Page 34

Finn

The war room is silent.

Not the comfortable kind of silence. Not the ‘we’ve made a great battle plan and are now basking in our brilliance’ kind of silence. No, this is the kind of silence that stretches too long, too loaded, too… deeply, deeply uncomfortable.

I shift where I stand, dragging a hand down my face. Yep. Still hard. Still very much feeling everything Kaia and Aspen just did. The bond has no chill. No shame. No mercy.

And I know, I know the rest of them feel it too.

Kieran is at the head of the table, bracing himself against the wood like it’s the only thing keeping him standing.

His jaw is so tight I swear he’s seconds away from breaking his own teeth.

Malrik, for all his usual composure, looks mildly less smug than usual.

Torric is standing stiff as a board, arms crossed over his chest like if he just folds himself tightly enough, he can pretend this didn’t happen.

But it did .

And the bond made damn sure we got every single detail .

I can still taste her on my tongue—salt and sweetness that isn’t mine to claim. The phantom press of skin against skin. The echo of pleasure that wasn’t mine rippling through me like I swallowed lightning.

My body can’t tell the difference. My heart—

Nope. Not going there.

Fucking hell.

I glance around for an escape route, but nope—no exits, no mercy, and to make things worse, Walter is just floating nearby like the smug little shadow menace he is.

I swear to the gods, he’s smirking at me. Or whatever passes for a smirk when you’re a cosmic intern made of shadow stuff and existential dread.

My eyes flick back to Kieran. He looks like he’s two seconds away from snapping a chair in half with his bare hands.

Finally, I can’t take it anymore. The silence, the tension, the hard situation (pun absolutely intended). I clear my throat, shifting uncomfortably as I adjust my stance.

“Well,” I say, my voice a little hoarse, “this is awkward.”

No one responds.

Malrik inhales sharply through his nose, then turns on his heel and walks out.

Torric follows, his movements tight, like he hates everything about this moment.

Honestly, same.

Kieran doesn’t move. Doesn’t react.

Walter bobs beside him, vibrating like he’s thriving in the discomfort. Little bastard .

“Should we, uh, talk about the weather instead? Sunny with a chance of magical sex echoes?” I try again.

Nothing. Not even a glare.

Something shifts in the bond—a click, a lock turning. The sensation floods through me like freezing water, dousing the heat with something worse.

The phantom taste of her vanishes from my mouth.

I’m alone in my skin again.

And somehow, that’s so much worse.

Kieran’s fingers dig into the wood of the table, leaving actual indentations.

Oh.

I feel it then—the bond between Kaia and Aspen, cementing into place. Stronger than before. Different than before.

And it hurts . Not jealousy exactly. Something more… displaced.

Like a house I helped build… and then someone else got handed the keys.

Like when my sister moved out and took her half of our shared record collection.

Except this isn’t records. This is my—

Not mine. Never was. Never will be.

“Right then,” I mutter, the joke dying in my throat. “I’ll just—”

I don’t finish the sentence. Don’t need to. No one’s listening anyway.

I sigh dramatically, adjusting my pants before muttering, “Gonna need a cold bath after that one.”

Kieran’s head snaps up, those predator eyes locking on me. Something cold and dark flickers across his face, and for a brief, bizarre moment, I want him to say something. Anything. To acknowledge that whatever just happened in the bond affected us both.

Instead, he just looks through me like I’m already gone.

Fine. Fine.

I stroll out of the war room, whistling a tune that sounds hollow even to my own ears.

The hallway isn’t much better. The stone walls feel too close, the air too thick with magic that isn’t mine. I’m fine. Totally fine. It’s not like I wasn’t expecting this. It’s not like I thought—

A shadow detaches from the wall, following me. Patricia, with her little shadowy notebook and too-observant eyes.

She floats alongside me, furiously scribbling notes, tilting her formless head as she studies me like I’m some fascinating specimen. She holds up her notebook, tapping insistently at a graph that seems to be tracking my emotional state.

I blink at her. “What?”

She points at me, then at her notebook again, gesturing emphatically at what looks like a statistical analysis of… my emotional state? Great. Even Kaia’s shadows are psychoanalyzing me now.

“Nope,” I say, popping the ‘p’ with extra emphasis. “No data. No statistics. No… whatever this is. I’m good.”

Patricia tilts her head, clearly unconvinced. She scribbles something else, then holds it up—a rudimentary drawing of a face that looks suspiciously like mine, with arrows pointing to the eyes and chest with little notations.

“Bye, Patricia!” I wave, walking faster.

She hovers for a moment longer, then melts back into the shadows with what feels like disapproving energy trailing behind her .

I round the corner, making sure I’m alone before I let my shoulders slump.

Then straighten them immediately. Because I’m fine.

The truth is, I’m not fine. Not even a little bit.

The bond between Kaia and Aspen feels… right. Settled. Like it was always meant to be that way.

I check the walls for more shadows. Count the torches. One, two, three—fuck, my hands are shaking.

Because none of us got a real choice, did we? Not after the Hall of Echoes. Not after Kieran forced the issue.

“I mean, I chose Kaia. Chose her that night she fell asleep surrounded by her shadows, if I’m being honest with myself—which I’m absolutely not going to be. But the others? Kieran took that choice away from them.”

Took it away from her.

No, that’s not fair. Maybe she would have picked Aspen anyway. Maybe she would have—

I didn’t want this. Didn’t want to feel it. Didn’t want to know what it’s like when they—

But I did. I felt every second. How he touched her. How she responded. How the bond between them locked into place like the final piece of a puzzle I’m not part of.

I’m not jealous.

I’m fucking devastated.

Wait, no. I’m not. I’m just tired. Mildly annoyed. Perfectly healthy emotional response to magical voyeurism .

I press my back against the cold stone wall, letting my head thump against it. Once. Twice. The third time actually hurts, which feels oddly appropriate.

“I made my choice that night she fell asleep surrounded by her shadows,” I whisper to the empty hallway. “Watching her finally look peaceful, realizing I’d do anything to keep her that way. I just didn’t realize how fast the world would take that choice away from her.”

The bond pulses once, quiet and distant. Not gone, but settled. Stabilized.

And somehow, that’s scarier than if it had disappeared entirely.

Because now? Now it feels like watching the tide go out, knowing the wave that’s coming back will drown everything in its path.

I push off the wall, shaking out my arms like I can physically cast off the feeling crawling under my skin.

"Yeah, sure, magical soul-bond sex echo," I mutter to myself, forcing a grin that feels brittle. "Just what I needed to get through the day. That and maybe three bottles of wine."

Actually, fuck the wine. I need something that won't make me think. Something that won't remind me of bonds and choices and everything I'm apparently not part of.

I head for the kitchens instead.

Twenty minutes later, I'm emerging with an armload of travel cakes, dried fruit, and what might be chocolate but could also be some kind of preserved meat. My arms are so full I can barely see over the pile, which is probably why I nearly walk straight into Malrik as I turn the corner.

He's standing there like he was waiting for me, silver eyes dark with something I recognize because I'm feeling it too. We're both breathing a little too hard, both still processing what we just experienced through the bond.

His gaze drops to my ridiculous haul of food, one eyebrow arching. "Finn, what—"

"What?" I say, stuffing a crumbling square into my mouth before any of it can fall. "Survival Tip #2. Don't forget the snacks. Ancient evil is exhausting work."

For a heartbeat, neither of us moves. The air between us crackles with tension—not just the shared aftermath of Kaia and Aspen's intimacy, but something else. Something that's been building since that kiss we shared, since all the moments we've been dancing around each other.

"Don't," I warn, but my voice comes out rougher than intended.

“Don’t what?” His tone is carefully controlled, but I can see the crack in his composure. The way his hands are clenched at his sides like he’s fighting not to reach for something.

“Whatever you’re thinking. Whatever you’re about to say.”

He steps closer, close enough that I can feel the heat radiating off him. “You think you know what I’m thinking?”

“I think we both just got a very detailed reminder of what we’re not getting,” I snap, then immediately want to take it back because that’s too honest. Too raw.

Something flickers in his silver eyes—understanding, maybe. Or recognition. “Finn—”

“No.” I step back, but there’s nowhere to go. The wall is right behind me, and he’s right in front of me, and suddenly the hallway feels too small for both of us. “I can’t do this right now.”

“Do what?”

“Pretend like that didn’t just happen. Pretend like we don’t both want—” I cut myself off, shaking my head.

“Want what?” He’s closer now, close enough that I could reach out and touch him if I wanted to. Which I absolutely do not want to do.

Liar.

“You know what.”

His eyes drop to my mouth for just a second, but I catch it. The tension between us ratchets higher, dangerous and electric.

“We should talk about this,” he says quietly.

“Should we? Because I’m pretty sure talking is the last thing on either of our minds right now. ”

The silence stretches between us, loaded with everything we’re not saying. Everything we felt through the bond. Everything we want and can’t have and are too fucked up to figure out.

Finally, Malrik steps back, giving me room to breathe.

“This isn’t over,” he says, and it sounds like a promise and a threat all at once.

I push past him, shoulder brushing his in a way that sends sparks down my spine. “Sure it isn’t, prince.”

But as I walk away, I can feel his eyes on me until I turn the corner.

The shadows around me shift and fade, leaving me alone with the taste of something I can’t name and the certainty that I’m in way over my head.