Maelis did not sleep.
She lay awake on the narrow bed assigned to her, staring at the faint crack in the ceiling where moonlight slipped through like a blade. The packhouse was quiet—too quiet for someone carrying this many secrets beneath her skin.
Her pulse still hadn’t slowed from the training field.
From Ember.
She pressed two fingers to the inside of her wrist, grounding herself as she’d been taught. The thrum beneath her skin wasn’t fear.
It was the bond.
Or rather—the thing wearing its shape.
The enchantment hummed softly, a living weave threaded through her veins, responding to proximity, emotion, proximity again. It was elegant magic. Old magic.
Cruel in its subtlety.
You are holding, a voice whispered at the back of her mind.
Maelis closed her eyes.
“I know,” she murmu
