Chapter 21
TWENTY-ONE
Aiden
I was sitting in the common room when I heard the insistent ping of message notifications coming from Jupiter’s room.
At first, I tried to ignore it, focusing on the combat strategy report I was reviewing, but the sound was persistent, every few seconds, like someone was desperately trying to get her attention.
With an irritated sigh, I set down my tablet and stood. Jupiter was at her meeting lunch with Lydia, and the constant noise was grating on my last nerve. I’d just go in and silence her laptop. Nothing more.
Her door was ajar, which was unusual. Noddle was nowhere to be seen either. Jupiter was meticulous about privacy, especially after the threatening note incident. I pushed it open, intending to make it quick, to find the source of the noise and shut it down.
Her laptop sat open on the desk, screen illuminated with what looked like a dozen new email notifications in the official Dominion messaging app. I moved closer, just wanting to close the damn thing or at least mute it. That’s when I saw the sender: Director Orion.
I shouldn’t have looked. I knew I shouldn’t. But something cold settled in my stomach as I glanced at the preview line of the most recent message:
Re: Bond Manipulation Progress - Status Update Required
My hand froze above the keyboard. Bond manipulation? I told myself there had to be an explanation, some context I was missing. But as I stood there, another message notification popped up:
Jupiter - Urgent: Nightfall Shield Integration Timeline
Before I could talk myself out of it, I clicked on the message thread. The screen filled with correspondence, dozens of emails between Jupiter and Director Orion dating back months before she’d even arrived at Dominion.
My blood turned to ice as I began to read.
Director Orion: The Nightfall Shield presents our optimal pairing target. Their resistance to traditional axis candidates makes them vulnerable to your particular skillset. Your Ophis designation allows for bond manipulation at a level previously unseen. Use this to your advantage.
Jupiter: I’ve studied their profiles extensively. Reece will be the most difficult to convince, but once he’s compromised, the others will follow. The fabricated room invasion was successful in forcing proximity.
I felt physically ill as I scrolled further, finding detailed strategies for how Jupiter had planned to integrate herself with us, how she would use her Ophis abilities to manipulate our emotions, create artificial attraction, forge a bond without our true consent.
Director Orion: The Philadelphia deployment exceeded expectations. The trauma bond created during your “near-death” experience accelerated the timeline considerably. Your performance was convincing.
Jupiter: The sexual bonding phase is proceeding as anticipated. Three of four targets secured. Aiden Reece remains resistant but showing promising signs of possessive behavior.
My hands shook with fury as I kept reading. Everything had all been calculated. Engineered. A fucking Assembly operation with us as the unwitting subjects.
I grabbed my phone and sent a group text to the others.
A: Shield room. Now. Emergency.
Percy arrived first, his expression shifting from concern to confusion when he saw me standing in Jupiter’s room. “What’s going on?”
I couldn’t speak, just pointed at the screen. His eyes narrowed as he moved closer to read, his body going frighteningly still as he processed what he was seeing.
Draco and Eris arrived together, both looking wary.
“Aiden? What’s the emergency?” Draco asked.
“See for yourself,” I managed, my voice a hoarse whisper. I felt like I could throw up any second.
The four of us crowded around the laptop, reading in stunned silence. With each scroll of the page, I felt something inside me shatter.
“She was playing us,” Eris said finally, his voice hollow with disbelief. “The whole fucking time.”
Percy hadn’t spoken yet. His face had gone blank, the warm light in his eyes extinguished completely. I’d never seen him look so cold, so utterly devoid of emotion.
Draco sank into the desk chair, head in his hands. “I knew it,” he whispered. “I knew it was too good to be true. The legendary Ophis just happens to manifest when we need an axis, and she just happens to be perfect for us?”
“They engineered everything,” I said, unable to keep the rage from my voice. “The note in her room, the ‘attack’—it was all staged to get her closer to us.”
“And we fell for it,” Percy finally spoke, each word like ice. “Every. Fucking. Word.”
Eris’s control snapped. With a roar of fury, he stormed into the common room. The sound of shattering glass followed, then splintering wood as he systematically destroyed everything in his path.
“Her Ophis magic,” Draco said quietly, looking up with devastated eyes. “It says here she can manipulate our emotions, make us feel things that aren’t real. That’s why—“ He broke off, unable to finish the thought.
That’s why we wanted her so desperately. Why we couldn’t stop thinking about her. Why we salivated over her like animals. Why we’d been willing to risk everything for her. None of it had been real.
Percy walked to the window, his back rigid. “She’ll be back soon.”
“What do we do?” Draco asked.
“Nothing,” Percy said, his voice deadly calm. “We cut her loose.”
“The bond—” I started.
“Isn’t real,” Percy cut me off. “According to these emails from the fucking Assembly Director herself, she fabricated it. Tricked our bodies and minds into thinking we were bonded.”
The realization made me physically sick. The woman I’d been dreaming about, fantasizing about, jealously watching with my shield brothers, she was nothing but a lie. A weapon pointed at the heart of everything I cared about.
“We need to report this to Director Waverly,” Draco said. “The Assembly can’t just—“
“The Assembly and the school are behind it,” Percy interrupted. “Calla Orion orchestrated the whole thing, probably with Waverly’s blessing.”
I scrolled through more emails. Plans for how to handle us once the bond was secured. Strategies for keeping us compliant. Even contingencies for if we discovered the truth. There were details in here that nobody could have possibly known except for Jupiter.
“She never cared about any of us,” I said, the words tasting like ash.
Eris returned to the doorway, knuckles bloody, eyes wild. “The common room’s fucked,” he said flatly. “Just like us.”
We fell silent as footsteps approached in the hallway. Jupiter’s footsteps. I knew them by heart now, the light, quick pace that used to make my pulse quicken. Now it just made my magic flare with rage, golden light crackling across my skin.
“Ready?” Percy asked, his voice empty and utterly cold.
The door pushed open, and there she was, the axis we’d thought was ours, the woman we’d all fallen for, the most elaborate lie I’d ever believed.
“Hey,” she said, smiling as she entered, though it faltered when she saw us all gathered in her room. Her silver eyes darted to her laptop, then back to us, confusion evident on her face. “What’s going on? Why are you all in here?”
I watched her face carefully, searching for any sign that she knew what we’d found. Was that genuine confusion, or just another performance from the Assembly’s perfect actress?
“We were just leaving,” Percy said, his voice glacial as he pushed past her without a glance.
“Percy?” she called after him, then looked at the rest of us with growing alarm. “What happened? Did someone die or something?”
Eris laughed bitterly. “Something like that, lass.”
He followed Percy out, shouldering past her roughly. Draco stood next, his usually composed face a mask of pain.
“Draco, please,” she said, reaching for his arm. “Tell me what’s happening.”
He jerked away from her touch like it burned him. “Don’t,” he quietly warned before leaving.
I was the last one left, standing before the woman who’d played me for a fucking fool.
“Aiden,” she said, her voice small now, uncertain. “What the hell is going on?”
I looked at her—really looked at her. The silver eyes that had captivated me from the first moment. The dark hair I’d dreamed of running my fingers through. The lips I’d kissed so fucking deeply. Had any of it been real? Or was she really that good at her job?
“Your laptop was making noise,” I said flatly. “I came in to shut it off.”
She stared at me for a long moment. Without another word, she moved past me to the laptop, her fingers trembling slightly as she scrolled through the emails.
I watched her face carefully, searching for any sign of deception, any flicker that might betray her. But all I saw was genuine shock as the color drained from her face.
“I... I don’t understand,” she whispered, her eyes wide as she looked up at me. “Aiden, what is this? These aren’t my emails. I’ve never written these things. I didn’t—I would never—“
“Save it.” The pain in my chest was unbearable, like someone had carved out my heart with a dull blade. “We’ve read enough.”
“But this isn’t me!” Her voice cracked as she gestured wildly at the screen. “I don’t know what these are or where they came from! You have to believe me—“
“Have your things packed by sunset,” I said, cutting through her desperate words. “Or we’ll do it for you.”
“Aiden, please—”
I turned away from her, unable to look at those eyes for another second. Every memory we’d shared now felt tainted, poisoned by the knowledge that it had all been orchestrated, every touch calculated for maximum effect. I walked to the door, pulled it open.
“Sunset,” I repeated without looking back.
I closed the door quietly behind me. Not a slam, not a bang, just a soft click. In the hallway, I leaned against the wall, my legs suddenly weak. Through what remained of our bond, I could feel her panic, her confusion, her desperation.
But I couldn’t trust that either, could I? If she could manipulate our emotions to create a false bond, she could certainly fake distress now that she’d been caught.
Percy was in the common room, standing amid the destruction Eris had left in his wake. Shattered glass crunched under my boots as I approached him.
“She’s claiming they aren’t her emails,” I said, my voice hollow.
“Of course she is.” Percy’s eyes were fixed on the broken window where Eris had put his fist through.
Draco emerged from his room, a duffel bag in hand. “I’m going to train. I can’t be here when she comes out.”
I nodded, understanding completely. None of us could bear to look at her right now.
“What about the bond?” I asked after Draco left. “If it’s artificial...”
“We’ll find a way to break it,” Percy said with cold certainty. “The Assembly created it; they can undo it.”
I ran a hand through my hair, feeling like I was drowning. “And if they won’t?”
Percy finally looked at me, his dark eyes flat and lifeless. “Then we’ll find another way. I won’t be tethered to a lie for the rest of my life. If I have to fuck half the women at this school to break it then I fucking will.”
From Jupiter’s room came the sound of something heavy hitting the floor, followed by what might have been a sob. The noise twisted in my gut like a knife.
“I need air,” I muttered, heading for the door.
I couldn’t stand another second in these quarters, surrounded by memories of her—Jupiter sprawled on the couch during movie night, Jupiter laughing in the kitchen as Eris tried to teach her to cook, Jupiter’s scent lingering everywhere like a ghost I couldn’t exorcise.
Outside, the autumn air was crisp and cold, filling my lungs as I gulped it down. Students passed by, giving me a wide berth when they saw my expression. I must have looked dangerous, feral with rage and pain.
I found myself at the edge of the training field, watching a group of first-years practicing basic combat forms. Their movements were clumsy, unpracticed, so different from Jupiter’s grace when she fought. Had that been real, at least?
How much of what I knew about her was truth, and how much carefully crafted fiction?
My phone buzzed in my pocket half an hour later. A text from Percy.
P: She’s gone.
Something twisted in my chest.
A: Where?
P: Don’t know. Don’t care.
But I did care, and that was the worst part of all. Even knowing what she’d done, some traitorous part of me wanted to find her, to hear her explanation one more time. To believe her when she said it wasn’t her.
I shoved the feeling down violently. It wasn’t real. None of it had been real.