First-Person: Nyra
The forest is quiet tonight, too quiet.
Even the wind seems to hold its breath.
Kael sits across from me by the fire, his expression distant, unreadable. We've been training for hours, but the bond hasn't settled. It pulses beneath my skin like a heartbeat that isn't mine, tugging at something deep and unguarded.
"Again?" I ask.
He shakes his head. "No more tonight."
His tone is calm, but I can feel the tension rippling through him. The mark on his chest is still faintly lit, answering the rhythm of mine.
"What happens if we stop fighting it?" I ask quietly.
His eyes lift, catching the firelight. "We don't stop. Not until we can control it."
"And if control isn't what it wants?"
He doesn't answer, but I see the muscle in his jaw tighten. The silence between us hums with too many things neither of us will name.
The bond stirs again, uninvited. The energy rises, curling through me in slow, steady waves. I can feel his heartbeat now — not through sight or sound, but through that invisible thread that links us. It's uneven, too fast.
He feels it too. I know because his breath falters.
"Nyra," he says, voice rough. "Don't."
"I'm not doing anything."
His gaze darkens. "You're feeling. That's enough."
The fire crackles, and the world seems to close in around us — just him, me, and the heat we can't contain.
I try to pull away from the bond, to shut it down, but it only answers harder, surging between us until the air itself hums with it. The pull is magnetic, aching, inevitable.
Kael curses softly under his breath and stands, as if distance will help. It doesn't. The bond stretches, reaching for him like light reaching for its reflection.
"Kael," I whisper, "it's not stopping."
He turns toward me, and the look in his eyes is raw — a mix of control and surrender, of fear and need. "Then we don't stop it," he says quietly.
The power flares, catching both of us in its wake. My vision blurs with light, warmth, and the dizzying rush of shared sensation. The bond threads through every breath, every heartbeat, every thought, until I can't tell where I end and he begins.
It's too much — too bright, too human, too wild.
And then it breaks. Not violently, but with the quiet inevitability of a tide giving in to the shore. The world tilts, and the energy rushes out in a single breath that feels like falling.
When the light fades, Kael is on one knee, breathing hard. The glow of our marks has dimmed, but the air still hums with aftershock.
He looks up at me slowly, his voice barely steady. "Now you understand."
I swallow. "What just happened?"
"The bond claimed us both." His gaze flickers to my ribs, then back to my face. "And it won't let go."
The forest seems too still, the fire too small to contain what's left between us.
For the first time, I realize control was never the point. It was only ever the illusion before the fall.