The world outside the tower is unchanged — gray skies, bare branches, silence. But Haera feels different now.
Something has shifted.
The air hums around her like the pause before a thunderclap.
---
In the days that follow, everything sharpens.
The dreams come faster. Clearer.
She wakes with names in her mouth she never learned.
Esmée. Rhyse. Delora.
In one life, she was a healer with ink-stained fingers. In another, a warrior queen who rode into battle with Kael at her side. In yet another… she was neither hero nor lover — just a girl who died too young, waiting for a promise to be kept.
The common thread in all those lives?
A kiss.
---
Not a passionate one.
Not always romantic.
But a kiss that marked the moment before something ended — or began.
---
It happens again on a Thursday.
She's in the library.
Alone, or so she thinks.
Cairos appears beside her, holding a book she doesn't remember picking out: Echoes and Their Vows.
He sits across from her without speaking.
And for a while, they just stare — not at each other, but through.
---
"I remember more now," she finally says.
He nods, quietly.
"I remember that in one life, you died for me. And in another… I died because of you."
"I know."
"And in one… we both chose other people."
He closes his eyes. "That was the hardest."
---
The air thickens.
She whispers, "Why do we keep finding each other?"
His eyes — storm-colored and exhausted — lock onto hers.
"Because some souls don't stop loving. Even when they should."
---
He leans forward, just slightly. Enough for her to see it coming.
But this time, it isn't déjà vu.
It's choice.
She lets him.
Their lips meet softly — not out of desperation, but recognition.
And suddenly, she's not in the library.
---
She's in a cathedral.
A battlefield.
A sun-drenched courtyard.
A rainy train station.
Different versions of her. Different versions of him.
And the same kiss.
Over and over.
A memory written in skin, not words.
---
When the vision breaks, they pull apart.
Both are breathless.
Not from passion. But from the weight of it all.
"I don't know what to do with all of this," she says.
"You don't have to yet," he replies. "Just… stay. In this life. With me. For now."
---
Haera stares at him.
"I'll stay," she says. "But I won't belong to you."
He nods, quietly. "Fair."
---
That night, her dreams shift.
She's no longer watching from the outside.
She is Lilienne. And Haera. And all the others.
And this time, she doesn't die.
She fights.
She speaks.
She chooses.