Morning came quietly.
Not with trumpets of alarm, nor with the trembling hum of a breach, but with the soft rustle of wind through the academy courtyard and the pale light slipping between the blinds of the infirmary.
For a moment, waking felt peaceful.
Then the mark on my collarbone pulsed—
not painfully, but insistently,
like something beneath my skin wanted attention.
Someone wanted attention.
The entity's whisper lingered in my bones like old smoke.
But today wasn't for the entity.
Today was for truth.
Lira waited just outside the infirmary doors, hands clasped in front of her. She looked as if she'd been standing there longer than she would admit. When she saw me, her shoulders loosened with quiet relief.
"You slept?" she asked.
"Enough," I said.
Seris appeared beside her, stretching her arms behind her head. "Good. Because today Halin wants to poke the part of your soul that's apparently… what did she call it? Ah—'structurally compromised.'"
"That's not what she said," Lira murmured.
"It's what she meant."
I didn't argue.
I didn't joke.
The fractured signature pulsed again beneath my skin—
an echo of someone I'd never known
calling from a place I couldn't remember.
Seris noticed the tension in my jaw and clapped a hand onto my back. "Come on. Better us beside you than Halin poking your skull alone."
Lira nodded. "We'll be with you the entire time."
And somehow, that made it easier to breathe.
The Training Hall
Master Halin stood waiting in a circle of runes she'd carved into the polished stone floor. Her expression was unreadable—but her eyes softened slightly when she saw us.
"Good. All three of you."
She gestured to the circle. "Step inside."
The runes hummed as our feet crossed the boundary, reacting to the triad bond instantly. Halin placed three crystalline resonators at the circle's edge. They lit up one by one, casting pale light across the room.
"This is a resonance mirror," Halin said.
"It will let us examine the fractured pattern bound to Arin."
Seris frowned. "Why haven't we used this before?"
"Because," Halin answered calmly, "until last night, I had no confirmation it still existed."
That sent a chill along my arms.
Lira swallowed nervously. "Will it hurt him?"
"Only if we're careless," Halin answered without blinking.
"Comforting," Seris muttered.
Halin raised a brow. "Then don't distract him."
Seris fell silent instantly.
The Resonance Mirror Awakens
"Arin," Halin said softly, "close your eyes."
I did.
"Now… breathe. And let the bond open—not fully. Just enough for the mirror to hear you."
I exhaled slowly.
The bond flickered—
soft warmth from Lira,
steady fire from Seris,
filtering into me like two hands guiding me through darkness.
Then the mirror resonators began to hum.
And something inside me
shifted.
Not painfully.
Not violently.
More like an old door creaking open after years of disuse.
A faint frequency—
thin, cracked, familiar only because the entity echoed it—
rose from the depth of my chest.
Lira gasped softly.
Seris's grip tightened around my arm.
Halin's eyes hardened. "There it is."
The fractured resonance pulsed again, weak but insistent—
like a forgotten heartbeat
struggling to be remembered.
Halin circled us.
"This is not a simple scar," she said. "This is a remnant. A piece of a former bond, severed before it fully formed."
Lira's face paled. "But… Arin was a child."
"Yes."
Halin's tone was gentle but unyielding.
"And that is why this fracture is dangerous. Bonding at that age imprints deeply—even if erased."
Seris's voice dropped low. "So that thing… is hunting a piece of Arin that isn't even his fault?"
Halin nodded once. "Correct."
Something tightened in my chest—
not fear,
not grief,
something harder.
Anger.
For the first time, I felt a flicker of anger toward the unseen past that had shaped this fracture.
But Lira's hand closed gently around mine, grounding me.
Seris rested her palm on my shoulder, warm and steady.
The bond steadied.
The mirror brightened.
And the fractured signature flared fully into view.
The Image That Formed
The resonance mirror projected the fractured pattern into the air above us.
At first it looked like a simple curve—
like a crescent moon.
Then another curve appeared—
broken in half.
Then a shimmer.
A third shape.
A piece missing.
Not destroyed.
Not erased.
Simply… gone.
Halin inhaled sharply.
"This symbol…"
Seris squinted. "You recognize it?"
Lira's fingers trembled. "Halin… that looks like—"
"Yes," Halin said, voice tight with knowledge she had hoped never to confront.
"It resembles the remnants of an ancient triad seal."
My pulse stuttered.
"A seal," I echoed quietly. "From a bond?"
"From a powerful bond," Halin corrected. "The kind formed long before modern wards, when triads were rare and dangerous… and sometimes hunted."
The air thinned.
"And Arin had one?" Lira whispered.
"No," Halin said.
Her eyes met mine.
"Arin was never part of it."
Seris's brows snapped together. "Then why—"
"Because," Halin said softly,
"Arin carries the imprint of the one who was."
Silence crashed through the hall.
I felt the world tip beneath my feet.
Not a past bond.
Not my lost memory.
But someone else's bond
was tied to me.
Someone whose life intersected mine only long enough
to leave a fragment behind.
Someone the entity remembered.
The mirror pulse brightened—
once, twice—
before fading.
The fracture dimmed.
The room grew still.
Lira's voice broke the silence first, trembling:
"Arin… are you okay?"
I didn't answer immediately.
I looked down at my hands—
at the faint shimmer of resonance still cracking softly beneath my skin.
"I don't know," I whispered.
"But I want to be."
Seris stepped closer. "Then we'll help you be."
Lira nodded, her voice soothing. "Every step."
The bond pulsed—
warm, steady, alive.
And even as the fractured signature lingered,
even as the unknown past hung heavy,
I realized something:
Whatever had been imprinted onto me,
whatever the entity sought,
whatever piece had been torn away—
I wasn't defined by that broken history.
I was defined by the two people holding me up now.