Page 16 of The Syndicate’s Shadow Heiress (Branche de Lune Syndicate #1)

THREADBOUND

Kali’s Emotional State: Bone-deep exhaustion. Shadow-wrapped vulnerability. Her mind was cracking open, and something ancient had been waiting to crawl inside.

K ali didn’t remember falling asleep. One moment, she was in her suite—flat on her back, city lights flickering through the curtains, Astraeus whispering warnings beneath her skin.

The next—nothing.

Not silence. Void.

Then: A thread, red, and glowing. Descending like it had always belonged to her.

It kissed her wrist.

Another looped around her ankle.

Then one circled her throat, not choking. Claiming.

Threadwoven.

She gasped, but no air came. Her magic was there, coiled inside her like a caged thing—but it didn’t move .

It watched. It waited.

Fear. Her pulse spiked, quickening as something foreign tugged at her core. What was happening? Was this real? She had no words to answer it. The truth began to loom, a force she could no longer ignore.

And then he stepped out of the dark.

Not walked—unfolded like sin carved in silk and starlight.

Tall. Barefoot. Bare-chested. Silver hair tumbling past his jaw. His eyes weren’t made of night. They were eclipses rimmed in starlight, and when they locked onto her, the world forgot how to breathe.

“Thorne Soren Draeven.”

She didn’t know how she knew. But she did.

Somewhere deeper than blood, her magic remembered him.

“You let me in,” he said, voice dipped in honeyed ruin.

“I didn’t—” Her voice cracked like glass.

“You did,” he murmured, stepping closer. “You dreamed of hunger. I brought the feast.”

Red threads wound tighter, lifting her from the void floor. Suspended, offered, and claimed without mercy.

Confusion twisted in her chest, but underneath it, the nameless desire stirred. Her body fought to break free, yet it couldn’t deny the pull of him. The tension between fear and longing made her tremble—raw, exposed.

Thorne smiled like a slow knife. “Yours.”

She lunged—stupid. Raw.

He caught her mid-air.

No hands. Just threads.

Wrist. Waist. Thighs.

She was bound like a prayer wrapped in silk and sin.

“I don’t belong to anyone,” she hissed.

“Liar,” he said. “But a lovely one.”

He cupped her jaw, thumb dragging down her lip. “So damn beautiful,” he breathed.

Her pulse hammered—terror and desire fighting for dominance.

The hunger within her flared—too much, too fast. Her heart pounded in her chest, and her mind couldn’t reconcile the two forces—her magic recoiling from him, and yet.

.. a darker, deeper part of her yearned for this connection.

She was caught between worlds, between her past and whatever Thorne was offering. Her body was at war with itself.

Magic coiled. Shadows trembled. Her dragon roared distantly, but it was faint. Muffled.

Thorne knelt .

Not like a knight.

Like a king claiming tribute.

The threads dragged her thighs wide, heat blooming so fast it stole her breath.

The force of it made her pulse quicken, her control slipping further from her reach. She couldn’t even move; her body was locked in place, overwhelmed by sensations, too real to deny, too much to process.

He didn’t tease. Didn’t warm her up.

He worshipped.

His mouth pressed to her with reverence and ruin. Tongue stroking. Lips sucking. The kind of hunger that made temples fall and empires kneel.

A scream tore from her throat as her body arced in response—shameless, wild. The walls she had so carefully built began to crumble.

She felt his name leave her lips, the shame and rapture tangled in the same breath.

Somewhere in her mind, a voice whispered— Why does this feel like home?

He moaned into her like she was holy.

She screamed his name .

And at the peak—her back arched, her magic cracked—he looked up. Eyes glowing. Mouth soaked.

“Threadbound,” he whispered.

Not a prisoner. Not a pet. Bound by choice she never made but could never sever.

Then, she woke.

Back in her bed.

Slick with sweat. Shaking. Gasping.

The city still buzzed beyond her windows.

But the mark? It remained.

A faint red sigil—etched into her collarbone like a kiss she hadn’t consented to but had begged for anyway.

Astraeus roared in her skull. “WHAT. DID. YOU. LET. IN?”

Fear. She should be afraid. But there was something else. Something crawling beneath her skin, a heat still simmering where his lips had touched her.

Kali touched the mark.

And said nothing.

Because she didn’t know what to say.

Only that it wasn’t over. Not even close.

The Thread was awake.

And now? So was she.

Thorne's POV

Somewhere deep within the Loom—beyond time, beyond Thread, beyond anything the Spiral Court could name—Thorne opened his eyes.

The altar had answered.

She had entered.

Kali.

Her name lived in the back of his throat like a sin he'd never repent for. The mark had spread—he felt it. A new thread had woven itself through his spine, whispering a pulse that didn't belong to him.

Hers.

He stood at the edge of a shifting void, Thread magic unfurling from his shoulders like a second skin. Beneath his feet, the Loom itself shivered. His body wasn’t shaking. The world was.

And then… he felt it.

The Spiral Mouth stirred.

Not just a whisper now. A summoning.

The vampires had lit a candle in its name. Stupid. Reckless. Unknowing.

Thorne’s fingers curled into a fist. “You idiots,” he muttered. “You don’t bait the mouth. You bleed for it.”

A ripple of dread slid across his bond with Kali. A moment—fleeting, but sharp .

The tether between them quivered—raw, unclaimed, burning.

She felt it, too. Not the Spiral, but Him.

He closed his eyes and whispered her name—not aloud, but into the thread.

“Kali… brace yourself.”

Because they were going to come for her.

And next time?

He wouldn’t wait for her to dream.

He’d come for her awake.