But if I did... you’d be in it."

That hurt him. She saw it. But he smiled anyway.

Later, Elara finally found Aeron in the greenhouse wing, near the broken fountain. Moonlight spilled over him, painting silver across his shoulders.

"You didn’t come to the truce," she said, approaching slowly.

"I didn’t need to. I already chose you."

She sat beside him. "That’s not what the truce was about."

"I know," he said. "But I’ve made too many choices for others. I’m trying to stop doing that."

They were quiet for a moment.

Then Aeron turned, his voice low. "Kael was the version of me that didn’t break. He didn’t fall in love. He didn’t question orders. He was perfect."

"And you?" Elara asked.

He reached out, brushing his fingers across hers.

"I was the one who learned how to fall."

She leaned her head against his shoulder. "I’m tired of falling."

"Then maybe it’s time we learn how to stand."

Far away, in an Architect enclave, cold, steel, and silent, Kael stood before a glowing wall of holograms. The estate pulsed on one of them. On another: Elara’s face.

Behind him, a voice echoed through the darkness.

"She is not the mission."

Kael’s voice was cold. "She is the deviation."

The voice paused. "Then do what is necessary."

Kael stared at the image of Aeron. "He has something I want."

"Then take it."

The screen blinked, and the image changed.

To a facility.

Buried deep in the ice of a distant moon.

A project long dormant began to stir.

Back in the estate, Elara stood alone in the upper tower before dawn.

She had watched the stars shift overhead, wondering if any of them were still real—or just illusions built to make her feel small.

Behind her, two footfalls. She didn’t turn.

Aeron’s voice. "Couldn’t sleep?"

She shook her head.

He stood beside her, not touching.

Then quietly, "When this ends, where will you go?"

Elara looked up at him. "Will it end?"

A beat.

"I don’t know," he said. "But if it does, I don’t want to go alone."

She turned, placing her hand against his chest. "Then stay."

In the stillness, in the hush of something not quite love, not yet peace, they kissed.

Not a war.

Not yet surrender.

Something in between.

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