*Jiselle*


    The wind was too quiet.


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    Not soft–quiet. Like it had nothing left to say. Like it had listened to everything I’d screamed into it earlier. and decided, simply, to hush. I sat outside the eastern hall on one of the stone benches that faced the leyline canyon, arms wrapped around my knees, Nate’s absence like a hollow beside me.


    The bond wasn’t broken.


    But it had thinned again.


    Like a pulled thread in a cloak–still attached, but barely holding together.


    I didn’t know what stung more–the fact that I had walked away… or the fact that he let me.


    He hadn’t followed.


    He always followed. Even when he was mad. Even when he was scared.


    But now?


    Now, he was nowhere.


    And I couldn’t decide if that meant he was finally learning to trust me… or starting to give up.


    “Hey,”


    Ethan’s voice came gently, boots crunching against gravel as he walked up. I didn’t turn.


    He sat beside me anyway, close enough that our shoulders brushed.


    “You look like you could burn the whole mountain down,” he said after a pause.


    “I might.”


    “You’d be prettier doing it than thest time, at least.”


    A weakugh escaped me. Barely.


    We sat in silence a while longer before I asked, “Do you ever think we’re just… pretending? That any of this will work out?”


    Ethan rubbed the back of his neck. “Pretending’s gotten me this far.”


    I turned toward him. “I think I’m starting to like it.”


    “The pretending?”


    “No. The power.”


    :


    His expression didn’t change, but his breath did–sharpening, just slightly.


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    “I used to be afraid of it,” I went on. “Used to pray I’d wake up and it’d be gone. But now… I feel it. In everything. The way the mes curl when I call them. The way the leyline pulses when I get too close. The way people look at me–like I’m bing something else. And the worst part is…”


    He waited.


    “I think I’m okay with it.”


    Ethan didn’t answer right away. His hand found mine, squeezed once. “You’re allowed to change, Jis. You just have to know who you’re changing for.”


    I nodded.


    And yet, the guilt remained.


    The child kicked.


    It wasn’t the flutter I’d felt before–those vague shifts in pressure that might’ve been imagined. This was sharp. Real. Sudden.


    I gasped, hand flying to my stomach.


    “What?” Ethan asked, eyes darting.


    Before I could answer, my vision turned.


    Just slightly. Just enough.


    The canyon shimmered.


    The trees outside blurred into flickers of fire.


    And inside the mes–standing perfectly still–was him.


    Aedric.


    At the foot of my bed.


    Only, I wasn’t in my bed. But I could see it.


    I could feel the cool sheets under my body, the pulse of the child still fluttering faintly inside me.


    And he was there.


    Tall. Shadowed. Watching.


    He didn’t speak.


    He didn’t have to.


    Because I knew what this was.


    The child had pulled me into the vision.


    Or maybe he had. Maybe both.


    Either way… Aedric was inside now.


    And he wasn’t leaving.


    I shot to my feet with a sharp breath, the image vanishing like steam off wet stone.


    Ethan steadied me. “Jiselle?”


    “I saw him,” I whispered. “I saw him again.”


    Ethan’s jaw tightened. “Where?”


    “My room. Standing. Watching.”


    “Shit.”


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    I barely heard him. My heart was hammering too loudly, my breath too uneven. The child moved again- slight, nervous. Like it had just shown me a secret it couldn’t undo.


    And I had no idea what it meant.


    —


    Bastain summoned us that evening.


    All of us.


    Ethan. Eva. Nate–who arrivedte and didn’t look at me.


    We met in the inner observatory, a dome carved from obsidian and stone, its ceiling reflecting the stars above


    like a mirror.


    Bastain stood in the center, hands sped behind his back, gaze sharp and unreadable.


    “The Triad,” he said without preamble, “is waking.”


    No one spoke.


    He paced slowly. “I’ve traced the leyline fractures back to their origin points. There’s a pattern. They converge near sites with ancient Veil history… and blood.”


    Eva frowned. “You mean someone’s bleeding on them?”


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    “No.” Bastain said “Something is drawing from them. The leylines are not just reacting to the Triad bond anymore–they’re feeding it”


    I swallowed. “Feeding what, exactly?”


    He looked at me. The child.”


    A silence heavier than stone fell over the room.


    Nate finally spoke, voice low. “Are you saying she’s pulling energy from leyline fractures?”


    “Yes” Bastain confirmed. “And possibly more. If she’s connected to the Triad’s full alignment–me, veil. blood–then she is no longer a vessel. She’s a source.”


    “Then why are we feeling it?” Ethan asked, lifting his palm. “Why did I wake upst night with this-”


    He stopped. Turned his hand over.


    We all leaned in.


    Burned into the flesh of his hand, raw but unmistakable, were three words:


    “One must fall.”


    Eva gasped. I stepped back.


    Bastain went still. “When did that appear?”


    “This morning,” Ethan said. “I thought it was a dream. Thought maybe I scratched myself in sleep.”


    But we all knew better.


    No dream wrote prophecy.


    “No one else saw this?” Bastain asked.


    Ethan shook his head,


    Nate moved closer, squinting at the mark. “It’s like the script from the door.”


    “Same etching.” I said.


    Eva stepped forward. “But it’s on Ethan. Why him?”


    “Because I’m the third,” he said quietly. “me. Veil. Blood.”


    My stomach turned.


    Bastain folded his arms. “It may be a warning. It may be a choice. Either way-


    The leyline pulsed.


    We felt it beneath our feet.


    A tremor. A spark. A rush of magic so fierce I staggered.


    Nate clutched his chest.


    Then copsed.


    Blood bloomed across his palms, dripping from long, thin slices that hadn’t been there before.


    “NATE!” I dropped to my knees beside him. “Nate, stay with me!”


    His eyes fluttered, breath shallow.


    Bastain cursed under his breath, already tearing open a satchel of herbs and wraps.


    Ethan hovered beside me. “What the hell is happening?!”


    “The bond,” Bastain said grimly. “It’s cracking. The Triad is unbnced.”


    I pressed my hands over Nate’s, trying to stop the bleeding. “What does that mean? Is he dying?”


    “No,” Bastain said. “But if this continues__”


    He didn’t finish.


    Because we already knew.


    The bond may not kill us.


    But whatever was trying to control it…


    Just might.


    And in Nate’s blood, I saw the cost of what we were bing.


    Not chosen.


    Not blessed.


    Just three wolves bound to something ancient, unstable… and hungry.


    And only one of us would survive if the others fell.


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