The ritual chamber lay beneath the Council's hall a place older than any empire, carved from obsidian and lined with veins of light.
It was said that only two kinds of people ever entered this room: those about to be crowned… and those about to be bound.
Tonight, Aster was the latter.
I stood at the edge of the circle, my wrists wrapped in silver bands that pulsed faintly with my heartbeat. Every breath I took stirred the runes around us alive, hungry, waiting.
Aster knelt within the center of the sigil, head bowed, cloak draped across his shoulders like wings. The light reflected off the scar along his cheek, turning it to molten gold.
The High Seer's voice filled the chamber.
"Commander Aster of the Celestial Division, do you understand the vow you are about to take?"
"I do."
"You bind yourself to the vessel of the Black Sun. His strength and his ruin shall be your own. His light, your burden. His fall, your death."
"I understand," Aster said again, steady, unshaken.
I couldn't. My voice broke. "Stop you don't have to do this."
He looked up at me then really looked. And in that gaze, all the unspoken years of duty, pain, and silent care collided.
"I do," he said softly. "Because I already made this choice the day I found you."
Before I could reply, the Seer began the invocation.
Light erupted white and gold, spinning like fireflies, then sinking into Aster's skin. Sigils crawled up his arms, across his neck, into his heart.
And from mine, the darkness answered the pulse of the Black Sun rising to meet it.
Our powers collided light and shadow screaming into each other, forming a bridge between us, invisible yet alive.
I felt him.
Not his thoughts, but his essence the calm beneath the storm, the guilt he carried like armor, the unyielding devotion that burned even through fear.
Then the pain struck.
My body convulsed as the mark across my chest flared black, spilling light that wasn't light. Aster gritted his teeth, blood streaking his lip, but he didn't pull away. He reached for me instead his hand finding mine, fingers locking tight.
The Seer's voice rose above the storm.
"By the stars that burn and the void that binds, the oath is sealed. Keeper and Vessel, joined in fate until death."
Silence.
The light dimmed. The air stilled.
Aster collapsed to one knee, breathing hard. The sigils across his skin flickered once, then settled into faint, glowing lines mirrored by the dark ones etched into mine.
I knelt beside him. "You shouldn't have"
He pressed a hand against my chest over the mark. "It's done."
Our eyes met. The bond pulsed once between us not pain, but something deeper.
Understanding.
Resonance.
A silent promise neither of us dared speak.
The Seer dismissed us with a whisper. "Heaven watches now. Do not give it reason to strike."
As we stepped out into the cold night, the wind carried the scent of rain and iron.
Aster looked toward the burning horizon. "From now on, if you fall…"
"I know," I said quietly. "You fall with me."
He nodded once.
"But I won't let that happen."
And for the first time, he smiled faint, tired, but real.
The bond between us thrummed in the silence.
A thread of fate, glowing faintly in the dark.