Cyrus lay in his massive bed, staring at the ceiling through the darkness.
Sleep eluded him as fragmented images played behind his closed eyes—Kane walking away, Kane's empty office, Kane's laughter fading into silence.
Cyrus shifted restlessly against the silk sheets, his jaw clenched with frustration.
The rational part of his mind insisted these were merely echoes of the day's separation, nothing more than the residual anxiety from their severed bond.
But something deeper gnawed at him—a hollow ache that had nothing to do with karmic magic and everything to do with the fox spirit's absence from his carefully ordered world.
Was this simply the aftermath of their supernatural connection? Some lingering attachment born from shared trials and forced proximity?
Or had something fundamental shifted between them, something that transcended debt and obligation?
