ADINNA’S POV
I wake up every morning with the same dull ache behind my eyes and the same weight pressing on my chest. It’s not pain, exactly. More like the echo of something I can’t turn off. The bond hums inside me like a low-frequency sound I can’t escape. It’s always there. Quiet, constant, and waiting.
So I do the only thing I can, I bury myself in work.
Books, assignments, training logs, anything that keeps my mind too busy to think. I study until my eyes sting, until the words blur together on the page. Sometimes I don’t even remember what I’m reading, just that I’m turning pages to fill the silence.
No one talks about the Solstice Ball anymore.
The academy has moved on. Classes continue, gossip shifts to new scandals, and the night that changed everything for me becomes nothing
