KAELEN'S POV
The girl was magnificent when she destroyed things.
Shadow-fire poured from Elara's hands, wild and uncontrolled, slamming into the attacking mages like a tidal wave of darkness. Three went down screaming. Four more scattered, their own magic fizzling against her raw power.
She had no training. No control. Pure instinct fueled by rage.
Perfect.
"Focus the energy!" I shouted over the chaos, my own shadows forming a barrier against Marcus's device. "Don't just throw power—direct it!"
She didn't listen. Too angry. Too hurt by her brother's betrayal.
Damien scrambled backward as her next blast nearly took his head off. "Elara, stop! You're going to kill someone!"
"Good!" she screamed, and the fury in her voice made me smile.
There was the monster. Finally awake.
But she was burning through power too fast. I felt it through the bond—her energy draining, her body reaching its limit. Untrained mages always burned bright and fast.
She'd collapse soon. And we'd die.
"Elara!" I caught her wrist as she prepared another blast. "We need to leave. Now."
"I'm not running from them!"
"You're running out of power," I said bluntly. "In thirty seconds, you'll faint. Then they'll capture us both. Is that what you want?"
Her silver eyes blazed with frustration, but she knew I was right.
Marcus raised his device, magic crackling around it. "You're not escaping again!"
I grabbed Elara around the waist and pulled the shadows around us.
Teleportation when you're dying from a curse and bleeding from an angelic sword? Terrible idea. I did it anyway.
Reality twisted. Darkness swallowed us. Elara's scream cut off as we dissolved into shadow.
We materialized on cold stone.
Elara collapsed immediately. I barely caught her before she hit the ground, then went down myself. The curse flared, punishment for using power I didn't have. Pain tore through my chest like claws.
I managed to lay Elara down gently before the agony drove me to my knees.
Six hundred years of this. Six hundred years of slowly dying.
I was so tired.
Through the bond, I felt her. Unconscious but alive. Her new power had exhausted her completely. She'd sleep for hours, maybe longer.
Good. That gave me time to think.
I studied the mark over my heart, glowing faintly even through the blood-soaked shirt. The soul tether. Incomplete but forming. If she completed the bond, the curse would break. I'd be whole again.
If she refused, we'd both die.
Simple math.
So why did the thought of manipulating her make something uncomfortable twist in my chest?
Because she's not Selene, I admitted to myself. And you're starting to care what she thinks of you.
Dangerous. Caring led to weakness. Weakness led to death.
I should wake her up. Convince her to complete the bond immediately. Use fear, logic, whatever worked.
Instead, I sat against the cathedral wall and watched her sleep.
She looked younger unconscious. Vulnerable. The angry, forsaken scholar disappeared, leaving just a twenty-eight-year-old woman who'd been betrayed by everyone she loved.
"You're an idiot," I told her sleeping form. "Summoning a Shadow King for revenge. Did you really think it would be that simple?"
She didn't answer. Obviously.
I closed my eyes, letting exhaustion pull at me. Just a few minutes of rest. Then I'd wake her and—
Pain exploded through the bond.
My eyes snapped open. Elara was convulsing, her back arching off the stone floor. Her scream tore through the cathedral.
"No!" I crawled to her, ignoring my own agony. "Elara! What's wrong?"
Her eyes opened—completely silver now, glowing with power that shouldn't be there. When she spoke, her voice echoed with something ancient.
"The bond... incomplete... tearing her apart..."
That wasn't Elara's voice.
"Who are you?" I demanded.
"What... remains... of Selene..." The words came in gasps between Elara's screams. "Her soul... fighting... the new one... two souls... one body... can't coexist..."
Ice flooded my veins. "That's impossible. Reincarnation doesn't work that way. The old soul merges completely—"
"Not... when bond... incomplete..." Elara's body twisted. "Finish it... or lose... both..."
Then Selene's presence vanished, and Elara went limp.
I pulled her into my lap, checking for breathing. Alive. Unconscious again. But for how long?
The bond was killing her.
I'd known incomplete soul tethers were dangerous. But I'd thought we had time. Weeks, maybe months to complete the ritual.
Apparently, we had hours.
"Damn it!" I pressed my forehead against hers. "You infuriating human. Why didn't you just agree to complete the bond?"
Because she didn't trust me. Because I'd been honest about viewing her as a tool.
Because I'd given her no reason to believe I saw her as anything more than Selene's replacement.
My fault. All of it.
The curse pulsed, eating another piece of my power. I coughed, tasting blood. Getting weaker. Running out of time.
If she didn't wake soon and agree to the bonding ritual, we'd both die. Her from the warring souls, me from the curse.
Poetry, really. Two broken people, bound together, destroying each other.
I pulled her closer, feeling her heartbeat against my chest. Through the bond, I whispered into her unconscious mind:
Wake up, little forsaken one. I need you to hate me, rage at me, fight me—anything but this. Wake up and choose. Live or die. But choose.
Her eyes fluttered open.
Silver. Glowing. Not quite Elara. Not quite Selene.
Something in between.
"Kaelen," she whispered, her voice layered with two tones. "I'm dying."
"I know. The bond—"
"Complete it. Now." Her hand found mine, squeezed weakly. "Before I lose myself completely."
Relief flooded through me. "The ritual requires preparation. Sacred space, specific timing—"
"Liar." A ghost of a smile crossed her face. "It requires choice. Acceptance. I choose this. I choose you." Her eyes focused on mine. "Do you choose me?"
The question landed like a blade between my ribs.
Did I? Or did I just choose survival?
"Answer me," she pressed. "Because if you're just using me to break your curse, I'd rather die than be someone's tool again."
Honest answer? I didn't know.
I knew I needed her. Wanted her power. Craved the freedom from the curse.
But somewhere in the past few hours, between her summoning me and her defending herself with wild shadow-fire, something had shifted.
She wasn't a tool. Wasn't just Selene's soul.
She was Elara. The forsaken one. The invisible scholar who'd had enough.
And I... wanted her to stay.
"I choose you," I said, and meant it. "Not Selene. Not the cure. You."
Her smile widened. "Liar. But I'll take it."
She pulled my head down and kissed me.
The bond exploded between us.
Power flooded through the connection—her shadow magic meeting mine, amplifying, multiplying. The mark on our chests blazed like twin stars. Her soul and Selene's began merging, no longer fighting but joining, creating something entirely new.
The curse screamed in protest as the bond began breaking its chains.
Then Elara gasped and pulled back. "Someone's here."
I felt it too. Multiple presences surrounding the cathedral. Moving with military precision.
The doors slammed open.
Ravenna Nightshade stood in the entrance, surrounded by two dozen mages. Her smile was cold and victorious.
"Did you really think you could escape me, Shadow King?" She raised one hand, and I felt the spell activate. A trap. Already woven into the cathedral stones.
Blood magic. My blood from the wound Aurelia gave me.
"I've been tracking you since the moment you bled in my city," Ravenna said. "This cathedral? I've owned it for years. Every stone is marked with my power." She snapped her fingers.
Chains erupted from the walls—not metal, but solidified darkness and blood magic combined. They wrapped around me before I could move, burning where they touched. Elara screamed as similar chains grabbed her, dragging her away from me.
"The incomplete bond makes you both vulnerable," Ravenna explained, walking closer. "Separately, you're weak. Together, you're unstoppable. So I'll simply keep you apart."
She pulled out a knife that glowed with sickly green light.
"Now then. Let's discuss what happens to little scholars who summon things they can't control."
She pressed the blade against Elara's throat.
And through the bond, I felt Elara's terror mix with something else.
Rage.
The cathedral trembled.
Elara's eyes blazed pure silver.
And when she spoke, power made the air crack.
"I
didn't summon something I can't control. I summoned something that answers to me."
The chains shattered.