Elira moved before she realized she had decided to.
Her body shifted, weight rolling to the balls of her feet, knees bending slightly, breath slowing. The motion was smooth. Practiced. Wrong.
She froze.
The corridor ahead was empty. The broken door at the far end hung crooked on its hinges. The men who had come for her lay unconscious or fled. Silence pressed in, thick and watchful.
Elira's heart pounded as she straightened, every muscle screaming awareness.
"I didn't tell myself to do that," she whispered.
Kael did not answer.
That was worse.
She took a step forward. Then another. Her body adjusted with each movement, automatically seeking balance, reading shadows, calculating distance. She felt it happening in real time, like her instincts had been rewritten while she wasn't looking.
"Kael," she said, louder. "Stop."
A pause.
Then his voice slid through her, calm and precise.
You are alive because your body is learning. Do not insult it by panicking.
Her stomach twisted. "You changed me."
I used what was available.
"That's not an answer."
It is the only one that matters.
Elira swallowed and forced herself to keep walking. The corridor opened into a larger space beyond, half storage, half staging area. Crates lined the walls. Emergency lights buzzed overhead, casting everything in a sickly yellow glow.
Blood smeared the concrete where she'd fought.
Her blood.
The sight made her dizzy.
She leaned against a crate, breathing through the nausea. Her wrist throbbed, the wound still open, still warm.
Kael's attention sharpened immediately.
Do not bleed like that, he said. You are not a waste.
Her hands clenched. "Don't talk about me like I'm a resource."
A faint pressure slid along her spine, not painful, but unmistakable.
You are a vessel. That is not an insult. It is a function.
Elira closed her eyes, fighting the urge to scream.
"What happens now?" she asked.
Kael did not respond right away. She felt him assessing, measuring the space, the air, the lingering echo of danger.
Now, he said finally, we leave.
Her eyes snapped open. "We?"
There is no other arrangement.
She pushed off the crate and started toward the exit without arguing. If leaving meant distance from the bodies, the blood, the chanting echoing in her memory, she would take it.
They moved quickly through the building, Kael guiding her with subtle pressure rather than force. A turn before she thought of it. A pause before a corner. Her body obeyed without conscious command, as if she had been trained in her sleep.
Each time it happened, something inside her recoiled.
They slipped out a side door into the cold night. The city greeted her with indifference. Wet pavement. Flickering streetlights. The distant hum of traffic.
Elira staggered as fresh air hit her lungs.
She bent over, hands on her knees, trying to ground herself.
"Don't do that again," she said hoarsely. "Don't move me without warning."
Kael was silent for a long moment.
Then, you will learn the difference between control and cooperation. Tonight was not the time for permission.
Her jaw tightened. "So this is how it's going to be."
This is how survival works.
They walked. Not aimlessly. Kael directed her through alleys and side streets, avoiding main roads, steering her away from cameras she hadn't noticed until she passed them.
Eventually, they reached a nondescript apartment building squeezed between two shuttered shops. The kind of place people forgot existed.
Elira unlocked the door to a vacant unit she recognized with a jolt of confusion.
"I've never been here," she said.
You have passed it dozens of times, Kael replied. You remember paths even when you do not remember destinations.
The door creaked open.
Inside, the apartment was bare but clean. A mattress on the floor. A chair. Running water. Someone had prepared it.
That realization sent a chill down her spine.
"They planned this," she whispered. "Didn't they?"
Yes. No hesitation. The council plans many outcomes. They did not plan for me.
Elira shut the door behind her and slid down against it, legs shaking.
Her body finally gave in.
She curled in on herself, pressing her forehead to her knees. The adrenaline drained, leaving only pain and exhaustion behind.
Her wrist burned. Her head ached. Her chest felt too tight to breathe correctly.
"I can't keep doing this," she said quietly. "I can't fight. I can't let you use me like that."
Kael's presence shifted, closer, heavier.
You misunderstand, he said. I am not preparing you to fight. I am preparing you to endure.
Her throat closed.
"I don't want to endure," she whispered. "I want my life back."
Silence stretched between them.
When Kael spoke again, his voice was lower, stripped of amusement.
Your life ended the moment your blood answered mine.
Elira's eyes burned. "You could have let me die."
Yes.
The word landed hard.
"Why didn't you?"
Kael did not answer immediately.
She felt him withdraw slightly, not in distance, but in depth, like something coiling back to consider whether the truth was worth giving.
Finally, he said:
Because you survived the call.
Her breath hitched. "What call?"
The summoning was not meant to awaken me. It was meant to test vessels. Most die before they are heard—a pause. You were heard.
Elira hugged herself tighter. "So I was… compatible."
You were chosen, Kael corrected.
"That's not better."
It is worse, he agreed calmly.
She laughed then, a short, broken sound that surprised her. "Of course it is."
Her body shuddered as exhaustion pulled her down. She lay back on the mattress without fully deciding to, staring at the cracked ceiling.
Minutes passed—maybe more.
Her breathing slowed.
Just as she thought Kael had gone quiet again, his voice returned, softer, closer.
You should sleep. Fear weakens you. Hunger weakens you. Exhaustion weakens you. I will not have my vessel compromised by neglect.
Her eyes fluttered. "You care now?"
I invest.
That word chilled her more than cruelty ever could.
Elira turned her head toward the wall, tears slipping silently into her hair.
"Kael," she said, barely audible. "If I survive this… will I ever be free of you?"
The bond tightened, not painfully, but definitively.
No.
Her chest hollowed.
Before she could ask anything else, he added:
But you will become something no one can take from me.
Her eyes snapped open. "What does that mean?"
Kael did not answer.
Outside, somewhere in the city, a siren wailed and faded.
Inside the apartment, Elira lay awake, staring into the dark, understanding with quiet terror that staying alive had already begun to cost her more than dying ever would.