BOUND BY MIDNIGHT BLOOD

Chapter 4: Fractured Bonds

"I don't know," I said, and my voice came out small and tired. I pulled my arm out of Kael's hand before he could ask again. "I need to find Liora."

I did not wait to see his face. I walked away fast, even though my ribs still hurt from the fight and my legs still felt weak under me. The words I had thrown at Liora kept playing over and over in my head, getting sharper every time, and each time they did, my stomach dropped a little more. I had done that. Me. Not the power. Me.

I searched half the academy before I found her. She was sitting very straight in a chair in one of the private lounges near the guest rooms, and Alpha Harlan was standing over her, his shadow stretching across the floor between us the moment I stepped inside.

"Liora." I kept my voice soft, my hands loose at my sides so I would not look like a threat. "I am sorry. What I said out there, I did not mean it. It was not me."

Alpha Harlan turned before she could answer. His face did not move, not even a little. "You have embarrassed this family enough for one day, Lyra. Remember your place. You exist here because I allow it. Cause another scene like that and you will find out exactly how bad the consequences can be. Do not forget where you came from."

Each word landed somewhere different inside me, in my stomach, in my throat, behind my eyes. I looked at Liora, hoping for anything at all, a look, a small movement, something to tell me she still saw me as a person and not just a mistake her father made. She stared down at her own hands instead, arms wrapped tight around herself like she was trying to hold something in.

"I understand," I whispered. My voice barely made it out of my mouth. I turned and left before anything worse could happen.

Night had already fallen by the time I stepped outside. The paths were lit thin and dim between long stretches of dark. I walked with my arms wrapped around my stomach and my eyes on the ground, not really going anywhere, just needing to move so I would not have to sit still with everything I was feeling.

A sound behind me made me stop cold. Not quite a footstep, but more like the air had changed, the kind of quiet that meant someone was trying very hard not to be heard.

I turned too slowly.

Instructor Vesper stepped out from behind a stone pillar, half his face lost in shadow. My mind could not make sense of what I was seeing at first. A teacher. Someone who had graded my homework only weeks ago. "You should not exist," he said, and he came at me before I even finished turning around.

I threw myself sideways, but his fist still caught my shoulder, tearing through cloth and skin. Pain flared hot and sharp. I scrambled back, shadow flickering at my fingers, my breath already ragged.

He came again, faster this time, a blade catching what little light there was. "Anomalies like you get removed before they ruin everything."

I slipped through his next swing and got behind him, pulling some of his strength away as I moved, but his elbow caught my ribs hard on the way back and the air left my lungs completely. I hit the wall, shoulder first, and the blade cut into my arm next, deep, blood already running warm down to my wrist.

I fought back with whatever I had left, shadow bursting out of me wild and out of control, until one hit finally sent him stumbling backward. I did not stay to see if he got up, I ran, one hand pressed hard over my arm, blood slipping between my fingers, my legs shaking more with every step, until I finally collapsed into the small gap between two dorm buildings and just sat there, back against the cold brick, chest heaving.

Blood soaked through my sleeve fast. My ribs screamed with every breath I took. I pressed my palm harder against the cut, but it did not stop the bleeding. The path stayed empty and quiet around me, and for a moment, sitting there alone in the dark with blood on my hands, I wondered if anyone would even come looking, or if I would just have to fix this myself, the way I fixed everything else.

Footsteps again. I flinched hard, shadow gathering weak at my fingertips, bracing myself for another blade, another voice calling me something that was not my name.

"Lyra."

It was Kael. He knelt down beside me fast, and his hands, when they reached for my arm, were gentler than I expected from someone who looked at people the way he did. He tore a strip from his own shirt without even pausing and pressed it hard against the cut.

"Who did this." His voice had gone flat and low, the kind of low that meant something underneath was working hard to stay in control.

"Instructor Vesper," I said, my teeth chattering even though I was not cold. "He called me an anomaly. He tried to kill me."

His jaw tightened, but his hands stayed careful the whole time. That gap between the two sides of him, the anger on his face and the gentleness in his hands, made my throat feel tight and strange, made my eyes sting for reasons that had nothing to do with the cut.

"You keep surprising me," he said quietly, his thumb brushing just below the fresh bandage. "Most people would have broken by now."

I almost laughed, but it came out more like a shaky breath. "I've had a lot of practice."

We were close. Too close. I could feel his breath against my skin, and for one second, I let myself lean in without deciding to. His hand moved to my jaw, tilting my face up, and something shifted in his eyes, something almost soft.

Something slid out of his jacket and dropped to the ground between us.

A folded note, sealed with dark wax in the shape of a wolf circled by thorns. I did not know the crest exactly, but I did not need to. Kael went completely still the moment his eyes landed on it, his whole body locking up in a way that told me everything the wax seal could not. Whatever this was, it belonged to his family, and it scared him.

He grabbed it fast, too fast. But I had already seen enough to feel my whole body go cold.

The Veilshadow threat must be contained, even if it means removing people close to you.

Whatever had almost happened between us was gone in an instant, replaced by something cold sitting between us instead.

I stared at him, blood still soaking through the bandage on my arm, my hands shaking now that the fear had nowhere left to go. "Kael. What is this. How deep does this go?"

His face closed like a door shutting. The boy who had just held my arm like it mattered was gone, replaced by someone I did not recognize at all.