Chapter 79

Isla POV

“Not this time,” he said, voice low.

I looked down at his hand, then up into his eyes. There was no anger there, only quiet desperation the kind that comes when someone has already lost too much and can’t bear to lose more.

I didn’t pull away.

“I’m not going after him,” I said. “Not unless I have to.”

Tristan studied me for a long moment, then released my wrist slowly. “You always say that right before you do.”

A faint smile tugged at the corner of my mouth. “Then maybe this time I’ll prove you wrong.”

He didn’t smile back. Instead, he brushed a hand against my arm, a brief touch, almost unintentional. “Be careful, Isla. The lines between what’s human and what’s not are thinning. Magic doesn’t return without reason.”

“I know.”

“Good.” He turned and walked toward the field again. “Then start preparing for when it does.”

I didn’t see him for the rest of the day.

By nightfall, the compound had gone quiet again too quiet. Patrols moved like ghosts through the corridors, their eyes flicking toward the forest every few minutes.

The moon was rising, pale and swollen, when I found myself on the balcony again. I wasn’t sure why I kept coming back here. Maybe because from here, I could still feel him faint but real, like the echo of a heartbeat that wasn’t mine.

Kieran.

Every time I tried to let go, something in the bond refused. It wasn’t just pain anymore. It was awareness. The kind that felt him moving, breathing, thinking somewhere beyond the trees.

And tonight, for the first time, the bond didn’t ache.

It warmed. I froze.

The hum spread from my chest to my fingertips a soft, golden heat that pulsed once, twice, and then stilled. It was like a whisper brushing through my mind.

You’re safe. My breath caught.

Kieran.

I didn’t hear his voice, not exactly. But I felt the words, like they’d been carved into the space between us.

My fingers tightened on the railing. “Where are you?” I whispered.

No answer. Just that same warmth fading slowly, leaving me colder than before.

The air shifted behind me. I turned but it wasn’t him.

Lyra stood there, her face pale in the moonlight. “Luna,” she said softly. “They found something. Near the river.”

My heart lurched. “What?”

She swallowed. “A mark. Burned into the stones. Old runes. Tristan thinks it’s a sign.”

A sign. Of what?

I didn’t ask. I followed her through the dim corridors, the sound of our footsteps echoing off the stone until we reached the north gate.

Tristan was already there, crouched beside a blackened patch of earth where the grass had been seared away. The smell of magic hung thick in the air iron, smoke, and something else. Something ancient.

When I got closer, I saw the shape etched into the ground. Not a symbol of war. A circle imperfect, hand-drawn and inside it, one word.

Luna.

My throat closed.

Tristan rose slowly, his gaze never leaving the mark. “He was here.”It wasn’t a question.

“He left it for me,” I said quietly.Tristan’s jaw flexed. “Or for me.”

“No.” I shook my head. “He could’ve come closer. He didn’t. That means he’s still”

“Watching,” Tristan finished, his voice hard. “That’s what worries me.”

I crouched beside the mark, reaching out before Tristan could stop me. The ground was warm. The rune pulsed faintly under my fingers, alive for just a second before fading into ash.

When I looked up, the forest beyond the border seemed to shift a shadow moving where there shouldn’t have been one.

For a heartbeat, I swore I saw him. Gold eyes, just beyond the trees. Then he was gone.

My chest tightened around something that wasn’t quite fear. “He’s trying to warn us,” I whispered.

Tristan’s expression darkened. “Or lure you out.”

I met his gaze, steady and certain. “He wouldn’t need to. The bond already could.”

His lips parted, but before he could respond, a gust of wind swept through the clearing cold and sharp enough to snuff out every torch.

The air shimmered again. This time brighter. The ground beneath the mark cracked, light spilling through like veins of molten gold.

Lyra screamed. Tristan pulled me back just as the glow pulsed once more then vanished, leaving only the faint smell of burnt earth.

The three of us stood frozen.“What was that?” Lyra whispered. “Something waking up,” Tristan said grimly.

My gaze lingered on the dark forest, heart hammering in rhythm with something ancient and alive. I could feel it now the pull of the magic, the echo of Kieran’s bond, and the quiet promise of something that hadn’t yet revealed its face.

It wasn’t war.

Not yet.

But whatever was coming had already chosen its ground.

And it had started here.

Far beyond the ridge, in the shadows of the old forest, Kieran stood where the light had vanished, his hands still faintly glowing.

He looked down at the mark he’d left the one that had burned itself into the soil when he whispered her name.

He hadn’t meant for it to reach her like that. But when he’d thought of Isla, the magic had answered.

Ronan’s words returned to him, low and dangerous: You can’t protect her from what’s coming.

Maybe not. But he could try.

And if the old magic wanted to use him as its vessel, then so be it as long as it stayed away from her.

He lifted his gaze to the moon and whispered, almost to himself, “Stay where it’s safe, Isla.”

Because soon, even the forest wouldn’t be able to tell who was friend, foe or fate.

The night deepened, and somewhere between the borders of love and ruin, two heartbeats still moved in sync stubborn, defiant, unbroken.