The lodge was colder than the storm. Damp clung to the timbers, cobwebs strung the corners like gray lace, and stiff pelts hung from the rafters, their glassy eyes dulled with dust. A broken antler leaned against the hearth, brittle with age.

Corven struck flint to tinder. Sparks leapt, caught, and flame licked slowly along old wood until fire pushed shadows back. Heat unfurled in uneven breaths, throwing his face into relief—sharp cheekbones, jaw set like stone, eyes a storm even firelight could not soften.

The storm battered the walls, rattling shutters that hadn’t been touched in years. Water dripped from Corven’s cloak to the warped floorboards, dark stains spreading like ink. Myrren caught herself staring at the way his hair clung damp to his temple, the fire catching on the sharp lines of his face until he looked less man, more shadow made flesh. She turned quickly back to her satchel, heart thudding for reasons she refused to name.

Myrren wrung rain from her braid, every movement sharper than she meant. Her satchel sagged with damp, set carefully by the hearth to dry. She rubbed her arms against the cold, refusing to look at him too long.

“You didn’t have to come with me,” she said, voice brittle as glass.

Corven’s gaze flicked to hers, then back to the flames. “The Queen would never send you alone.”

Her mouth twisted. “So I am a piece on her board. Moved where she wishes. Bound by her hand.”

“Better a chain that warns you of its weight,” Corven murmured, “than a thread that strangles in silence.”

The words slid too easily into her skin, like a blade between ribs. Myrren’s fists curled in her skirts.

“Chains or threads—either way, they kill,” she shot back.

His head turned, gaze steady, unreadable. “Chains can be borne. A thread snaps when you least expect it.”

Her laugh came sharp and bitter. “You speak as if you care what happens when it snaps.”

His jaw tightened, a muscle ticking in his cheek. “If I did not care, you would be dead a hundred times over.”

The silence that followed pressed heavier than the storm outside. The tether hummed low and sharp in her blood, louder here, in the stillness. She felt it like a current thrumming between them, every heartbeat too loud.

The fire hissed, smoke curling toward the rafters like a warning no one heeded. Myrren paced a tight line in front of the hearth, damp skirts brushing her boots, her hands restless at her sides.

“You see poison in everything,” she snapped, whirling on him. “Every shadow hides venom, every smile masks a dagger. That isn’t wisdom, Corven. It’s suspicion. It’s sickness.”

His gaze tracked her, steady as a blade point. “And you saw devotion and called it love.”

The words landed like a strike. She froze.

“You can read aconitine from a breath,” he pressed, voice low, unyielding, “but you could not smell betrayal on his lips.”

Her throat went tight. “Better light than shadow. Better a lie that feels warm than silence that burns cold.”

Corven rose from his chair. The fire painted his face in flame and darkness, but his voice was no longer calm—it cracked, sharp as lightning. “Better chains than a grave.”

Myrren’s heart slammed against her ribs, fury boiling to the surface. “Better truth than chains! You think silence keeps you clean, but it only rots you from the inside. You think watching me proves your strength, but it’s only cowardice. You won’t speak what you feel because you know it will bind you.”

His control shattered. His storm-gray eyes burned. “And you—” His voice shook with restrained violence. “You cling to lies because the truth would undo you. You want chains, Myrren. You want someone to hold you back from burning yourself alive, and you hate me because I am the one who does it.”

“You guard me like a hound, then sneer when I bite back,” she spat. “Tell me, Corven—do you even know where your duty ends and you begin? Or are you so used to being silence that you’ve forgotten what it is to be a man?”

His composure cracked, fury flashing raw across his face. “And you—do you even know what it is to be alive? You clutch poisons like prayer beads, as if naming them keeps you safe. But you can name every venom in Eirden and still not see the one killing you.”

Her breath caught. The tether snapped taut between them, thrumming like struck steel.

She tried to push past him, but his hand shot out, catching her wrist. Firm. Unyielding.

“Let me go,” she hissed, though her pulse betrayed her, hammering too fast.

“Never,” he said, voice rough, no longer the calm shadow he had always been. His restraint was ash now, burning away in the storm between them.

Corven’s grip on her wrist tightened, not cruel, but unshakable—like iron shackles forged from his will alone.

“Every time you run headlong into fire,” his voice broke low, ragged, “I am dragged after you. Do you think I want this tether? Do you think I chose it?” His breath came harsh, thunder beneath the words. “Saints damn it, I can’t stop wanting—”

Her breath caught, anger and something far more dangerous sparking through her veins. “Then silence yourself—”

And he did.

Not with words. With a kiss.

His mouth crashed against hers, hard enough to steal the air from her lungs. No gentleness, no restraint—only hunger, fury, and the desperate breaking of chains too long held.

The tether roared through her blood, binding her pulse to his. She shoved against him, for a heartbeat resisting, but the fire seared hotter—her lips parted, betraying her.

Then his hands were at her waist, dragging her closer. Her back struck the wall, furs and splintered wood at her spine, his body a storm before her. His mouth left hers only to blaze down the line of her jaw, to her throat, where his lips pressed hard, reverent, starving. The scrape of his breath against her skin made her knees weaken.

“Myrren,” he murmured against her neck, her name half-curse, half-prayer.

Her own hands betrayed her too, clutching his coat, fingers fisting in the fabric, pulling him closer. She kissed him back, fierce and breathless, tasting cypress and steel, tasting the hunger he had buried for too long.

The world shrank to fire and storm and the heat of his mouth. Every breath was him. Every heartbeat, tethered.

His mouth claimed hers again, slower this time, less fury than ache. As though he had broken and now could only linger in the ruins. His forehead pressed to hers, breath ragged, the tether burning like a brand between them.

“I swore I would never touch what I could not claim,” he whispered against her lips. “But you—saints damn you, Myrren, you undo me.”

Her throat tightened. “You terrify me more than poison ever could.”

His hand rose to cradle her jaw, thumb grazing her damp cheek. “Then fear me. Hate me. But don’t tell me you don’t feel it.” His mouth brushed her throat, the hollow just below her jaw. “This bond. This hunger.”

Her knees weakened as his lips moved lower, pressing hard against the collarbone bared by her shift’s torn lacing. Heat seared there, heat that had nothing to do with the fire.

The tether blazed hotter, searing down her veins, binding pulse to pulse. It was not gentle—it was ruthless, merciless, as though some unseen hand had forged them together long before this storm. Every time she tried to breathe, she breathed him. Every time her heart raced, she felt his answering beat inside her chest.

She clutched at his coat, nails biting into fabric, words trembling out before she could cage them. “I don’t want this—” Her voice broke. “And yet I want nothing else.”

The truth hung between them, raw, unbearable.

Corven’s breath caught, and for a heartbeat he stilled, as if her confession had cleaved him open. His forehead rested against hers again, storm-gray eyes inches from her own.

“Myrren,” he said, her name stripped down to something like prayer, something like surrender.

The tether hummed mercilessly, louder than the storm outside.

She tore herself free at last, staggering back against the wall, chest heaving, lips burning with the taste she could not deny.

Silence slammed into the lodge, heavier than thunder.

Corven stood motionless before her, breath ragged, shoulders rising and falling as if he had fought a war. For the first time since she had known him, he looked undone.

“It meant nothing.” Her voice shook; she hated that it shook. “We’ll pretend it never happened.”

Corven did not answer. He only watched her, unblinking, unreadable, the fire painting his face in shadow and flame. His silence weighed heavier than words.

“Do you hear me?” she demanded, though her own pulse betrayed her, racing too fast, too loud. “We’ll never speak of this.”

At last he stirred, a breath dragged from somewhere deep, storm-gray eyes still locked on hers. His voice was quiet, dangerous.
“If that is the lie you choose… then wear it. For now.”

Her throat closed. The tether thrummed hot and merciless in her blood, as if mocking her words.

“You can silence your tongue, Myrren,” he said, softer now, but no less sharp. “But not the bond that already speaks.”

Outside, thunder split the sky once more.

And in her heart, she knew the lie she had just spoken. His lips had touched hers,
and she was the one pretending it hadn’t happened.