Ch. 36

“Between Ice & Shadow”

It is disorienting, like being plunged into freeze water and I can’t see the bottom. His thoughts, his emotions, his memories — they unfurl around me, raw and vivid. I feel him struggling as my voice first touches his mind, reaching through the dark like a faint, fractured melody. I was unaware then, just drifting, yet he felt it. Every. Single. Moment.

I feel it now. The shock and confusion gripping him as realizes he is hearing my thoughts — fractured pieces, woven with pain and urgency, spilling into him against his will. For someone as controlled and composed as Zanir, it is like a fracture in his well-guarded defenses. There is resistance, a brief surge of panic as he instinctively tries to close himself off, to push me out. But then… something else emerges.

It is fascination — intense, consuming. My presence, so unexpected, so invasive, ignites something primal in him. I feel his control slipping, just a little, and the pulse of my voice echoes louder, threading deeper into him. My words, my thoughts — unguarded — begin to burn through him, leaving marks like glowing embers. They’re not just thoughts to him, they’re like a song he can’t shake, a pull he can’t escape.

They grow louder each time we touch, when our hands met in the tavern that started to scream.

I sense how he tries to block them out, to ignore my cries as they seep through his mind. But I was in pain, reaching out unconsciously, and my need felt like an electric current, vibrating with raw desperation. Every time he closed his eyes, my thoughts surged louder, each fractured whisper carving into his mind, calling him closer to me.

In the forest, surrounded by scouts and strangers, he lays awake, eyes fixed on the stars above, but all he could hear was me. I feel his frustration, his resistance, his confusion. He knows he should be irritated, but… he is compelled to listen. I am there, beneath his skin, curling into the corners of his mind, and he can’t shut me out.

And then, late at night when he can no longer bear my cries, my tears, he sends something to me. A shadow, the shadow knows, can sense me, drawn to the fire I have lit inside Zanir. The shadow, almost a sentient thing and alive on its own, carrying a part of him, weaving through the darkness to find me. I feel his relief when it reaches me, like a weight lifting off his chest, his heart settling as it wraps around me with its familiar chill. It calls me “Light One.”, its voice soft, reverent, like they recognize me long before their master.

There is something gentle in his memories, a quiet pull he never quite admitted to himself. He was aware, even then, that the bond between us was something ancient and undeniable. He didn’t question it — he didn’t dare. But he was drawn to me, compelled to watch over me, to feel my presence as if it were woven into his own.

And here, now, standing in this dark barrier of a single shadow and cold, I feel every echo of his emotions as clearly as if they were my own.

Oh, little bat… Mihaela. His voice is soft as it moves through my skull, a whisper in the back of my mind. He steps closer, as if that was even possible, but each movement is controlled. His gaze piercing through every defense I have ever had. After that first touch on the shore… something change. Different from anything shared in our youth.

He is so close now, his shadow curling around us. I can feel it, the beat of his pulse, the hum of his slowly returning power, as if it is a part of my own.

“Do you feel it too?” His question cuts through my haze.

Do I feel it?

I am suspended in his memories, the sensations pulling me deeper. He felt it first. He felt me before I even knew I was there. His emotions bleed into me, mixing my own, and I can feel the depth of his longing, the unspoken connection he has never dared to claim.

My heart hammers faster as I look into his eyes, searching for some break in the spell I have clearly cast over him. I must have done this, I think. My powers, uncontrolled, reckless — Somehow, I have forced myself into his mind. The thought coils around me, stoking my fear, and I feel something about to snap.

I start to pull away, panic creeping up my spine. I can feel the pressure building, the weight of his presence in my mind, and it is unbearable. Did I force him to feel me? Did I force inside this cage? An invasion, an intrusion — I am no better than the control I despise. Coldness creeps up my neck, my breathing shortens, every inhale like a gasp, each exhale rasping in the chilled air.

My eyes cut back to him, desperate. “No.” I whisper, almost a plea. He’s in my head. I let him in, no worse — dragged him in. My chest tightens, my vision blurs. The world around me pulses, the ground seeming to tilt. I try to breathe, to focus, but it is slipping. My thoughts spiral, drowning in dread. I can’t trust my mind. I can’t trust me.

“Mihaela—” His voice is calm, pulling me from the brink, but the words don’t sink in. I am caught in a typhoon of noise, scents, and icy cold filling my senses, and now the air smells like mine — cloying and crisp, pressing in from all sides. I can’t shake it.

“Why…” My voice is rough, gravelly, animalistic. “Why do you always smell like mint?”

I hear his faint laugh, that unbothered sound that seems to fuel the rage pumping with a chilled intent. “Always with the questions, little bat,” he coos, his tone amused and unafraid.

“Shut. Up.” My grip tightens on the hilt of the dagger strapped to my thigh. Before I know it, I have released it, sending the blade hurtling through the air. It slams into the barrier behind him, falling until it quivers as it sinks into the frozen soil. A thin line of blood appears on his cheek, a red slash against his olived pale skin.

He touches the wound, his grin widening. “Out for blood, I see.” He is almost laughing. “Still mortal, if you're wondering. Just one single shadow friend… the one that liked you the most.” A laugh finally escapes his lips. “I’ll take a scar from you over Iamys any day.”

His words slip through the fog of my fear, my anger. But instead of helping, they only drive me further into the spiraling darkness. I can’t breathe. My heart thunders, my vision narrows, and I feel the beast within me stirring, hungry for release. I’m losing control. I can feel it, the cold encasing my bones, the weight of shadows pressing in around us, smothering, suffocating —

“Mihaela.” His hand closes around my wrist, firm yet unhurried, and I flinch, caught between instinct and a pang of something I can’t quite name. “Calm. Down.” His voice is low, unyielding, each word laced with an edge that slips beneath my skin, settling here.

He is close now, close enough that I can feel his breath ghosting over, each syllable measured and deliberate. “You didn’t do this,” he whispers, a strange softness in his tone that is almost teasing. “If it were that simple, it wouldn’t be half as… interesting.”

I narrow my eyes, pulling against his hold, but his grip holds me here, as if he knows my every move before I make it. The way he looks at me, his gaze intense, something in it almost heating inside me. His thumb brushes absently against my wrist, and I can’t tell if he is grounding me — or himself.

“You think you reached me with your tricks, but you didn’t call me here that way. You called me here because…” His eyes searching mine out, unblinking. “Because you needed me to look at you. Even when you weren’t in this skull, it was like I could feel you, feel your presence — insistent, reckless. You wanted me to find you.” His voice lowers, I feel his breath as it moves past my ear. “Begging, in your own way.”

My pulse stirs beneath his hand, and I try to pull my eyes away from his, but something keeps drawing me back, a strange gravity between us that I can’t seem to shake. His fingers flex around my wrist, as though keeping us both us in this moment, even as his words twist around me, unsettling and raw.

“But don’t get any ideas.” His mouth quirks in a humorless smirk. “If you had any clue what this really is… well, maybe you wouldn’t be so quick to run.”

I can’t hear him over the roaring in my ears, the thudding of my heart. Everything is too loud, too bright, too… close. My chest heaves, my lungs struggling for air. I am trapped, my power slipping, claw running against my mind.

Breathe. I hear his voice. I feel it move through my skull. His grip is firm, holding me, trying to ground me back into the moment. “You are in control of yourself. No one else. Just breath.”

I try. A shaky breath in, then out. The cold begins to wane, just slightly, as I find his steady gaze, his eyes unblinking and calm.

“Again,” he says voice holding me steady. “You’re here, Mihaela. Just breathe.”

My vison clears, the world moves back into focus, the barrier starts to melt around us. I feel the beast retreat, claws tapping back into the dark, leaving only the familiar coldness in its wake. I blink. Sunlight is now breaking through as the barrier melts, as if it was never there to begin with, harsh and blinding.

When my vision steadies, I see Zanir in front of me, his hand still on my wrist. He is watching me intently, as if searching for some hidden answer in my eyes. His fingers leave faint purple marks around the Samca inked on my skin, as if claiming a part of me he never asked to take.

Behind me, the voices are hard to make out, growing distant and indistinct. The world is suddenly quiet, save for the sound of my own shallow breaths. I can feel the weight of his gaze, the shadow moving and dancing with his small braid the brushes my forehead as he leaned in.

Suddenly, my body feels heavy, as if the ground itself is pulling me down. I realize, too late, that my legs are giving away, and I can brace myself, I am slipping, falling.

Shit. The word is a whisper, unsure if it is mine or someone else’s, as darkness encroaches. My head spins, trying to grab on to a sense of reality.

A comforting voice slips into my mind, one I know too well — Kiza’s, cool and resolute, a faint brush of claws against my consciousness. Lady Mihaela, he says, a voice a low rumble, you are always in control.