I didn't wake from a nightmare.
I didn't wake from fear.
I woke because something brushed against my thoughts—softly, shy like a child tugging on a sleeve, not pulling, just touching.
My eyes opened slowly.
Morning light spilled across the room, the soft gold hitting Seris's cheek, warming the line of Lira's shoulder. They were still asleep—comfortable, breathing slow and steady, both pressed against me as if the night wasn't long enough to stay close.
But I wasn't alone in my head.
Something else was awake too.
Not calling, not demanding, not frightened—
just aware.
It pulsed gently inside my chest, and the sensation wasn't mine.
It was asking.
Lira stirred first, eyes blinking open, voice sleepy. "Arin… something wrong?"
"No," I whispered. "Something's happening."
Seris woke instantly at the tone, pulling herself upright. "What kind?"
I placed a hand over my sternum, feeling the pulse beneath my fingertips.
"It's trying to say something."
Both girls went still.
Lira leaned in. "How?"
Seris's voice softened. "Arin, what do you feel?"
I closed my eyes—
and there it was again.
A pulse. Another pulse.
Then— a soft surge— like emotion trying to form into shape, but too young to take a word yet.
And then— one feeling, sudden, full, overwhelming:
Happiness.
I gasped.
Lira clutched my hand. "Arin?"
Seris leaned closer, face inches from mine. "What did you feel?"
I swallowed hard, eyes burning with something I didn't expect.
"It's… happy."
Seris blinked, stunned. "Because we're here?"
"No…" I whispered.
"Because we stayed."
Lira's voice broke. "It trusts us…"
And then, something else—
A second pulse…
this one deeper, warmer, almost trembling—
thankful.
My chest tightened painfully. "It remembers last night."
Seris looked at me with that fierce protective fire—only now it had something soft beneath it.
"Then it knows we're not going anywhere."
Lira whispered against my shoulder, voice shaking, "We're yours."
The fracture pulsed sharply— deep, warm, completely alive—
and for the first time since the fracture existed in my life, I felt a single clear emotional message inside my mind—soft, fragile, forming into shape:
us.
Lira gasped.
Seris froze.
And I whispered the only translation I could find:
"It doesn't think I'm alone anymore."
Seris pressed her forehead against mine, voice breaking—"You're not."
Lira wrapped her arms around both of us, whispering against my neck—
"None of us are."
The presence pulsed again. Warm. Gentle. Grateful.
Safe.
The room stayed quiet after that single word pulsed through us. It wasn't a sound, not even a whisper—just a feeling settling inside our hearts like a small hand reaching up, waiting to be held.
Lira sat very still beside me, her eyes wide and shimmering. "Arin… it understands us."
"More than just us," Seris murmured. "It understands itself through us."
I placed a hand over the place the pulse had come from, feeling the gentle warmth fade and settle like a heartbeat returning to rest. "It knew what to say."
"No," Lira corrected softly. "It knew what to feel."
Seris brushed a strand of hair behind my ear—carefully, like she didn't want to interrupt something delicate inside me. "This isn't only your magic anymore."
I exhaled slowly. "It never was."
Lira leaned against my shoulder, voice trembling. "We're changing it."
"And it's changing us," Seris finished.
I looked at both of them—two people I never should've had, who somehow ended up in my life anyway. Two people I didn't deserve who chose to stay.
"You don't have to stay," I whispered, because the fear needed to be said out loud before I could let it go.
Seris cupped my jaw gently. "We already did."
Lira squeezed my hand. "We keep choosing you."
The fracture pulsed softly—
as if choosing us back.
For a long moment, the three of us just stayed close enough that our shoulders brushed and our breaths mixed. It wasn't about comfort anymore—it was about the quiet realization that something had shifted forever.
Lira looked up at me, eyes soft but unreadably deep. "Arin… what does 'us' mean?"
I shook my head slowly. "I don't know yet."
Seris tilted her head. "You mean the word? The feeling?"
"The future," I said quietly.
Seris fell silent. Lira swallowed.
The fracture pulsed once—comfortingly, like a hand on the back.
Lira whispered, "Maybe it doesn't need us to define it yet."
Seris stared at the window, voice low. "Maybe we don't need to either."
I turned slightly toward them. "So what do we do?"
Seris looked at me like I was missing the obvious. "What we're already doing."
Lira's voice trembled, but with something like hope. "Staying with each other."
I felt something release in my chest, like a stretched thread snapping back into place. "You think that's enough?"
Seris leaned in, forehead touching mine for a brief heartbeat. "It was enough to change it."
Lira rested her hand over my heart again. "Then it's enough to change what comes next."
And for the first time in a long time, the future didn't feel terrifying—
it felt like something unfolding between all of us.
We didn't plan the silence that followed — it settled naturally, like the room itself understood the moment better than any words could. Morning light spilled across the blankets in warm stripes, brushing our faces, making everything feel softer than reality ever should.
Lira leaned her head against me again, her hair brushing my shoulder. "Do you think it sleeps?" she asked quietly.
Seris slid down beside us and rested against the headboard. "Maybe it dreams."
I let my hand rest over the slow, warm pulse in my chest. "If it does… I hope it dreams about this."
Lira looked up at me, shy smile appearing. "About us?"
Seris's voice was calm, steady. "About not being alone."
The pulse answered — soft, small, almost like a child curling closer beneath a blanket. For a moment, I saw that dream-space again in my mind — not a nightmare, not a memory, just a quiet place waiting for light.
I exhaled slowly. "Whatever happens next…"
Lira took my hand without needing to be asked.
Seris took the other.
"…we face it together."
The warmth inside my chest pulsed again.
Not fear. Not warning.
Just belonging.
And in that moment — quiet, gentle, wrapped in morning light and the people who chose to stay — I realized something simple and overwhelmingly powerful:
I wasn't afraid of being alive anymore.
Not with them.