Mr Fellmark has broken his neck and is quadriplegic. Ellara Fellmark decides to buck taboo and find someone who could help. She knows about a lore of a temple in the mountains with a healer. She decides to travel to the ☶ Mountain Sanctum to find this temple.
She sticks to living off the land, which is easy for her. She finds crude maps with directions to a large structure. She goes in that direction.
She's in sight of the structure, but falls and breaks her leg badly. Patrols find her and bring her to Garrick. The structure she was heading towards was his manor in the mountains.
Garrick heals her and nurses her, keeping her around because he feels the weight of the world lift off his shoulders in her presence. They fall for each other. He tries to resist because of Zudaeshi but they have sex anyway.
She is healed enough to get home with a mountain mule, so they part ways. She wants desperately to get home to help her family.
She goes home and euthanizes her father. She just had to try everything she could to help, but couldn't find help.
“He was in pain. The Sky-Touched wouldn’t come. I… didn’t want him to die afraid. So I made sure he didn’t. That’s what love does, isn’t it? Makes you a monster for someone else’s peace.”
She discovers her brother and sister don't need her anymore. They flourished in her absence (unknowingly because the talisman was away from them) and they are capable of taking care of themselves now. They were a sickly, struggling family but they seem stronger without her.
She decides to go back to Garrick and see if they can make something together. She arrives and finds the place has been sacked. A remaining servant tells her that the Zudaeshi believes Garrick is hers and was furious to find out he had slept with another person, and human no less. She has captured him and has him locked in her palace.
She decides to go to the palace and observe and see if there is a way to save him.