—Natasha's POV—
Consciousness did not return with peace, but with a silent, searing proclamation etched across my flesh. The first awareness was not the profound, singular weight of the completed bond, but a spiderweb of sharp, stinging sensations—a constellation of localized pains mapping a bizarre geography on my skin. Pushing aside the rough wool blanket, I looked down.
My breath hitched, trapped in a throat gone tight with dread.
There was no unified mark of possession, no elegant, powerful sigil extending from the original half-moon on my neck. Instead, a luminous latticework crawled over my skin. Dozens of fine, hair-thin lines, glowing with a faint, inner silver light like captured moonlight, radiated from the epicenter of the old scar.
They branched and forked in chaotic, deli
