28. Chapter 28 #3
The tether spiked again with frustration and fury from Eryndor's side—something that sounded an awful bit like get your eyes off her and I'll kill him and why can't I do this one simple thing.
I felt him clamp down and try to crush it back into the box he kept everything in.
The bond shuddered. For one horrible moment, I felt it start to fray at the edges.
"Stop." Cormac's voice had lost its amusement. "Both of you. Stop."
We froze.
"You're making it worse." He studied the space between us, and for the first time, he looked concerned rather than entertained. "The instability is accelerating. Every time he suppresses, the bond destabilizes further."
"Then tell me how to fix it," Eryndor growled.
Cormac stepped closer, his voice dropping.
"You're not failing because you're weak, Crownforged.
You're failing because you're trying to control this with the same iron grip you use for everything else.
The jealousy, the hunger, the wanting—you're crushing it all down because you think it's dangerous.
But every time you cage them, you cage the bond too.
And the bond is the only thing keeping both of you alive. "
Silence.
Eryndor’s internal war burned through the tether—the desperate need for control fighting against everything Cormac was saying.
"You want to protect her?" Cormac's voice softened. Almost kind. "Then stop protecting her from yourself. The bond needs all of you. Even the parts you hate."
Eryndor held my gaze. I watched the fight drain out of him—watched him decide, finally, to lose on purpose.
He opened the gate.
The energy that had been dammed up surged into him. I felt him suck in a ragged inhale as my power flooded his starvation. It felt intimate. Obscene.
But it didn't hurt.
The pressure vanished. The burning stopped. The jagged, screaming tether suddenly smoothed out into a hum—a dark, heavy, rhythmic cycle. Thump-thump. Thump-thump.
Heart to heart. Pulse to pulse. A closed circuit.
He stared at me, eyes blown wide. He looked terrified. He looked more real than I’d ever seen him.
"There," Cormac said softly. The mockery was gone. "Balance."
We stood there, breathing together, the circuit humming between us. I didn't want to move. Didn't want to break whatever fragile thing we'd just built.
Thessaly was watching from the edge of the clearing. I hadn't noticed her arrive, but she was studying the space between us with approval.
"Good," she said. "That's the foundation.
You keep that circuit clean—practice it until it's as natural as breathing.
And you keep strengthening yourselves with the Ancestral work.
" She nodded toward the pile of ash and seedlings scattered around the garden.
"The stronger your wells, the more stable the bond becomes. "
"And the second Mark?" Eryndor's voice was rough. He didn't look away from me. "The Griefweaver. We still need to—"
"Eventually." Thessaly held up a hand. "Not yet. Connecting to both Marks requires a foundation that won't crack under the weight. Right now, you'd shatter." She looked between us. "Build the circuit. Strengthen the wells. When you're ready—truly ready—we'll attempt the full binding."
"How will we know when we're ready?" I asked.
Thessaly smiled. It wasn't comforting.
"You'll know because you won't be afraid of it anymore."
She left us to practice.
So we did.
Hours of it. Eryndor and I running the circuit until it stopped feeling like a negotiation and started feeling like breathing.
Seeds turning to ash in our palms, then—slowly, painfully—beginning to sprout.
The others worked alongside us, their own breakthroughs coming in fits and starts.
Maxx finally made something grow and immediately tried to set it on fire.
Dreadscale's tree hummed so loudly the birds fled.
By the time the sun began its descent, my hands were black with ash and my mind was hollow with exhaustion.
"Enough for today," Thessaly finally said. "Rest. Eat. Let what you've learned settle."
"And tomorrow?" Serenya asked.
Thessaly gathered her things—seeds, stones, the remnants of our failures. "Today you learned to stop forcing. Tomorrow, you learn to occupy something larger than a seed."
Maxx perked up. "How much larger?"
"Large enough to be interesting." Naia smiled, bones clicking in her hair. "You've practiced bringing a tree into existence. Tomorrow, you practice assuming yourselves into something new."
"So we become the storm instead of calling it," Maxx said slowly. "But like... actually."
"Something like that."
"Excellent. I've always wanted to be a natural disaster."
The trainers left us in the garden as the amber light returned, shadows lengthening across the moss, the fountain's griffin watching with eyes that had seen this all before.
The others scattered—Serenya to find food, Maxx to find wine, Dreadscale to find whatever it was Dreadscale found when he disappeared into himself.
I stayed.
So did Eryndor.
Ash on our hands. The tether humming between us—steadier now, but still hungry for practice.
"Again?" I asked.
He picked up another seed.
"Again."
We practiced until the stars came out.
And then we kept practicing.