Calla's POV
Eraxis's hand touches the door lock.
"Wait!" I grab his arm. "Something's wrong. I can feel it."
Through the bond, Eraxis feels my certainty—my Guardian magic screaming warnings. He hesitates, his hand hovering over the lock.
"Calla, Theron is my student. I've known him for over a century—"
"And Morvess was your mentor for longer than that," I interrupt. "You trusted her completely. How did that work out?"
His face goes pale. Through the bond, I feel the impact of my words hitting him like a physical blow.
Outside, Theron screams: "They're breaking through! Eraxis, please! I don't want to die!"
The sound of his terror is convincing. Too convincing.
"He's lying," I say with absolute certainty. "My magic knows it. Can't you feel it through the bond? There's corruption magic mixed with his voice. Someone's helping him sound more desperate than he really is."
Eraxis closes his eyes, focusing. Through our connection, I feel him extending his senses beyond the door, reading the magical signatures in the air.
Then his eyes snap open, blazing with fury.
"You're right. There are three different magical signatures out there—Theron's, and two others using illusion magic to fake sounds of attack." His jaw clenches so hard I hear his teeth grind. "He's working with Morvess. My own student is a traitor."
The betrayal hits him like a knife to the chest. I feel his pain bleeding through the bond—another person he trusted, another person who lied.
"I'm sorry," I whisper.
"Don't be." His voice turns cold, deadly. "I should have seen it. He's been too eager to volunteer for missions, too interested in my investigations. He was reporting everything back to Morvess."
The door shudders again. Theron's voice changes, drops the fake panic: "I know you can hear me, Eraxis. I know you've figured it out. But it doesn't matter. Morvess has you surrounded. Open the door and surrender the Guardian witch, or we'll tear your fortress apart stone by stone."
Eraxis's hand moves away from the lock. Instead, he traces symbols on the door that glow with silver light. "Sealing spell. It'll hold for maybe an hour."
"Then what?"
"Then they break through and we fight." He turns to me, and his expression is grim. "But first, you need to understand something about your father's condition. About why Morvess went to such elaborate lengths to manipulate you."
"I know she poisoned him—"
"It's more than poison." Eraxis walks to where Papa is still unconscious, lying on a bench near the wall. He holds his hand over Papa's chest, and silver light reveals the threads connecting to my father's life force. "Look. Really look."
I focus my Guardian sight, and what I see makes my stomach drop.
Papa's thread isn't just corrupted. It's been systematically destroyed over the course of years—not to kill him, but to keep him in a state of slow, agonizing decline. The curse-rot was designed to be visible enough that I'd watch him suffer, but gradual enough that I'd have time to get desperate.
"She wanted me to break," I whisper.
"She needed you to break," Eraxis corrects. "Guardian magic doesn't awaken from normal training or meditation. It awakens from extreme emotional trauma—specifically, from an act of forbidden love so powerful it breaks cosmic law."
The truth crashes over me. "She engineered everything. She made sure I'd love my father desperately by taking away everyone else I could love. She made sure he'd get sick slowly so I'd have time to research solutions. She even left clues about the forbidden spell in that temple—"
"Because she knew eventually, you'd be desperate enough to use it." Eraxis's expression is dark with fury. "The entire village persecution, Helena's betrayal, even the timing of the harvest festival when everyone would be distracted—all planned. You never had a choice, Calla. She's been orchestrating your awakening since you were a child."
I feel sick. Every choice I thought I made—staying in that horrible village, enduring the abuse, performing the spell—none of it was really my choice. I was a puppet on strings I couldn't even see.
"But here's what she didn't plan for," Eraxis continues, and something shifts in his voice. He takes my hand, and through the bond, I feel fierce protective determination. "She didn't plan for me to bind myself to you. She didn't plan for me to commit treason. And she definitely didn't plan for you to have an ally who knows her tricks."
"You're going to help me stop her."
"I'm going to help you destroy her." His mercury eyes blaze. "She killed my family. She killed your family. She's been manipulating us both for centuries. And now she's planning something that will unravel reality itself. We're going to end this, Calla. Together."
The fortress shakes again, harder this time. Dust rains from the ceiling.
"They're using battering magic," Eraxis says grimly. "The seal won't hold much longer. We need to wake your father and move to the inner sanctum. It's the most protected place in the fortress."
He touches Papa's forehead, and silver light flows into him. Papa gasps, his eyes snapping open.
"Calla?" He sits up quickly, wincing. "Where—what happened? The last thing I remember is Morvess—" His face goes pale. "Oh gods, Morvess. She's the one who poisoned me."
"I know, Papa." I help him stand. "And she's outside right now trying to break in and kill me. Eraxis is protecting us, but we need to move."
Papa looks at Eraxis—really looks at him—and something passes between them. Understanding. Recognition.
"You're the one from the prophecy," Papa says softly. "The Reaper who would balance the Guardian. My mother told me about you before she died. She said one day, a Reaper Prince would break his own laws to save the last Guardian, and together they would—"
The door explodes inward.
The sealing spell shatters like glass. Stone fragments fly everywhere. Eraxis throws up a shield of shadow magic that protects us from the blast, but the shield cracks under the impact.
Through the smoke and dust, I see Theron standing in the ruined doorway. He's exactly as Eraxis described—handsome, charming, with a smile that makes my skin crawl.
"Hello, Master," Theron says pleasantly. "Sorry about the door. You know how Morvess hates waiting."
Behind him, a dozen more Reapers materialize. They're all armed with shadow-blades, all radiating death-cold.
We're outnumbered twelve to one.
Eraxis moves in front of Papa and me, his own blade appearing in his hand. "Theron. I trained you better than this. Working with Morvess? Betraying everything we stand for?"
"You stand for the old order," Theron says, his smile widening. "I stand for the new one. Morvess promised me the position of Reaper Prince once she rebuilds the Loom. All I had to do was keep you distracted while she hunted down the Guardian bloodline." His eyes fix on me. "And deliver the last Guardian to her alive."
"You'll have to go through me first," Eraxis growls.
"I was hoping you'd say that." Theron's blade ignites with green fire—Morvess's corruption magic. "I've wanted to prove I'm stronger than you for decades. Now I finally get my chance."
The other Reapers move to surround us, cutting off all escape routes.
Papa grabs my arm. "Calla, I need you to listen very carefully. Your grandmother told me something before she died—something I was supposed to tell you when you awakened."
"Papa, this isn't the time—"
"This is exactly the time!" His grip tightens desperately. "She said that if the last Guardian was ever in mortal danger, trapped with no escape, there's one spell that could save everyone. But it requires the ultimate sacrifice."
Ice floods my veins. "What kind of sacrifice?"
Through the bond, I feel Eraxis's sudden spike of fear. He heard what Papa said.
"No," Eraxis says sharply. "Aldwin, don't tell her about that spell. It's forbidden for a reason—"
"What spell?" I demand.
Papa meets my eyes. "The Thread Merge. It allows a Guardian to temporarily combine their life force with a Reaper's, creating a being with the power of both Life and Death. Grandmother said it was used once, thousands of years ago, to seal away an ancient evil. But the price—"
"The price," Eraxis interrupts harshly, "is that both participants burn through their life force at impossible speed. A Guardian-Reaper merge can exist for maybe ten minutes before both souls are completely consumed."
"Ten minutes," Papa says quietly, "of godlike power. Enough to defeat any enemy. Enough to rewrite reality itself."
Theron laughs. "Are you seriously considering a suicide spell? How pathetic." He raises his corrupted blade. "Reapers, take them. Kill the old man. The Prince and the Guardian witch come with us alive."
The Reapers attack as one.
Eraxis's shadow-magic explodes outward, holding them back. But I can feel through the bond that he's already exhausted from the shadow-walk earlier. He can't hold twelve trained Reapers for long.
Papa looks at me with desperate love. "Calla, you have to do the merge. It's the only way to survive."
"It'll kill us both!" I look at Eraxis, and through the bond, I feel his absolute terror—not of dying, but of taking me with him.
"I won't do it," Eraxis says through gritted teeth, still holding off the attackers. "I won't burn through your life, Calla. I'd rather die fighting than murder you with forbidden magic."
"Even if it means Morvess wins? Even if it means she destroys the Loom and kills billions?" Papa's voice is fierce. "This is bigger than you two! This is about saving reality itself!"
The shadow-shield cracks. One Reaper breaks through and lunges at Papa.
I don't think. I just react.
My Guardian magic explodes outward, golden light smashing the Reaper backward. But the effort drains me—I'm still exhausted from fighting Morvess earlier.
I can't protect Papa. I can't fight twelve Reapers. I can barely stand.
Through the bond, Eraxis and I feel each other's desperation. Our fear. Our love.
And our terrible certainty about what has to happen next.
"The Thread Merge," I say quietly.
"Calla, no—"
"Do it." I grab his hand, the one not holding the shadow-blade. "Ten minutes of godlike power. We use it to defeat Theron and his Reapers, then we run. We find somewhere safe before the merge burns us out."
"There is no 'safe' from this spell!" Eraxis's voice breaks. "You don't understand—the merge doesn't just consume life force. It fuses our souls completely. If we do this, there's no going back. Ever. We'll be bound in ways that make our current connection look like holding hands."
"Good." I squeeze his hand tighter. "Because I choose you, Eraxis. I choose this bond. I choose fighting beside you, even if it means burning bright for ten minutes instead of living dim for decades."
Through the bond, he feels my absolute certainty.
And his walls crumble completely.
"Damn you," he whispers. Then his lips crash against mine in a kiss that tastes like starlight and death and desperate love.
The moment our lips touch, the Thread Merge activates.
Our souls slam together like colliding stars.