Kael's POV
It had snowed while they slept.
Not the gentle, flurry-laced kind. Not the kind that blanketed rooftops and hushed the world.
This was a hunter's snow — thick, blinding, and loud in its silence. A veil for blades and secrets.
Kael stood at the window of the inn's upper room, watching it fall in thick spirals. His breath misted against the pane, and behind him, he felt the warmth of her presence like a second spine.
Eira stirred on the bed, wrapped in a blanket, golden skin glowing faintly in the low firelight. Her Mark pulsed like an ember.
So did his.
It hadn't stopped since the kiss. Since the binding.
Since her.
He should have felt fear. Shame. Strategy.
But instead, he felt something far worse.
He felt need.
"Someone's watching," she said softly, sitting up.
He didn't turn.
"I know."
Eira's POV
She felt it too. Like eyes pressed to the glass of their shared magic, peering in. Not physically, not yet — but magically. A disturbance in the current, like a ripple across still water.
Someone had felt the bond. That meant someone powerful.
Someone close.
Eira stood, pulling the blanket tighter around her. "It's not safe to stay here."
Kael turned to face her then, face unreadable.
"Then we run."
She blinked. "You'd leave your kingdom?"
"I'd rather run with you than bury you."
The words shouldn't have meant so much. They did.
She crossed the room, stood in front of him. She didn't ask for proof. She didn't need to.
But something inside her still whispered doubt.
"You're not bound because you chose to be," she said. "Neither of us did."
He raised a hand and pressed it gently over her Mark.
"No," he said. "But I am choosing you."
Before she could respond, a crash echoed from below.
Then a scream.
Then steel.
Kael's POV
He moved before the next breath.
Down the stairs. Sword in hand. His cloak streaming behind him like a shadow on fire.
Three figures stood in the common hall of the inn — all cloaked, masked, and armed. Not bounty hunters.
Court assassins.
He recognized the blade style. Frost-steel. Rare. Northern make. These weren't freelancers. These were sanctioned.
The Court had found out.
One assassin turned toward him. "You're harboring a fireborn."
Kael said nothing.
The second assassin pointed his sword. "Your father sends his regards."
That was all Kael needed.
He attacked.
Eira's POV
She didn't wait in the room.
She never could stay where the danger wasn't.
By the time she reached the bottom of the stairs, Kael was already moving like a storm. His blade sang — silver slicing through air. One assassin lunged; Kael met him mid-strike and twisted. A heartbeat later, the man hit the floor in a pool of silver blood.
But another charged from behind.
Eira raised both palms — and released a pulse of fire that sent the man flying back into the stone wall.
Her breath trembled. The Mark on her throat flared. And so did Kael's, like a pair of matching sigils cast by war.
The third assassin hesitated.
That was his mistake.
Kael struck low, a sweep of the leg, then drove his blade through the attacker's ribs with cold precision.
Silence returned.
Then Eira sagged to the wall, gasping.
Kael's POV
He crossed to her, sheathing his blade.
Her magic had overexerted again. It pulsed erratically, flickering like an overfed fire.
"Don't touch me," she warned.
But he already had.
His hands gripped her face, steadying her. "Breathe."
She blinked up at him, pupils dilated, mouth slightly parted.
Their Marks glowed in tandem — not from battle, but from connection. Every emotion she felt poured into him. Every flicker of pain. Every surge of adrenaline.
And beneath it all — desire.
Raw. Hungry. Dangerous.
"I told you," she whispered. "It's changing us."
"I know," he said. "But it's too late to run from it now."
He pulled her to him.
And she didn't resist.
Eira's POV
He kissed her again — this time not out of lust, but desperation.
The kind that came after blood.
The kind that came when the world turned against you, and the only safety you found was in someone else's breath.
Their bodies pressed together in the wreckage of the common room, bodies of assassins still warm at their feet. And all she could think of was how alive she felt.
His hands gripped her hips. Hers curled into his hair. Their Marks burned.
And then—
Boots in the snow. Outside.
More were coming.
Kael broke the kiss, voice low. "We leave now."
She nodded. "How?"
He smiled, but there was no humor in it. "Like fugitives."
Kael's POV
He'd burned bridges before. But never like this.
He took only what he needed: his sword, a coin pouch, a folded note with his family's seal — one he'd leave behind. A final farewell to the life that no longer belonged to him.
He would be hunted. Declared rogue.
And he didn't care.
Because he wasn't leaving her behind.
Eira waited at the back door, cloak tightened, eyes blazing.
"I'm ready," she said.
He took her hand.
And together, they stepped out into the snow.
Eira's POV
The cold bit at her skin, but it didn't matter.
She felt fire inside her now — fire that no longer belonged only to her. The bond was growing stronger by the hour. It connected her to Kael in ways that defied reason, magic, and law.
But it also meant blood would follow them.
They would be hunted by kings, feared by mages, whispered about in taverns.
A fireborn and a Warden.
Bound.
Lovers. Enemies. And now…
Something more.
As they disappeared into the night, her fingers tightened in his.
And she whispered the only truth that still felt solid.
"This is just the beginning."