Rowan woke to the sound of breathing.

  Not his own.

  Soft. Unsteady. Too close.

  He opened his eyes slowly, vision swimming. The world came into focus in fragments — bamboo swaying overhead, pale morning light filtering through the stalks, the faint scent of blood and moonlight.

  And Lyra.

  She sat beside him, knees drawn to her chest, her cloak wrapped tightly around her shoulders. Her eyes were red?rimmed, her hair tangled, her bells silent. She looked like she hadn’t slept at all.

  Rowan tried to sit up.

  Pain exploded across his shoulder.

  Lyra lunged forward. “Don’t—!”

  Her hands caught him, steadying him before he could fall back. Rowan hissed through his teeth, gripping the earth.

  “What… happened?” he muttered.

  Lyra swallowed hard. “You almost died.”

  He blinked, trying to piece together the night. The bamboo road. Elias. The blade. The blood. Lyra’s voice breaking as she held him.

  And then—

  His gaze dropped to her wrist.

  A faint crescent scar marked the skin.

  Rowan’s breath caught. “Lyra… what did you do?”

  She looked away. “What I had to.”

  “Lyra.”

  Her voice was barely a whisper. “I gave you my blood.”

  Rowan’s heart stopped.

  “Why?” he rasped.

  Lyra’s eyes flashed — anger, fear, something deeper. “Because you were dying. Because you wouldn’t stop bleeding. Because you told me to run and I couldn’t. Because—”

  Her voice cracked.

  “Because I couldn’t lose you.”

  Rowan stared at her, stunned.

  Lyra wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. “I know what it means. I know what it does. I know the risk. But I didn’t care.”

  Rowan’s pulse thudded painfully in his ears. “Lyra… you don’t understand. Your blood—”

  “Binds,” she whispered. “I know.”

  Rowan’s breath hitched. “Then why—”

  “Because you matter to me.”

  The words hit him harder than Elias’s blade.

  Lyra looked away, ears flattening. “I didn’t do it to trap you. Or to claim you. Or anything like that. I did it because you were slipping away and I—”

  She stopped, voice trembling.

  “I couldn’t watch you die.”

  Silence settled between them — heavy, fragile, charged.

  Rowan swallowed. “Lyra… look at me.”

  She hesitated, then lifted her gaze.

  Rowan reached out — slowly, carefully — and brushed his fingers against her wrist, tracing the faint scar.

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  “You saved my life.”

  Lyra’s breath caught. “I didn’t want to. I had to.”

  Rowan shook his head. “No. You chose to.”

  Her eyes softened, but fear still lingered beneath the surface. “Do you feel anything? Different? Strange?”

  Rowan paused.

  He did.

  A faint pull beneath his ribs. A warmth that wasn’t his. A thread connecting him to her — not physical, not visible, but unmistakable.

  He could feel her heartbeat.

  Not clearly. Not constantly. But enough to know it was there.

  Rowan exhaled slowly. “There’s… something.”

  Lyra’s face fell. “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be.”

  She blinked, startled.

  Rowan met her gaze. “You saved me. Whatever this bond is… we’ll deal with it.”

  Lyra stared at him, searching his face for anger, fear, resentment — anything.

  She found none.

  Rowan shifted, wincing. “Help me sit up?”

  Lyra moved instantly, supporting him with gentle hands. Rowan leaned against the bamboo, breathing through the pain.

  Lyra hovered beside him. “You shouldn’t move too much.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “You’re not.”

  He gave her a tired half?smile. “You always say that.”

  She glared at him — but her eyes softened almost immediately. “Because you’re always lying.”

  Rowan chuckled weakly. “Fair.”

  Lyra hesitated, then asked the question she’d been avoiding.

  “Rowan… do you hate me for what I did?”

  Rowan looked at her — really looked.

  At the exhaustion in her eyes.

  At the fear she tried to hide.

  At the girl who had given him her cursed blood to keep him alive.

  “No,” he said softly. “I don’t.”

  Lyra’s breath shuddered out of her.

  Before either of them could say more, a distant horn echoed through the forest.

  Lyra stiffened. “The Silver Oath.”

  Rowan’s jaw tightened. “They’re tracking us.”

  Lyra helped him to his feet, her hands steady even as her heart raced.

  “Can you walk?” she asked.

  Rowan nodded. “With you.”

  Lyra swallowed, then slipped her arm around his waist. Rowan leaned into her, their steps syncing instinctively.

  The bond pulsed faintly between them.

  Not a chain.

  Not a curse.

  Something else.

  Something neither of them understood yet.

  Together, they limped deeper into the forest — hunted, wounded, bound by blood and choice.

  And for the first time, neither of them was running alone.