“I don’t need to trust her.”
“You still remember what the last Purna did.” His voice is low.
The ghost of her brushes the edges of my mind like a whisper I’ve learned not to answer. I don’t reply. Instead, I roll the map away and glance down at my forearm.
“Sabrina,” I say at last.
Her name slips between my teeth like a blade dulled by time, but it cuts anyway.
“I remember everything,” I say quietly.
Sabrina had been beautiful in a dangerous way, like the edge of a ritual dagger. All grace and gravity, cloaked in silk and secrets. She never raised her voice. Never had to. She won rooms with a glance, twisted Council chambers into knots with half-truths and carefully planted doubt. I loved that about her. Now I hate it.
I thought I could handle her. I thought she saw me, not just the crown, not just the legacy. She touched my chest once and told me that if I ever stopped carrying the weight of Velcryn, my shoulders would collapse. I didn’t realize until too late she was studying where to strike.
She vanished after feeding the border coordinates to our enemies. My brother nearly died from the ambush that followed. The blade they left in his side was laced with spell poison and Vrakken sigils—mine.
I hunted her through half the realm. Found her deep in the ice caverns, cloaked in stolen runes. I gave her a warrior’s death. No one else knows that. No one else needs to.
So yes. I remember.
And now, fate delivers another Purna to my gates. Not a spy, not yet, but a firewalker. The kind that doesn’t break easily. That might be worse.
The bond stirs again beneath my skin, quieter this time, almost reverent. As if it’s waiting for her.
And I don’t know which terrifies me more: that it will awaken… or that it already has.
“She was nothing like this one,” I add. “She came smiling. This one comes furious for what I have heard.”
“That doesn’t mean she’s safe.”
“No,” I agree. “But it might mean she’s honest.”
I roll the map away and glance at my forearm. A faint shimmer dances beneath the skin, like smoke beneath glass.
The bond magic is stirring again. “It should still be dormant. Barely formed. But even at this distance, something old is waking. It knows her. Or wants to.
“She’s not like the last one,” Garrick says again, watching me carefully. “But if you form the bond, even partially... there’s no going back.”
“She doesn’t know what she’s asking,” I murmur.
“She will. Soon.”
I nod once. Then look up, meeting his eyes. “When she arrives, escort her directly to me. No ceremonial delays.”
Garrick hesitates. “And if the bond responds?”
I don’t look at the shimmer again. “Then may the gods help us both.”
Garrick's voice is quiet as he closes the map case. “Zeidan… if you let that bond take root, you know what that means.”
I turn, gaze sharp.
“Once it takes hold, it doesn’t let go easily.”
The bond doesn’t care about strategy. It’s not a treaty. It’s a chain forged in magic older than memory, older than either of us. Once it takes hold, it won’t be negotiated; it will demand.
It will twist who we are, until we don’t remember what was choice and what was compulsion. I know the risks. I studied the stories, even the ones we’re forbidden to write down.