Delicate curling lines in ink-dark silver spiral outward like vines growing from a wound. Runes are laced through it…some Nytherian, some Vrakken, some I’ve never seen. The pattern shifts ever so slightly as I breathe, as if syncing itself to my rhythm. It is beautiful. And terrifying, graceful, sharp, ancient, and alive. I wonder how long we will survive before the mating bond decides to make us consummate it, to pursue it fully…
Across the room, Zeidan settles into his bed with a grunt. The bond pulses faintly and I feel it—his soreness, the burn in his limbs, the tightness in his spine. I shift on my side and close my eyes, trying to will the sensations away.
But they stay. Not painful. Just… present. Like a second body beneath my skin.
I can feel his thoughts brushing mine at the edges. Not words. Not images. Just the shape of him. Tired, guarded and conflicted.
And then something softer. A flicker of warmth that catches me off guard. Just a quiet recognition. A curiosity. I hold my breath and feel his echoing mine.
Neither of us speaks. Neither of us moves. But the bond stretches between our beds like a thread pulled taut. I shift again, and the air between us stirs charged and aware.
Eventually, I close my eyes, but it isn’t sleep that comes. It’s awareness. Of him. Of the way our magic hums in the same key now. Of how nothing will ever be fully mine again.
Then I feel it.
A flicker beneath the sigil at my collarbone. The one that ties me to Nytheria. It hums, just once, but it’s stronger than before. I sit up sharply.
Zeidan’s voice cuts through the silence. “What is it?”
I press my fingers to the mark. “The blight. The connection… it’s stronger. Just slightly, but it’s there.”
He stares across at me, his onyx eyes unreadable. But I feel his reaction through the bond: startled.
“It worked,” I whisper. “At least in part.”
His exhale is shaky but quiet. “Then we’re not too late.”
I shift slightly under the sheets, unable to stop the flutter beneath my skin. The bond is still active, but calmer now, like it’s watching us, waiting.
Zeidan’s voice cuts through the dark, softer than before. “You feel it too, don’t you?”
My throat is dry. “Yes.”
Another pause. Then: “It’s like standing in someone else’s skin.”
I stare up at the carved ceiling. “You’re too cold,” I murmur. “I can feel the tension in your spine. You hold yourself too tightly.”
He exhales, a slow sound. “And you’re too warm. You run like a fire even when you sleep.”
I bite the inside of my cheek, but the words come anyway. “You’re not what I expected.”
A beat. “Neither are you.”
The silence after that hums with something unspoken.
“I thought I’d feel… invaded,” I admit. “But this is different.”
He exhales slowly. Not a sigh, but a measured release.
“Different how?”
I hesitate. “Close.”
His jaw tightens at that. “Too close,” he says. Then, after a pause, “And not wrong.”
He doesn’t explain.
I turn onto my side to face him. He’s already watching me, though the space between the beds still feels charged, deliberate. Moonlight catches the sharp line of his jaw, the hollow at his throat. His hair hangs loose past his shoulders, untied for sleep.