35: TETHERED

**CELESTE**

I didn’t understand what was happening.

One moment, I was standing, my breath shallow, my fingers clutching the edge of a table to steady myself. The next, pain lanced through me—sharp, all-consuming. It wasn’t a wound. Not one I could see. But it was there, threading through my bones, twisting deep into the fabric of me.

I gasped, stumbling, my vision darkening at the edges. Across the room, Erkel groaned, gripping his stomach as though something had struck him. He looked up at me, and the slow, curling smile that spread across his face made my blood run cold.

“Oh, Celeste,” he murmured, his voice as sweet as poison. “You really don’t know, do you?”

I swallowed hard, forcing myself to breathe past the ache in my chest. “Know what?”

Erkel chuckled, pressing a palm to his side. “That if I die, so do you.”

The world tilted.

“What?” My voice came out thin, breathless, barely a whisper against the weight of his words.

He straightened, smoothing his hands down his coat as though he hadn’t just unraveled my entire existence. “I had a witch link our lives,” he said, voice light, conversational. “It wasn’t easy to find someone powerful enough, but you’d be surprised what people will do for the right price. A simple little spell—if I perish, so do you.”

I felt sick. My mind struggled to process it, to comprehend the impossibility of it. A life tethered to his, a heartbeat tied to another’s.

He sighed, feigning disappointment. “I had a feeling you’d do something foolish eventually, Celeste. Trying to kill me? Really? Did you think I’d let you slip away so easily?”

I wanted to scream, to tear the smug expression from his face. But I couldn’t. Because beneath the fury, beneath the rising wave of panic, there was something colder—Elijah’s silence.

Slowly, I turned my head toward him.

He stood utterly still, watching Erkel with a gaze so devoid of warmth it could have frozen the room solid. His hands curled at his sides, the veins in his forearms taut with restraint.

Then his gaze flicked to me.

For a single, excruciating moment, I saw something terrifying in his expression. Hesitation.

My stomach twisted violently.

Elijah was ruthless. He was calculated, unyielding, and I knew—I knew—that there was a part of him, however small, that was weighing the option of letting me die just to rid himself of Erkel.

My chest tightened.

“You son of a bitch,” I whispered, voice shaking.

Elijah exhaled sharply, dragging a hand down his face. “Don’t be dramatic,” he muttered, before turning toward the door. “I need a healer.”

It stung.

Not just the pain in my body but the way he spoke—as if my life was merely an inconvenience. As if he was only keeping me alive because I was useful.

A healer was summoned, a woman with silver-threaded hair and hands that smelled of bitter herbs. She barely spared me a glance before kneeling beside Erkel, pressing her fingers to his chest, muttering incantations under her breath.

I felt it instantly.

Warmth seeped through me, knitting together something unseen. It wasn’t comforting. It was violation. A forced tether pulling me back into alignment with him. I clenched my fists, nails biting into my palms, willing myself to stay upright as the weight of it settled over me.

Elijah turned to Erkel, his expression void of anything close to patience. “When you’re healed, you leave,” he said, voice like cut glass. “And don’t come back.”

Erkel smirked. “Why would I leave? I just bought the house next to yours.”

The room dropped into silence.

For a moment, it seemed Elijah didn’t process the words. And then—

The wall behind him cracked.

A deep, splintering fissure spread through the stone as power pulsed off him in violent waves. The maids in the corner flinched, one of them audibly gasping. The healer quickly finished her work and stepped back, clearly not wanting to be caught between them.

Erkel chuckled, standing with an infuriating grace. “I have to say, I do enjoy getting under your skin, Elijah.”

Elijah took a slow, measured step forward. “If you so much as breathe near my house, I will rip you apart piece by piece.”

Erkel hummed. “Now, now. You wouldn’t want to hurt me, would you? That would be terribly unfortunate for dear Celeste.” He turned to me, winking. “Until next time, sweetheart.”

And then he was gone.

Elijah remained still, his jaw clenched so tight I thought it might shatter. Finally, he turned to me. His gaze swept over my face, lingering at my throat, at the places where my body still hummed with phantom pain.

“You’re not off the hook for trying to kill me,” he said flatly. “I just haven’t found a fitting punishment yet.”

Then he left, slamming the door behind him.

I stood there, shaking, feeling the weight of every gaze in the room. The maids had witnessed everything. Their eyes flickered with unease, whispers already beginning to swirl between them. I ignored them, forcing my feet to move, stumbling back toward my chambers.

I barely made it before Mona caught up to me.

“Celeste!” She grabbed my wrist, her warm brown eyes wide with concern. “What is going on? Why are you in such a mess with both of them?”

I pressed a trembling hand to my forehead. “Mona, I— I don’t know where to begin.”

“Start anywhere,” she urged.

I exhaled, shakily. Then, wordlessly, I reached for the fabric of my sleeve, pulling it down just enough to reveal the mark on my skin—the birthmark I had spent my life hiding. A delicate, star-shaped pattern, etched into me like a whisper of something ancient.

Mona gasped.

And then, with a slow, almost reverent motion, she pulled back her own sleeve.

The same mark.

In the exact same place.

We stared at each other, the air between us charged with something unspoken, something bigger than either of us could comprehend.

“You—” I choked out, my voice barely above a whisper.

Mona’s lips parted, her expression unreadable.

And then, softly, she whispered, “You’re a Mond, too?”

I couldn’t breathe. “I’m a sea star.” I replied and a loud gasp tore through the air. 

The shock on her face couldn’t be missed. 

The world had shifted beneath my feet, tilting so violently that I couldn’t find my balance. The walls felt too close, the air too thick, my body not quite my own. A thousand thoughts swarmed in my head, overlapping, colliding, until all I could hear was white noise.

Erkel had linked our lives. If he died, so did I.

It was an impossible truth, one that shouldn’t exist. Magic like that was ancient, dark, the kind that should have been lost to time. But of course, he had found a way. He had tethered me to him like a chain around my neck, a cruel reminder that no matter how far I ran, how desperately I tried to carve out my own fate, someone would always find a way to own me.

I had spent my entire life fighting against being controlled.

And now, I was trapped again.

But what shattered me most wasn’t the bond itself. It wasn’t the injustice of it, nor the violation. It was Elijah.

The way he had hesitated.

I had seen it in his eyes, that flicker of calculation, that brief moment where he weighed the idea of letting me die just to be free of Erkel. He had decided against it, of course. He had called the healer. But the hesitation had been there. And it had hurt.

I had always known what Elijah was. He was a creature of logic, of ruthless efficiency, a man who saw the world in terms of what was necessary rather than what was right. I had known this. And yet, some foolish, deeply buried part of me had believed that I mattered to him in some way beyond mere convenience. That I wasn’t just a piece in his game, a tool to be wielded.

But when the moment came, when my life was hanging by a thread, he had hesitated.

What was I to him, really? A puzzle he hadn’t yet solved? A challenge?

Or just another burden?

My stomach twisted, nausea rolling through me in thick, suffocating waves. I hated that it hurt. I hated that it mattered. Because I had told myself—over and over again—that I wouldn’t make the mistake of wanting more from him. That I wouldn’t look at him and hope for softness where there was only steel.

But I had.

And now, I felt like a fool.

And then, there was Mona.

I had spent years hiding my birthmark, convinced it was something unnatural, something dangerous. I had been careful, so careful, to never let anyone see. Because I knew—I knew—that if anyone found out, I would no longer be just Celeste. I would become something else in their eyes. Something unknown. Something feared.

But now Mona had the same mark.

I didn’t know what that meant.

I didn’t know who we were.

And after everything that had just happened, I wasn’t sure I had the strength to find out.