Betrayed by My Ex, Marked by His Alpha Emperor Brother novel Chapter 135

Chapter 135: Chapter 135

Elara’s POV

Snapping out of my daze in the tavern, I stared at Finnian’s cheerful message on the communication stone until the glowing letters blurred.

The tavern noise faded. The laughter, the clinking mugs, the crackle of the hearth—all of it dissolved into a dull hum beneath the pounding in my ears.

Ela. Long time no see.

Such simple words. Casual. Warm. The kind of message you sent to an old friend on a quiet evening when life was ordinary and whole. He had no idea. He couldn’t possibly know that the woman reading his words was sitting in a stranger’s tavern with nothing but a half-empty coin purse and a bag of clothes, running from the wreckage of her own life.

My thumbs hovered over the stone’s surface. I drafted three different replies on the stone’s surface and erased each one.

I’m fine, just busy.

Erased.

Things have been difficult.

Erased.

I left my children tonight and I can’t stop shaking.

Erased.

I pressed my forehead against the cool surface of the communication stone and closed my eyes. The young mother at the next table was humming now, rocking her smaller child against her shoulder. The sound was a knife turning slowly between my ribs.

I traced the words again. Kept it short.

"Can I come see you?"

I stared at those five words for what felt like endless moments. My finger rested on the edge of the stone, hovering over the sending rune. One press. One small motion. And I’d be committing to this—to the direction, the distance, the finality of moving farther from the capital instead of turning back.

The young mother kissed her child’s hair. He made a soft, sleepy sound against her neck.

I pressed the sending rune.

The reply came instantly. As if he’d been sitting there with the stone in his hand, waiting.

"Ela!! Of course!! When? I’ll come get you. Where are you?"

Three exclamation marks. I could hear his voice through the glowing letters—that open, uncomplicated enthusiasm that had never once made me feel like I owed him something in return. Finnian didn’t calculate. He didn’t weigh costs. He just gave.

"No need to come get me. I’ll take the public coaches. I should arrive by tomorrow evening."

"Don’t be ridiculous, those coaches are terrible. Let me drive out to meet you halfway at least—"

"Finnian. I’m fine. I’ll message you when I’m close."

A pause. Then: "Alright. But you message me at every stop. Promise me, Ela."

"I promise."

I tucked the stone back into my bag. Paid for the ale I hadn’t touched. Pulled my hood up and stepped back into the night.

The next coach was already waiting at the edge of town—a smaller, rougher vehicle than the first, with a cracked leather bench and a door that didn’t close all the way. I wedged myself inside. Two other passengers sat across from me: a man with mud-caked boots who smelled of livestock, and an older woman clutching a basket of turnips to her chest like it contained gold.

The coach lurched forward. I braced my arm against the wall and watched the dark countryside slide past through the gap where the door didn’t seal.

Fields. Hedgerows. The occasional distant flicker of a farmhouse window. The world beyond the capital was quieter than I remembered. Emptier. The kind of emptiness that pressed against your skin and made the thoughts louder.

Kaelen has found the letter by now.

The certainty settled over me like cold water. He would have gone to the nursery eventually. He always checked on Lyra before he retired, even on the nights when we didn’t speak, even during the worst of the silence between us. He’d push open the door, glance at her crib, and see the folded paper on the table beside it.

I imagined his hand reaching for it. The crease forming between his brows. The way those dark gold eyes would move across my handwriting—slow at first, then faster as the meaning hit.

Would he send the guards? Would he dispatch riders to every road leaving the capital?

Or would he stand there in the nursery with the letter in his fist and feel nothing but the confirmation of what he’d always expected—that everyone he let close enough to matter would eventually leave?

My chest cramped. I pressed my knuckles against my mouth and bit down.

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