The glass kept whispering.
Not loud—never loud—but like a pulse that had learned to speak.Every few breaths it throbbed under Maya's fingertips, faint blue veins of light moving through the cracks, spider-webbing toward her reflection.
Aarav had fallen asleep again, curled on the couch beneath the blanket she'd wrapped around him. The hum had gentled for his sake, almost tender.
Maya stood before the window, barefoot, hair loose, every nerve in her body poised between flight and surrender.
The eyes were still there.Silver and sad.
"Arjun," she whispered.
They flickered. The reflection leaned closer. "You can hear me."
"Yes," she said, throat dry. "You shouldn't be here."
"I'm not," he answered, and the words rippled across the glass like wind on water. "Not in your way. The worlds are touching on their own. I'm only following the fault line."
"The fault line?"
He smiled faintly. "The path between what we wanted and what we deserved."
Maya's fingers pressed harder against the glass. The hum climbed until the air itself trembled. "You're the one breaking it. You stayed."
"I had to." His voice was soft, but underneath it was something brittle. "They needed me. And when I tried to let go, the world remembered me anyway."
She shook her head. "Then forget it. Forget this. I already made my choice."
"You think I haven't tried?"
The reflection fractured, momentarily showing two versions of him—one calm and luminous, one gaunt, human, terrified.The light wavered. "Every time I force myself to stay there, I hear your world calling back. It isn't me anymore—it's both of us. The seam won't close unless someone crosses completely."
The phrase chilled her. "Crosses?"
His hand lifted, palm to the glass, mirroring hers. "Let me show you what's happening."
For a moment, she couldn't move. Aarav's sleeping form anchored her; the small, steady sound of his breath was the last real thing she had.But outside, the red-gold haze was rising again. Buildings shimmered, their edges feathering into unfamiliar spires. The hum grew deep enough to shake her bones.
If she didn't understand what was happening, she couldn't protect him.
She set her palm against Arjun's.
The glass turned liquid.
Light flooded through her—cold and hot at once, a river of memories that weren't hers. She saw the twin moons, the camps, the reversed river, the star that pulsed like a heartbeat. She felt the weight of Arathen's robes on her shoulders, the raw exhaustion of command, the endless burden of being the one everyone looked to.
And then she saw him—Arjun—kneeling in the center of a storm, eyes closed, body dissolving into threads of light that reached toward her world.
The current dragged her forward. She gasped, half inside, half out.
"Stop!" she cried. "I'll tear apart if I go further!"
Arjun's voice echoed through the shimmer. "Then let me anchor you."
Something pulled tight between them, an invisible thread snapping taut. Her heart stuttered; for one breath she was seeing through him, his memories overlaying hers—his first battle, his first spell, the same sick hope that what he did mattered.
He had wanted belonging. She had wanted escape.Both had found guilt instead.
The surge faded. The world steadied around her. She was still in her apartment, hand against the window—but the cracks were gone. The glass gleamed unbroken, clear as water.
Beyond it, only a sky full of quiet, ordinary stars.
"Arjun?" she whispered.
A faint shimmer answered, the outline of a man fading into the night.His voice came like a breath against her ear.
"The gate's closed for now. But it won't hold forever. When it breaks again… don't run."
Maya pressed her forehead to the glass. "What do you want me to do?"
"Remember," he said. "So the world doesn't forget either of us."
Then the light went out.
The silence afterward was heavier than the hum had ever been.
Aarav stirred and murmured, "Mom?"
She turned, blinking tears she hadn't noticed. "I'm here."
Outside, dawn was beginning again—one sun, pale and pure. But in its heart a second flicker pulsed faintly, a heartbeat waiting for its moment.
Maya watched it rise, whispering his name once more.
And somewhere, on the other side of the seam, Arjun whispered hers.