KAEL'S POV
The chains were mine.
I could feel them now—cold, thick links, coiled through my blood, cinched around my bones. Every breath rattled against iron that wasn't there. Every beat of my heart struck like a hammer on a lock I couldn't break.
The abyss whispered through those chains. Not as an enemy clawing at me, but as something older, patient, intimate.
You fight me as though I am separate. But I am your marrow now. I am the shadow that sharpened your rage, the silence that steadied your hand, the hunger that carried you through every battlefield. You don't drive me out. You starve without me.
My teeth ground together. I bore them to the dark. "I am not yours."
The laugh rolled inside my skull. Then why do you wear my chains so well?
Pain tore through me as it yanked—veins straining, silver light splintering. My wolf howled, thrashing against the grip. But the abyss clamped harder, and the sound cut off like a chokehold around the throat.
Through the haze, I saw her.
