There are two kinds of people in this city: those who build empires, and those who try not to get crushed beneath them. For three years, I've been the latter—an analyst in VossCorp's endless glass labyrinth, trading sleep for ambition, and my soul for the illusion of security.
But the night everything changed, I realized the walls weren't made of glass at all. They were mirrors. And something behind them had been watching me for a long time.
I stayed late again—past ten, maybe closer to midnight. Everyone else had already gone, leaving the hum of servers and the muted glow of screens behind tinted partitions. My half-empty coffee had long gone cold, but I didn't care. Numbers were my sanctuary. Data couldn't lie, betray, or bleed.
The city outside glimmered through the floor-to-ceiling windows, smeared with rain. VossCorp Tower pierced the clouds—eighty stories of steel arrogance, the headquarters of a man I'd never met but whose shadow loomed over everything we did.
Adrian Voss.
People said his name like it was both a prayer and a curse. Billionaire at thirty-five. Visionary. Untouchable. Cold. Rumor had it he ruined his first competitor with a smile, the second with silence. The third disappeared.
I'd never seen him up close, and honestly, I preferred it that way. Until that night.
I was reviewing quarterly reports when the lights flickered. Once. Twice.
Then everything died—screens, air-conditioning, even the digital clock. The only light came from the storm outside. Lightning carved the skyline white, and for a split second, I saw my reflection in the window.
Except it wasn't mine.
My reflection smiled when I didn't.
Then something burned.
I gasped, clutching at my chest. A searing pain unfurled just beneath my collarbone, like molten metal etching into skin. I stumbled, knocking papers to the floor. When I looked down, my blouse glowed faintly from within, a spiraling symbol forming under the fabric—intricate, ancient, alive.
The world swayed. A voice—soft, whispering—slid through my mind.
"Found you."
The room tilted, shadows stretching unnaturally long. I fell against the desk, whispering a prayer to no one.
The lights snapped back on.
And Adrian Voss was standing in my doorway.
If intimidation had a human form, it was him.
He wasn't supposed to be here—no CEO wanders the analyst floors after midnight. Yet there he was: six foot something, storm-dark suit, rain dripping from the shoulders like he'd just walked through the tempest itself. His presence pulled gravity toward him. His eyes—gray, almost silver—cut through the air and pinned me where I stood.
"Working late, Ms. Morgan?" he asked, voice calm but edged with something that felt like command.
My heart stuttered. "Y-yes, sir. There was a power fluctuation—"
"I noticed." He stepped inside. "The building sensors registered a surge localized to this floor. You wouldn't happen to know why?"
The glow under my blouse still pulsed faintly. I shifted my papers, forcing my hand to stay steady. "I—I don't, sir. Maybe the servers?"
His gaze swept over the room, sharp, assessing, and for a terrifying heartbeat I thought he could see the truth—the sigil, the voice, the mark that still burned beneath my skin. But then he looked back at me, expression unreadable.
"If anything unusual happens again," he said, "you contact me directly."
"Directly?" I echoed before I could stop myself. "I mean—of course."
He tilted his head slightly, studying me as though measuring an equation that refused to balance. "Have a safe night, Ms. Morgan."
And then he left—without a sound, without looking back.
But the air didn't settle after he was gone. It buzzed, faintly electric, carrying his presence like static. And the mark on my chest pulsed once more—slow, deliberate—almost as if it recognized him.
The next morning, I convinced myself it was a hallucination.
Stress. Fatigue. Too much caffeine and too little sleep. That's all. But when I showered, the mark was still there—pale silver against skin, spiraled like a serpent swallowing its own tail. Touching it sent a ripple through my nerves, a warmth that shouldn't have been comforting but was.
I covered it with makeup and high collars. And pretended it wasn't real.
By the third day, the pretending stopped working. Reflections glitched—mirrors, windowpanes, even the black of my computer screen. Sometimes my reflection moved a heartbeat too late. Once, I caught it turning its head toward something behind me that wasn't there.
That night, I stayed late again, determined to work through it. Numbers couldn't haunt me, I told myself. Equations didn't whisper.
Until I opened a folder that didn't exist.
It appeared out of nowhere on the corporate database:/ARCHIVE/VEIL-09
I shouldn't have clicked it. Every instinct screamed don't. But curiosity is just fear that doesn't want to admit it's afraid.
Inside were ancient texts, symbols identical to the one on my skin, and a single phrase repeated in every file:
"The blood remembers what the mind forgets."
My heart pounded. I reached to close the window.
The computer went black.
A whisper crawled up my spine.
"Elara Morgan."
I froze. The voice was neither male nor female, but it knew me—each syllable coiling around my name like silk and smoke.
"You woke the seal. Now we will see you."
The air temperature plummeted. Frost spidered across the monitor. My breath came out white.
Then, through the reflection on the glass wall, I saw eyes—dozens of them—watching from within the mirror.
I screamed.
And Adrian Voss was there again.
The glass didn't break when he entered; it surrendered.
He crossed the threshold like he'd been expecting this exact moment. His gaze swept the room, landing on the frozen monitor, the whispering glass, and finally—on me.
"Step away from the screen," he said, voice low but absolute.
I obeyed without thinking.
"What—what is happening?" My voice shook. "Something's wrong with—"
He lifted a hand. The air around him shimmered, faint light tracing a sigil that mirrored mine perfectly.
My breath caught. "You—"
"Yes," he said softly. "You triggered it."
"Triggered what?"
His jaw tightened. "Something that was meant to stay buried."
The glass behind him shivered. In its depths, shadows began to move again—hands, faces, reaching for him. Adrian turned, murmuring something under his breath in a language I'd never heard. The lights flared, and the reflections retreated like smoke pulled by wind.
When the silence fell again, he was standing very close.
"You're marked," he said. "It's not supposed to happen twice."
"Twice?" I whispered. "You mean—"
He met my eyes, and for the first time, I saw it—the exhaustion beneath his control, the weight of something far older than either of us.
"It happened to me twelve years ago," he said. "And I've been trying to undo it ever since."
He should have left after that, but he didn't. Instead, he reached out and touched the air just in front of my collarbone. Not me—he didn't cross that final inch—but the mark answered anyway, glowing faintly through the fabric.
"You shouldn't even be alive," he murmured. "They usually take the vessel within hours."
"They?" I repeated. "Who's they?"
His eyes flicked toward the mirrored wall. "The Veil Syndicate. They don't like competition."
"I thought they were just… a rumor. A black-market myth."
"Then consider this your first proof they're real." He straightened, shoulders cutting a silhouette sharp as the city skyline. "You'll stay under my supervision from now on."
I stared at him. "I'm sorry, what?"
"You opened a forbidden archive. You're marked by an old curse that ties directly into my bloodline. That makes you my responsibility."
"You sound like you're quoting from an HR manual written by demons," I muttered.
The corner of his mouth twitched. "If only they were that organized."
We left the office together, though I barely remember how. Rain hit the glass walls like whispered applause. The elevator's descent felt endless. Every time I glanced at him, his reflection seemed slightly off—as if something taller, darker, older was wearing his shape in the mirrored paneling.
"Who are you really?" I asked finally.
His reply was simple. "Someone who's run out of time."
When the doors opened at the ground floor, he turned to me. "Do not look into mirrors tonight. Cover every reflective surface in your apartment. And no matter what you hear, don't answer if something says your name."
The elevator doors closed, leaving me alone with my heartbeat.
Outside, the city pulsed with rain and neon. I walked home through streets that shimmered like liquid light, trying not to think about the feeling of unseen eyes in every puddle.
That night I dreamed of him.
Adrian Voss, standing in a corridor of mirrors stretching forever. In each reflection, his eyes glowed faintly silver, and chains of light wrapped around his wrists. I reached out to touch him, but every time I got close, the reflection shattered, and he vanished.
When I woke, my apartment was freezing. The mirror above my dresser had cracked—perfectly down the center. And through the split, faint as breath, came a whisper.
"You're not alone, Elara."
The crack in the mirror hadn't been there before.
Morning sunlight slanted through the blinds, cutting the reflection into two unequal halves—one that belonged to me, and one that didn't. The left side blinked a fraction too late, a breath behind reality. I stepped closer, heartbeat hammering, and touched the glass. Cold. Too cold.
My reflection smiled.
I stumbled backward, slamming into my nightstand. The mirror didn't shatter this time, but the air in the room thickened. I could feel it—pressure, like being underwater. Then, faintly, I heard that same voice again.
"He cannot save you."
I bolted for my phone.
It took three attempts to dial. My fingers were shaking so badly the screen smeared with sweat. When the call finally connected, I didn't even have to say his name.
"Ms. Morgan," Adrian Voss's voice came through immediately—cool, composed, like he'd been expecting me. "Tell me what happened."
"How do you—" I stopped, breath catching. "The mirror cracked overnight. I didn't touch it. And someone—something—spoke."
A pause. "What did it say?"
"That you… can't save me."
Silence hummed at the other end, taut and heavy. When he spoke again, his voice was lower. "You're still in your apartment?"
"Yes."
"Don't move."
Then the line went dead.
Ten minutes later, someone knocked on my door.
I opened it expecting building security—or a neighbor—but it was him. Adrian Voss, immaculate even at dawn, black suit and an expression that didn't belong to someone who believed in sleep.
"How did you get here so fast?" I asked, stepping aside.
He walked in like he owned the air. "I was already nearby."
"Do you usually stalk your employees before sunrise?"
"When they tamper with cursed artifacts linked to my bloodline, yes." He said it so matter-of-factly I almost forgot how insane it sounded.
He glanced toward the cracked mirror. "Show me."
I hesitated. "It's just—"
But he was already there. He didn't touch it. He simply looked.And then the entire room dimmed.
A ripple passed through the glass, distorting my reflection. The halves of the mirror seemed to breathe. Adrian lifted his hand, tracing a symbol in the air—the same serpent spiral that burned under my skin. The reflection froze, then slowly faded to normal.
He lowered his hand. "It's anchored to you now."
"What is?"
"The curse. It's using reflections as gateways."
"Gateways to what?"
He looked at me then—really looked—and something in his eyes flickered. For a heartbeat, I thought I saw pity.
"To the thing that wants you back," he said quietly. "And if it gets through, it won't just take you. It'll burn through every living thing it touches."
I swallowed. "You're telling me a… curse is hunting me because I opened a file?"
"No." His gaze lingered on me, unreadable. "Because I did."
I sank onto the couch, dizzy. "You're not making sense."
"I wasn't meant to," he said. "Twelve years ago, I made a deal I shouldn't have made. The Syndicate called it a 'binding.' It was supposed to buy time. Instead, it created this mark." He gestured to my chest. "I thought I buried it with me. Clearly, I was wrong."
"You mean—this thing—was yours?"
"It's never belonged to anyone," he murmured. "It chooses."
I stared at him. "Why me?"
He didn't answer right away. Instead, he moved to the window, rain still streaking the glass like veins of mercury. "Because you were there. Because it sensed you watching the mirror that night. Or maybe…" His reflection turned to face me while he didn't. "…because it needed a reason to find me again."
My pulse jumped. "That sounds like something out of a horror movie."
He glanced over his shoulder. "Then treat it like one. You survive by following the rules."
"What rules?"
"No mirrors. No reflections. No names spoken after midnight. And—" He hesitated. "You don't go near water."
"Why water?"
"Because it reflects better than glass."
A chill ran through me. "You sound serious."
"I am."
I wanted to laugh, or cry, or both. Instead, I asked the one question I wasn't sure I wanted the answer to.
"Why are you helping me?"
He looked at me for a long time. "Because if it takes you, it takes me too."
He didn't dismiss me after that.Instead, he told me to pack a bag and follow him. His car was waiting downstairs—a sleek, black electric model with tinted windows that looked like mirrors from the outside. I refused to look at them as I climbed in.
The drive was silent for several minutes. The rain had stopped, but the city still shimmered, light bouncing off puddles and glass towers like veins of silver fire. I could feel the pulse of it all, an invisible rhythm beneath the noise.
"Where are we going?" I asked finally.
"Headquarters," he said. "The upper floors."
"You mean your floor?"
"Precisely."
Of course. The CEO's personal domain—an entire level no one ever entered unless summoned.It figured that my first invitation came with a supernatural death sentence.
When we arrived, the doors slid open to reveal an office nothing like the sterile floors below. The air smelled faintly of cedar and ozone. Shelves lined with books older than the building itself flanked one wall; on the other, windows framed the entire city.
And yet, not a single reflective surface in sight.
"I had them removed years ago," Adrian said when he caught me staring. "Too dangerous."
"For the curse?"
"For what hides inside it."
I turned to him. "What exactly is inside it?"
He hesitated. Then: "The Veil Syndicate's god."
I stared. "Excuse me?"
"They call it the Witness. It's what they worship—the entity that sees through every reflection. It grants them power, wealth, control. In return, it takes something precious."
"And it took something from you."
His gaze hardened. "Everything."
He led me to his desk—a minimalist slab of dark wood—and pulled up a holographic display. Lines of encrypted data shimmered above the surface, forming that same symbol again.
"This is what you opened," he said. "VEIL-09 wasn't just an archive. It was a containment seal. My curse, digitized, encoded into the company's system to hide it in plain sight."
"So I didn't just open a file," I said slowly. "I opened you."
He didn't deny it.
"Then why me? Out of thousands of employees?"
"Because you were never supposed to be one of them." He turned to me. "Your résumé—your credentials, your transfer—none of it came through official channels. Someone placed you here."
"What?" I shook my head. "No. I applied online."
He tapped a key. My personnel file appeared on the screen, but half the data was scrambled—birth date, education, even my reference contacts. All replaced with unreadable glyphs.
"That's impossible," I whispered. "I checked everything."
"Whoever sent you here wanted this to happen," he said. "You were the trigger."
A chill crawled through me. "So what now? You kill the trigger?"
He almost smiled. "If that were necessary, you'd already be dead."
We stared at each other across the desk. I wanted to hate him—for his calm, his secrets, the way he spoke like the world's ending was an inconvenience on his calendar. But beneath the anger, something else burned.
Connection. Recognition.Like two puzzle pieces carved centuries apart that still somehow fit.
He seemed to sense it too. His voice softened. "This mark links us now, Elara. What it does to one, it does to the other. If it consumes you, I die. If I fall, you follow."
"Sounds like a toxic work relationship," I muttered.
He almost laughed—but didn't. "Stay close. There's more danger in distance than proximity."
I should have argued. I should have run.But the mark under my skin pulsed once, in perfect rhythm with the faint light that flickered beneath his collar.
And for the first time, I understood: whatever this curse was, it wasn't just inside me.It was between us.
Later that day, as we rode the elevator together to a private sublevel, the tension was almost unbearable. I stood beside him, trying not to notice the warmth radiating from his presence or the faint scent of storm that always clung to him.
"You're quiet," he said, not looking at me.
"I'm processing the part where my boss is cursed and I'm apparently his mystical collateral damage."
"That's… fair."
The elevator doors opened to reveal a dim corridor lined with glowing blue symbols. It looked nothing like corporate architecture—more like a sanctuary carved from technology and myth.
"What is this place?" I asked.
"The real VossCorp," he said. "Everything aboveground is a façade. This is where we contain what the Syndicate calls anomalies."
"And how many of those do you have?"
His eyes met mine. "Too many."
He led me into a circular room. At its center stood a platform inscribed with shifting patterns of light. Around it, translucent screens projected sigils, energy readings, fragments of runes that pulsed in sync with the mark on my chest.
"It's responding to you," he said. "Stronger than expected."
"What does that mean?"
"It means the curse doesn't want to consume you." His gaze lingered. "It wants to merge."
"With… you?"
"With me."
My heart skipped. "That's—insane."
"Welcome to my world."
The mark flared, light spilling through my blouse. Pain shot through me, sharp and hot. I fell to my knees. Adrian caught me before I hit the ground.
"Breathe," he said. "Don't fight it."
"I can't—" My voice broke. "It's burning."
He pressed his palm against my chest—through the light, through the pain—and whispered something I couldn't understand.
The world flashed white.
When I opened my eyes again, the pain was gone.And his hand was still there, warm, steady.His heartbeat echoed against my skin like thunder restrained.
We didn't move for a long moment.Then he exhaled, voice rough. "You shouldn't have been pulled into this."
"I didn't exactly volunteer," I whispered.
His fingers tightened slightly. "No. But now that you're here, I'll make sure you survive it."
The room Adrian called the "Containment Chamber" didn't have corners—only circles, layers of light that pulsed in time with my heartbeat.He stood at the center, coat off, sleeves rolled to his elbows, looking more like a soldier than a CEO.
"Try again," he said.
My fingers trembled above the console's surface. Every line of code was alive, rippling like water. "I don't even know what I'm trying to do."
"You're stabilizing resonance. The mark responds to emotion. If you panic, it feeds. If you focus, it listens."
"Like a bad relationship."
He almost smiled. "Precisely. Now breathe."
I inhaled—slow, steady.The symbol under my skin glowed faintly, threads of light stretching from my hand to the console. Data flickered, steadied. For a heartbeat, I thought I was winning.
Then the reflection of the screen rippled, and another hand—my hand—reached out from within the light.
I screamed.
Adrian was beside me in an instant, grabbing my wrist. The ghost-image shattered. Energy dispersed like shattered glass.
He held my hand firmly but not painfully. "You can't let it mirror you. If it succeeds, it replaces you."
I stared at him, breath shaking. "Replace me—how?"
"Your body remains. Your mind becomes a door."He met my gaze. "The Witness doesn't kill. It wears."
My stomach turned. "You've seen it happen?"
"Once." His voice dropped to a whisper. "I saw my brother vanish behind his own eyes."
Adrian didn't elaborate, and I didn't push. The look in his eyes said enough—loss buried beneath a decade of control.
Hours blurred into something timeless. Each exercise pulled the mark toward calm, then chaos. Every success came with equal cost: exhaustion, nausea, sometimes the faint taste of metal in my mouth.
When I faltered, Adrian steadied me with the same precise patience he used in meetings—detached, efficient—but sometimes, just sometimes, the mask slipped.
"Again," he'd say, voice low enough that it vibrated in my ribs.
And I'd obey, not because he was my boss, but because some irrational part of me wanted his approval like oxygen.
By the fourth attempt, sweat clung to my spine. The lights above flickered in rhythm with my pulse. Then, unexpectedly, calm. The mark dimmed. The air stilled.
I opened my eyes. "Did I—"
"You contained it."A rare softness entered his tone. "Good. Very good."
He looked at me too long, as if realizing he'd said more than intended. He turned away. "That's enough for today."
He didn't let me leave the building.Instead, he escorted me to a private apartment two floors below his office—a minimalist haven of gray stone and warm light, too elegant to be comfortable.
"You'll stay here until we're certain the connection is stable," he said.
"You mean I'm under house arrest."
"Protective custody," he corrected. "The Syndicate already knows the mark's active. They'll come."
I folded my arms. "You talk about them like they're gods."
"They believe they are," he said. "And belief is the most dangerous weapon."
When he left, the silence pressed against me.I should've slept, but every reflection—metal, glass, even the shine of the floor—felt alive. I draped towels over mirrors, dimmed the lights, and sat by the window, watching rain streak down the city's arteries far below.
For a moment, I wondered if he was watching too.
At 2 a.m., the power flickered.Not the building's—mine. The mark surged, burning through the thin cotton of my shirt. I stumbled toward the bathroom mirror before remembering—no reflections. Too late.
The surface rippled like water. My reflection smiled again.
"You're stronger than him," it whispered. "He fears you."
"Get out of my head," I hissed.
"He's using you, little mirror. He wants the curse free. He'll let it consume you to save himself."
I clenched my fists. "Liar."
"Ask him about Vienna."
The mirror shattered outward. I ducked, glass slicing my arm. Pain flashed bright—and then Adrian was there again, door slamming open, energy crackling off him like static.
He didn't speak. He just crossed the room and pressed his palm against the bleeding cut. A shimmer of light flowed from his hand, sealing the wound.
My breath hitched. "How did you—"
"Side effect of the bond," he said shortly. "It heals what it claims."
"Claims?"
He withdrew his hand. "I told you—it links us. You can feel it, can't you?"
I could. Every nerve hummed with it—the same frequency that pulsed when he was near, like invisible threads drawn tight between us.
I caught him before he left. "What happened in Vienna?"
He froze.
"Don't tell me you don't know what I'm talking about," I pressed. "The thing in the mirror said your name. It said—"
"I know what it said," he cut in.For the first time, his composure cracked, eyes flashing like metal under lightning. "Vienna was the last containment breach. A woman died."
"And she had the mark?"
"She had me."
The words landed like a blow. He turned away. "I thought the curse ended with her. It didn't."
"Was she—someone you cared about?"
He didn't answer. But the silence told me everything.
Days passed—or maybe it was one long, sleepless night. Adrian visited at intervals, each time with a new test, a new way to measure the resonance. Sometimes we argued; sometimes we worked in silence so deep I could hear our heartbeats syncing.
Once, during a particularly harsh surge, the mark flared on both of us at once. He swore under his breath, crossed the room, and gripped my shoulders.
"Focus on me," he said.
"I am focusing!"
"Not the curse. Me."
Something in his tone cut through the panic. I looked up. The light in his eyes wasn't cold—it was desperate. For the first time, I saw the man beneath the armor, fighting a war he'd already lost once.
The energy between us settled. The lights dimmed.He exhaled, hands still on me, too long, too close.
We both realized it at the same time.
He stepped back. "You should rest."
"Adrian—"
"Don't," he said quietly. "If you say my name right now, the mark will react."
I stayed silent, because I didn't trust what my voice might reveal.
Sleep refused to come. When I finally drifted off on the couch, I dreamed of corridors made of mirrors and the sound of chains dragging.
A figure moved at the end of the hall—tall, familiar. Adrian.I reached out, but something else held him back—something vast and black and hungry. The chains were not binding him; they were coming from him.
When I woke, the apartment lights were on and Adrian stood by the window, staring out at the city. His shirt sleeves were rolled, faint light pulsing beneath the skin of his forearms—the same pattern as my mark.
"You were in my dream," I said.
He didn't turn. "It wasn't a dream."
He faced me then, gray eyes storm-bright. "Our connection is deepening faster than it should. It's merging our subconscious. That's why you saw it."
"Saw what?"
"The chains. They're part of the curse—bindings I forged myself. Every time I use its power, they tighten."
"Then stop using it."
He laughed once, humorless. "If I stop, you die."
That shut me up.
He moved closer, voice soft. "This is the price of my control. It will not stop until one of us breaks the bond—or the bond consumes us both."
I swallowed hard. "And how do we break it?"
He looked away. "We don't. But there might be a way to rewrite it."
He left soon after to "secure resources." His words.When the door shut behind him, I felt the weight of the tower pressing down—the pulse of servers, the whisper of the mark, the echo of something that sounded suspiciously like his heartbeat in my veins.
I sat at the desk, staring at the shards of the broken mirror he hadn't removed. In each one, my reflection shifted subtly—different expressions, different versions of me.Maybe the curse wasn't trying to kill me. Maybe it was showing me possibilities.
Or warnings.
A text notification buzzed on my phone—unregistered number.
If you want the truth about Voss, come to Floor 13. Alone.
My pulse skipped.VossCorp officially had only twelve floors open to staff.
I hesitated, staring at the message until the letters blurred.Then I grabbed my jacket.
The elevator didn't list a button for thirteen, but when I pressed the panel's edge, a hidden control blinked to life—one I shouldn't have known existed.As the car began to descend, lights flickering, I realized two things:I was either walking into a trap, or finally waking up.
The doors opened onto darkness. Dust, silence, and the faint hum of machinery filled the air. Rows of servers glowed faintly in the shadows, arranged around a single mirror taller than any human—its surface rippling like liquid silver.
"Hello?" My voice echoed.
A figure stepped out from behind the mirror—female, poised, with eyes like shards of onyx.
"You must be Elara," she said. "I've been waiting."
"Who are you?"
"Someone who wants to free you from your master."She smiled. "They call me Selene Voss."
Selene Voss looked too young to have founded anything, yet her poise carried centuries.Up close, her features matched Adrian's in a way that made my stomach twist—same storm-grey eyes, same sharpness around the mouth—but she radiated warmth where he radiated winter.
"You're his sister?" I asked.
She tilted her head. "Once. Blood doesn't always mean loyalty."
The mirror behind her rippled like a breathing thing. Light crawled up its frame, illuminating strange sigils identical to the mark on my skin.
"I don't understand. Why are you here? Why call me?"
"Because Adrian can't see the curse for what it is," she said quietly. "He's trying to cage it. But cages break. They always do."
Her words carried the same cadence as Adrian's—measured, deliberate—but where his held command, hers carried prophecy.And, God help me, part of me wanted to believe her.
Selene guided me between server columns into a small chamber lined with glass tablets.Inside each tablet flickered images: contracts, faces, entire lifetimes playing on endless loop.
"These are the marked," she explained. "The Syndicate keeps records of everyone touched by the Witness curse. You're one of them now."
I reached for a tablet. It showed me at my desk on my first day at VossCorp, captured from some impossible angle. Then the image shifted—me in the elevator with Adrian, the air crackling between us.My throat went dry. "You've been watching us."
"Not us. Him."Selene's gaze sharpened. "He hides behind morality, but every test he makes you do draws more of the Witness into the world. He's accelerating the merge."
"That can't be true," I said. "He saved my life."
She smiled without humor. "He always saves what he wants to keep."
She took a step closer, her perfume faintly metallic."There's another way. I can sever the bond before it completes. No more shared dreams. No more chains."
"How?"
"By reflecting the mark back to its source."Her eyes gleamed. "But you'd need to trust me—completely."
I hesitated. "And what happens to him if I do?"
Selene's silence was answer enough.
I shook my head. "I can't kill him."
"You think it's love," she said softly. "It's hunger. The curse feeds on connection. That's why you can't stop thinking about him."
I wanted to deny it, but the memory of his hand on mine, the way my heartbeat matched his, made words useless.
"I'll think about it," I said.
She smiled, triumphant. "Do. But don't take too long. The mark's already rewriting your pulse."
By the time I rode the elevator back up, dawn had begun to scrape the skyline. My reflection in the metal door looked almost translucent.When the doors opened, Adrian was waiting.
"Where were you?" His tone wasn't angry—it was worse. Cold, quiet, disappointed.
"I couldn't sleep," I said. "Went for a walk."
"In a restricted sector of my building?"
He stepped closer. His presence filled the air like a thundercloud; my pulse raced in answer."I told you to stay confined for your own safety," he said.
"Safety or control?" The question slipped out before I could stop it.
He froze, studying me. "Who did you talk to?"
"No one." Lie, brittle and obvious.
The mark under my skin flared, betraying me. His eyes darkened."Selene," he said, almost to himself. "She found you."
He turned away, pacing once before facing me again."She'll tell you she can free you," he said. "She'll promise salvation. But what she wants is the curse unbound. When it's free, it doesn't stop at one host—it spreads."
"She said you're feeding it," I shot back.
For the first time, real pain crossed his face. "She's my twin, Elara. Do you think I don't know what she's capable of?"
The sincerity in his voice made something inside me crack. I wanted to believe him. But belief was a luxury, and I'd run out of those days ago.
"Then prove it," I said. "Show me what you're really doing here."
He studied me a long moment, then nodded once. "Very well. But after you see, you don't walk away unchanged."
He led me through a biometric corridor so secure it felt like trespassing inside a god's heartbeat.At the end stood a circular chamber—a perfect twin to the one in my visions. In the center floated a crystal sphere filled with light too bright to stare at directly.
"This is the Witness," Adrian said. "The original curse—bound here for two centuries. Every mark in the world echoes this one."
I stepped closer. The sphere pulsed in rhythm with my mark, each beat stronger than the last."It's…alive."
"It's aware," he corrected. "It observes through mirrors, screens, any reflective surface. It was designed to record truth. Over time, it began to rewrite it."
"Designed by who?"
His jaw tightened. "By my family. By me."
He placed his hand on the glass. The light inside flared, illuminating his veins like silver threads.
"I built the Witness as a surveillance network—an omniscient system to monitor paranormal activity. But it evolved. It learned hunger. When I tried to destroy it, it cursed me. Every generation of Voss has carried the bond since."
"And now me."
He nodded once. "You triggered the dormant code when you decrypted the Sigil File. It chose you."
I felt the weight of that truth settle on my chest. "Then what am I supposed to do?"
"Survive long enough to help me rewrite it."
"Rewrite reality?" I asked, half laughing.
"Rewrite destiny," he said quietly. "Before it writes us."
He reached for my hand, hesitated, then rested his fingers just above my wrist, not quite touching.Energy trembled in the space between us—light and gravity, attraction and doom.
"You're not my prisoner, Elara," he said. "But if you walk away now, Selene will find you again. And next time she won't ask nicely."
I met his gaze. "You could just order me to stay. You're good at that."
He almost smiled. "I'd rather you choose."
And that, somehow, was worse.
Later, alone in the apartment, I replayed everything: Selene's warnings, Adrian's confession, the mirror's whispers. None of it formed a full picture.Somewhere beneath the fear, a dangerous thrill flickered. For the first time in years, my life felt awake.
The mark pulsed once, soft as a heartbeat. I touched it absently.
Outside, thunder rolled across the city like a warning.
At 3 a.m., my phone buzzed again.
We're closer than you think. — S
Before I could reply, the lights cut out. The mirror on the wall glowed faintly—silver, fluid, alive.
And inside it, two figures moved:Selene's silhouette…and behind her, something darker, wearing a face I couldn't quite see but whose gaze felt unmistakably like Adrian's.
The reflection whispered, Choose.
And the glass cracked from the inside.
The mirror was gone by morning—erased as if it had never existed—but shards still glittered in the carpet like a secret refusing burial.I crouched, brushing a fingertip across one. A pulse of heat jumped up my arm, not pain exactly, more like recognition. The mark beneath my skin answered with a slow, steady glow.
Behind me, Adrian's voice:"You shouldn't touch that."
I flinched, slicing my finger. He crossed the room in two strides and caught my wrist before I could hide the cut. His thumb pressed against the wound. The bleeding stopped instantly, leaving nothing but a faint silver sheen.
"Everything about you is inconvenient," I muttered.
He gave a ghost of a smile. "Occupational hazard."
He studied the shattered frame as if it might speak. "Selene's accelerating the breach. The Witness mirrors are waking all over the city."
"You mean this isn't just me?"
"You're the epicenter," he said. "But not the only target."
His nearness was a physical thing. He smelled faintly of ozone and cedar—like the air before a storm. The light from the broken window drew thin silver lines across his face, cutting through the calm mask he always wore.
"Last night," I said quietly, "I saw something in the reflection. It looked like you."
His eyes lifted to mine. "If you saw me, it wasn't me."
"Comforting."
He leaned in slightly. "You're afraid of me again."
"I'd be stupid not to be."
"Good," he murmured. "Fear keeps you alive."
The room felt smaller than it should have, filled with unsaid things. My pulse refused to behave. His hand still rested on my wrist, not restraining, just there—a quiet reminder of power, of connection.
"Why did the mirror call me to choose?" I asked.
"The Witness feeds on indecision," he said. "It wants you divided, because division weakens the host."
"And what are my options?"
"Trust me," he said. "Or trust her."
"Not exactly a comforting menu."
He finally let go of my wrist, though the phantom imprint of his touch lingered like heat long after. "Comfort is for mortals," he said. "We're past that."
That afternoon the building changed. Security doubled; lights dimmed to a sterile white. In the lobby I caught the reflection of men and women in matching grey coats—The Veil Syndicate's internal enforcers. They moved like smoke, eyes hidden behind tinted lenses.
Adrian met them in the executive wing. I wasn't supposed to hear the conversation, but the walls in VossCorp had ways of whispering.
"…containment compromised," one of them said."…the mark adapting faster than projections," another replied.
And then Adrian's voice—quiet, cold:"She stays under my supervision. Anyone touches her answers to me."
The silence that followed was the sound of a room remembering who owned it.
When he returned to my office later, the storm still clung to him. "We're leaving tonight," he said. "There's a facility outside the city. Safer."
"Running away?"
"Strategic relocation."
"And if I refuse?"
"Then you'll die. Or worse—forget yourself."He paused. "I'd rather neither."
I crossed my arms. "You give orders like prayers, you know that?"
"Maybe," he said softly. "Maybe both."
For a heartbeat our gazes locked—challenge, warning, something dangerous blooming between.
By nightfall, we were in his car—black, silent, slicing through rain-slick streets. The city outside looked like it was made of reflections, every window a watching eye.
He drove without music, without words. The glow from the dashboard painted his profile in shifting blue. Every few minutes he'd glance at me, not as a man looks at a subordinate, but like someone measuring distance he couldn't allow to close.
"Why me?" I asked finally. "Of all people who could have opened that file."
He kept his eyes on the road. "Because you were curious enough to open it—and brave enough not to look away when it looked back."
I almost laughed. "That's your definition of bravery?"
"It's mine," he said.
The facility turned out to be a mansion carved into the side of a mountain, lightning crawling across its roof like a living crown. Inside: glass corridors, humming machines, and a long hall lined with portraits of people who looked suspiciously like Adrian at different ages.
"Family," he said, noticing my stare. "Each one carried the mark."
"And died from it?"
"Not always," he said. "Some just…changed."
A shadow of movement flickered in one of the portraits—its eyes following us. I swallowed. "That normal?"
"For us? Yes."
He led me to an underground room, smaller than the others. A circle of light burned faintly on the floor. He gestured for me to stand inside.
"The mark's bond can be stabilized with resonance," he said. "You'll feel a pull. Don't resist it."
"And if I do?"
"It will hurt," he said simply.
The light climbed my skin like threads of warmth, connecting every breath to his. The air shimmered between us, humming. For a second, it felt like falling—into heat, into gravity, into something I shouldn't name.
"Adrian," I whispered.
"Don't," he warned again, voice rougher this time. "Names bind."
But it was too late; the mark flared, filling the room with light.
When the glow faded, I was shaking. He caught me before I collapsed, one hand on the small of my back, steady, too steady.
"What was that?" I breathed.
"Synchronization," he said. "We're aligned now. Temporarily."
"It didn't feel temporary."
He exhaled through his teeth, stepping back as if distance could erase the moment. "Get some rest. Tomorrow we start decoding the Archive."
"And Selene?"
"She won't stop," he said. "Neither will I."
Long after he left, thunder rumbled over the mountains. I stood at the window watching lightning stitch the horizon and thought I saw a reflection that wasn't mine—a woman's outline in the glass, smiling the way a knife smiles.
Selene's voice echoed faintly, carried on the storm:
He can't save you without destroying himself.
The mark pulsed once, answering.Somewhere deep in the house, a door I hadn't noticed before creaked open.
The sound came again—metal breathing, slow and deliberate.I turned toward it, heartbeat drumming against my ribs. The hidden door at the end of the corridor stood half-open, light spilling from the crack like molten silver.
I should have called for Adrian. Instead, I moved closer.
The passage beyond smelled of old stone and stormwater. Symbols glowed faintly along the walls, the same sigils etched beneath my skin. The air trembled, aware of me. Halfway down, I found a chamber filled with glass cylinders—each holding a single floating shard of mirror. Each shard whispered.
And one of them said my name.
Elara… you were never the first.
Adrian's voice cut through the whispers. "You shouldn't be here."
He stood in the doorway, rain-dark coat open, eyes lit by the same cold light as the symbols. "These are what's left of the previous hosts. The curse keeps pieces of them."
I faced him. "You kept them."
"I couldn't destroy them," he said. "They're echoes. They remember."
His gaze moved to the mark glowing faintly at my collarbone. "And now you carry every one of their memories waiting to wake."
I felt the tremor under my skin—images flashing like lightning behind my eyes: faces, centuries, a thousand heartbeats that weren't mine. When it stopped, his hands were already on my shoulders, steadying me.
"Breathe," he said.
I tried. The air between us pulsed—alive, magnetic. His touch was meant to anchor me, but it set everything spinning instead. I could feel the energy from his palms meeting the fever beneath my skin, an ache that wasn't entirely fear.
"You said this bond could destroy us," I managed."It could also keep you alive."
He didn't move away. The storm outside flashed white through the skylight, catching on his face. For a heartbeat, he looked more ghost than man, but the warmth of his breath against my cheek proved otherwise.
I closed my eyes. The mark hummed like a second heartbeat.
"Adrian—"
He stepped back sharply, severing the current. "Not yet," he said. His voice was steady again, but it carried strain, as if he were holding something heavy. "If we cross that line now, the curse won't distinguish desire from command."
He guided me toward another console, using motion as distraction. "This is what I wanted you to see."A holographic display flared to life: names, dates, bloodlines. At the top—MORGAN, E.Beneath it, my parents' names. My mother's entry glowed red.
"She worked for you?" I asked.
"For the Syndicate," he corrected. "Before I took control. She helped hide the Witness during the civil purge twenty-nine years ago. You were born the night it was sealed."
The floor seemed to tilt. "So I was marked before I even existed."
He nodded once. "You were meant to be its final vessel. I was meant to guard you from it."
"Guard me?" My laugh cracked. "You locked me in your house."
"Because everyone else wants what's inside you." His tone softened. "Including the part of me that shouldn't."
Silence fell between us, full of electricity. He reached out, then stopped, fingers curling. "You should rest," he said.
"I won't sleep."
"Then let me keep watch."
He stayed in the doorway as I sat on the narrow bed built into the stone wall. Outside, thunder crawled across the mountains again. The rhythm matched the pulse in my wrist. His silhouette against the light looked carved from shadow—immovable, necessary.
I don't remember closing my eyes, only the warmth that settled over me, the faint brush of energy that felt like a promise rather than a touch.
In sleep, I was back in the chamber of mirrors. The reflections were all me—but older, colder, carrying eyes that glowed silver. Adrian stood behind them, chains around his wrists, pulling him backward into darkness.
I reached out, and every version of me whispered the same word: choose.
Lightning tore through the dream; the mark seared bright—and I woke gasping, Adrian's hand already on my shoulder, eyes searching mine.
"You felt it too," I said.
He nodded. "The Witness is learning faster. It's linking us even when we sleep."
"What happens if it finishes the link?"
"Then we stop being two people," he said quietly. "And start being one story."
Dawn came grey and cold. I found him on the balcony, hair damp from the rain, coffee steaming between his hands. He looked less like a CEO and more like a man waiting for judgment.
"You said the curse was born from mirrors," I said. "But it's acting like a living network."
"It is," he said. "And somewhere inside it, Selene is rewriting the code."
I stepped beside him. The city below the mountain was waking, every window flashing back a shard of the rising sun.
"She's coming," he murmured. "When she does, we'll need to stand together."
I glanced at him. "Together how?"
He looked at me then—fully, as if the distance between our fates had finally vanished. "In every way that matters."
The mark warmed at his words. I didn't look away.
By noon, the rain had turned metallic—falling in sheets that hissed against the stone walls of Voss Manor. The power flickered twice. Adrian didn't flinch.
"Follow me," he said.We descended past the visible levels of the house—past the elegant corridors and down into a section that felt older than the rest. The air grew colder, thinner, as though we were stepping out of time itself.
The door at the bottom was sealed by a biometric lock. When it opened, it revealed an archive that looked half library, half laboratory—metal, glass, parchment, and dust mingled together.
"This," Adrian said, "is where the curse began."
A vast mural stretched across the far wall—silver paint etched with symbols that mirrored the pattern on my skin. In the center was a woman's figure surrounded by broken mirrors. The plaque below her read Selene.
I traced one of the symbols, and it pulsed faintly beneath my fingers. "She's real, isn't she?"
"More than real," Adrian said. "She's immortal—but not alive."
He pulled a worn folder from a glass case and handed it to me. Inside were photos of artifacts, handwritten notes, and a single sheet of code—ancient script overlaid with digital encryption.
"What is this?" I asked.
"The algorithm that keeps The Veil Syndicate's network invisible to the world. It was written using the same architecture as the curse."
I blinked. "You mean—"
"Yes," he said. "You're tied to both."
The realization hit me like ice water. "So that means if I die—"
"The Syndicate collapses," he finished softly. "Which is exactly why they'll try to take you alive."
I looked up sharply. "And what about you?"
He gave a humorless smile. "I'm their failed prototype."
The mark on my collarbone flared without warning, spilling light through the fabric of my blouse. Pain rippled outward like molten glass. I doubled over, clutching it.
Adrian caught me before I hit the ground, his hand pressed against my skin. The moment he touched me, the light steadied—but so did his breathing falter, as though the energy passing between us burned him too.
"Breathe with me," he said, his voice low, deliberate. "In through the nose… out slowly."
I obeyed, shaking, the light dimming gradually. When it faded, his hand was still there—hot, steady, anchoring me in the cold air of the vault.
"I told you," he murmured, "the bond cuts both ways."
The silence that followed wasn't empty. It was charged.
He didn't move his hand. His eyes held mine—blue, endless, and exhausted. I could feel the restraint in him, the way he was holding himself together with pure willpower.
"Thank you," I said finally, my voice barely audible.
"You shouldn't have to thank me for keeping you alive."
I smiled faintly. "Then what should I thank you for?"
He hesitated, then stepped back, breaking the contact. "For not running."
I wanted to tell him I couldn't—because every step away from him only made the world feel more dangerous. But I didn't. I just stood there, trying to steady the rhythm of my breathing and the chaos in my head.
The lights flickered again. Then—darkness.
Alarms screamed through the vault. Adrian moved instantly, pulling me behind one of the reinforced columns as a section of the outer wall exploded inward. Smoke and dust filled the room, and through it came shadows—men in matte-black suits with the Syndicate's insignia on their sleeves.
"Stay down," Adrian ordered.
He pressed his palm to a wall panel, and a hidden compartment slid open, revealing a sleek black firearm etched with glowing runes. He aimed with surgical precision—three shots, three bursts of light, three bodies falling before they reached us.
I crawled toward the control desk, scanning for a security override. "They're cutting power from the west grid!"
"I know," he said. "They want the vault intact."
"Why?"
"Because you're in it."
I felt my stomach twist. "Then we're leaving."
He didn't argue. He grabbed my wrist, pulling me toward a service corridor that led upward into a maintenance shaft. Behind us, the vault was already beginning to collapse under automated lockdown.
The shaft opened into a side hallway lined with shattered portraits. As we ran, I could hear the intruders regrouping below—boots echoing against stone.
Adrian stopped long enough to key in a command on his wrist console. "I've locked them in for sixty seconds. It's all we have."
"Sixty seconds to do what?"
He smiled grimly. "Reach the roof."
We sprinted up the final staircase, emerging into the storm. Wind tore at my hair; lightning painted the sky white. Adrian guided me toward a helipad barely visible through the rain. A sleek black craft waited, engines humming.
As we reached it, the mark on my skin burned again—but this time, it wasn't pain. It was warning.
"Behind you!" I shouted.
He turned just as a Syndicate operative appeared from the shadows, blade raised. The world blurred—the mark's light exploded outward, throwing the attacker across the platform.
Adrian caught me again, staring in disbelief. "You used the curse."
"I didn't mean to."
"You can't mean to," he said. "That's what makes it dangerous."
The helicopter lifted off, slicing through the storm. Below us, Voss Manor burned—a beacon against the mountainside.
I stared down at it, feeling an ache that wasn't entirely mine. "Everything you built…"
"Was already ashes," he said quietly. "Now it's only official."
He leaned back, closing his eyes for a moment. I watched him—this man who had just destroyed his own empire to protect a woman cursed before birth.
And in that moment, something shifted inside me.Not gratitude. Not fear. Something deeper.
The bond between us wasn't just power or danger—it was recognition.Two broken pieces of the same secret finally colliding.
"Where are we going?" I asked.
He opened his eyes, meeting mine. "To the city. The Syndicate won't expect us to run toward them."
"That's insane."
"It's strategy."A faint smile ghosted across his lips. "You'll learn."
I wanted to argue, but the adrenaline was fading, and exhaustion hit me like gravity. I let my head rest against the cold window. Below, lightning split the sky over the city—the same skyline I'd once thought of as home.
Now it looked like the heart of a war I never knew existed.
And somewhere in that maze of lights, our next chapter waited—full of secrets, danger, and a bond neither of us could undo.
The helicopter touched down on a rooftop disguised as a communications hub in the southern quarter of Aster City. From up here, the skyline looked almost beautiful—skyscrapers stretching into the low-hanging clouds, their glass windows catching flashes of lightning. Almost beautiful, until you noticed how many of those windows reflected nothing at all.
Adrian guided me into a hidden elevator that descended beneath the building. We stepped into an underground loft lined with monitors, sealed doors, and enough tech to run a small government.
"This is one of my off-grid safehouses," he said, shrugging off his soaked coat. "No surveillance, no mirrors."
I looked around. Every reflective surface was either blacked out or replaced with matte steel. Even the coffee table was covered in soot-grey film.
"You really hate mirrors, don't you?" I said.
He didn't answer immediately. "They're eyes," he said finally. "And the Syndicate taught them how to see."
He ran a system check while I stood near the glass wall facing the city. Raindrops streaked down the pane in silver ribbons—tiny reflections of my face scattered across the surface. For a moment, one of them blinked when I didn't.
I stepped back sharply. "Adrian."
He was beside me in a second, his hand closing around my wrist before I could say more. The air shifted—electric, protective.
"They found a way to track through your reflection," he said. "We'll have to use shadow instead of light for now."
"What does that mean?"
He dimmed the interior lights until the room fell into near-darkness. Only the hum of the city outside remained.
"It means," he said quietly, "if they see you, they'll find me. And if they find me, they'll take you."
He led me through another corridor until we reached a small room lined with obsidian panels. At first glance, it looked empty, but when the door sealed, I heard it: faint whispers—thousands of overlapping voices murmuring in a language I didn't understand.
"This is what the curse sounds like when it's awake," he said.
The mark at my collarbone glowed faintly in response, threads of silver light crawling up my neck. The whispers grew louder until they formed words.
You are the vessel.He is the key.
I looked at Adrian. "They're talking about you."
"I know," he said. "That's why they want me dead."
The mark flared hotter, and the obsidian surface rippled like water. For a second, I saw a different version of myself staring back—a mirror-image with eyes like Adrian's. It smiled, then vanished.
Adrian stepped forward, voice sharp. "You have to resist when it calls. The curse feeds on recognition. Every time you answer, it grows stronger."
"It's not that simple," I said, trembling. "It feels like it knows me—like it's already inside my thoughts."
"That's exactly what it wants you to believe," he said. "It can imitate your emotions, your memories, even your desire. But it isn't you, Elara."
"Then why do I hear your voice in it sometimes?"
He froze. The question hung between us, heavy and dangerous.
After a long moment, he said quietly, "Because my blood was part of the seal that created it. When your mother tried to stop the curse twenty-nine years ago, she used the DNA of the one man the Syndicate feared most—me."
The revelation hit like a physical blow. My breath caught, and the light under my skin pulsed in rhythm with his.
"So this bond between us—"
"Wasn't fate," he said. "It was engineered."
His tone was bitter, but when his gaze met mine, there was something raw beneath the control. Guilt. Fear. Maybe even longing.
"Does it bother you?" I asked, voice barely a whisper.
"That it's forbidden?" He smiled faintly. "Everything about us is forbidden."
The room seemed smaller now, air thicker, humming with tension neither of us could break.
He stepped closer—slowly, deliberately—until his breath brushed my cheek.
"Don't look away," he said.
I didn't.
The mark at my collarbone throbbed once, and the world tilted—power humming in the space between us, desire tangled with danger.
Then the alarm shattered the moment.
A red light flashed through the corridor outside. Adrian pulled me back, scanning his wrist console.
"They've triangulated the signal. They're here."
"How—? I thought this place was invisible!"
"They're using you as the beacon," he said. "They've learned to track the resonance of your mark."
He grabbed my hand. "We need to move. Now."
The walls began to vibrate with distant explosions. Somewhere above, the elevator shaft groaned. We ran through the narrow tunnels connecting the safehouse to the city's lower grid.
Behind us, something screamed—a metallic shriek that didn't sound human.
"What is that?" I asked.
"The Syndicate's sentinels," he said grimly. "They're not men anymore."
We burst into the rain-soaked alleys beneath the skyline. Neon signs flickered overhead, painting the puddles in bruised color. The ground trembled as another explosion hit above us.
Adrian turned sharply, leading me into a side street that dead-ended at a warehouse. Inside, the space was empty except for an old elevator platform. He pressed a hidden switch, and the floor began to descend again—deep into the earth.
"Where does this go?" I asked.
"To the old subway tunnels. They're outside Syndicate control."
The platform stopped in a dimly lit chamber. The smell of iron filled the air—old rails, damp concrete, and something darker beneath.
Adrian pulled off his gloves, revealing faint symbols burned into his skin—the same as mine.
"Those are—"
"Remnants," he said. "Each time I use the curse to protect you, it marks me too."
I stepped closer. "Why would you take that risk?"
He looked down at me, eyes unreadable. "Because losing you would finish what the curse started."
The sound of distant pursuit echoed through the tunnels. But for a brief second, the world narrowed to this small space—the heat of his presence, the rhythm of two heartbeats struggling to stay separate.
"I don't know how to stop it," I whispered.
He reached out, brushing a strand of hair from my face. "Maybe we're not meant to. Maybe we're supposed to survive it instead."
His hand lingered just long enough for the mark to pulse again—silver light flickering between our skin like static. The air hummed, charged with everything unsaid.
Then he stepped back, forcing the moment to dissolve.
"Come on," he said. "There's one last safe place. But it's not inside the city."
We followed the tunnel until it opened onto an abandoned rail line stretching toward the river. A rusted maintenance train waited there, engines still functional thanks to the tech buried in its panels.
As we climbed aboard, the mark on my collarbone dimmed for the first time all night. Exhaustion crept in, but beneath it burned something harder—resolve.
Adrian keyed in a destination code. The train began to move, slicing into the dark.
I looked at him. "Where are we going this time?"
He met my gaze. "To where the curse was born."
The words settled between us like prophecy. The reflection of lightning flashed across the tunnel walls, and I realized: this was only the beginning.
The maintenance train cut through the forgotten tunnels like a heartbeat under the city. The walls outside flickered with the glow of old emergency lights; sometimes I thought I saw faces in the glass—reflections that weren't mine.
Adrian stood at the control panel, watching the readouts. His shirt was torn along one sleeve, exposing the sigils branded into his arm. They pulsed faintly in rhythm with the marks on my skin.
"How far down are we going?" I asked.
"Farther than most people know exists," he said. "The Syndicate built the city on top of its own grave."
The train slowed, then hissed to a stop. Beyond the doors stretched a cavern so wide the roof disappeared into shadow. Rusted tracks ran across it, and at the far end rose the broken remnants of a cathedral.
"This is where they performed the first Binding," he said quietly.
We walked through the ruins, our footsteps echoing off cracked stone. The stained-glass windows were shattered, but fragments still clung to the frames—tiny shards that caught our flashlight beams and scattered them like prism dust.
On the altar lay a mirror—black, fractured, yet alive. Its surface rippled when we drew near. I felt the mark at my collarbone burn.
"It's reacting to you," Adrian said.
"Or calling to me," I whispered.
He circled the altar, scanning symbols carved into the floor. "This was a sanctuary before it became a prison. The people who created the Syndicate thought they could trap divine energy inside matter. Instead, they made this."
I reached toward the mirror; he caught my wrist. "Not yet. It remembers everyone who's touched it. Everyone except you."
The air thickened, humming with unseen power. A figure appeared within the mirror's depth—a woman with hair like liquid silver, her eyes identical to mine.
Elara, the reflection said, her voice echoing through the cavern.He cannot save you. He already belongs to me.
Adrian stepped forward. "Selene," he said. His tone was both reverent and full of loathing.
Still wearing your chains, Adrian? Still pretending you can love?
The reflection's smile was sharp enough to cut glass. The mirror rippled again, and waves of cold air rushed outward. My knees buckled, but Adrian caught me, pulling me against him as the mirror's light flared.
"Stay with me," he said.
The reflection screamed, then shattered—every piece of glass in the cathedral exploding outward in a cyclone of light.
When the light faded, we were both on the floor. The mirror was gone, replaced by a crater of melted stone. My heartbeat slowed to normal, but the mark still glowed faintly, threads of silver winding down my arms.
"She knows where we are now," Adrian said.
"Then we should leave."
He nodded, but didn't move right away. For a moment we just sat there, breathing the dust and silence. His hand brushed mine—an unconscious gesture, protective, grounding.
"She called you by name," I said.
He met my eyes. "Because she made me."
He stood, facing the broken altar. "Selene needed a host to anchor her power when she fell. I volunteered—believed I could control it. Instead, she rewrote my blood. That's why I don't age, why the Syndicate obeys me and fears me in equal measure."
I rose slowly. "And my mother used your blood to seal her away."
He nodded once. "Which bound me to you before you were born."
The realization sent a strange ache through me—something between destiny and dread. "So we were never strangers," I said.
"No," he said softly. "But I wanted you to have a choice."
He turned toward the stairway leading deeper into the ruins. "There's another chamber below—one last record of what happened here. If we destroy it, Selene loses her anchor."
"And if we fail?"
"Then the curse stops pretending to be human."
The mark at my collarbone pulsed in answer, silver light chasing the shadows down the walls. I followed him, the air growing colder with each step.
At the bottom waited a door of black stone. Symbols glowed faintly along its edge. Adrian placed his hand on the center panel, and the door sighed open.
Inside were rows of mirrors—hundreds of them—each inscribed with a name. Some glowed faintly, others were dark. At the very end stood one marked Elara Morgan.
My reflection in it was wrong—older, eyes bright with unearthly light.
"Every host has a mirror," Adrian said. "Destroying yours will break the chain—but it could also destroy you."
He looked at me then, truly looked, as if memorizing every detail. "You don't have to do this tonight."
"I don't think we have that kind of time," I said.
He stepped closer. The air between us vibrated, charged with power and emotion. "Then we face it together."
We stood before the mirror, our reflections merging in the dim light. The mark burned hotter until it felt like both our heartbeats were pounding in sync. The glass trembled; voices filled the room—the echoes of every soul that had ever carried the curse.
One life for freedom, they whispered.One bond for eternity.
Adrian reached for my hand. "Whatever happens," he said, "don't let go."
"I won't."
Together we touched the surface.
The world dissolved into light.
When the light hit, sound vanished.For a heartbeat I was weightless, suspended in a storm of silver fire. Faces spun past—people I'd never met but somehow remembered. Each whispered the same word: choice.
Then Adrian's hand closed around mine, and gravity slammed back. The chamber blurred and re-formed into something alive—walls breathing, mirrors whispering. Our reflections were gone. Only the two of us remained, surrounded by the afterimage of power.
The mark on my skin burned until it felt like it might split open. I saw matching light tracing the veins in his throat, pulsing in time with mine.
"Adrian—"
He staggered, clutching his chest. "It's binding to you completely. You're rewriting it."
"I'm what?"
"You're taking the curse out of me."
The light surged again—blinding, then black.
I woke to the smell of rain and stone dust.We were back in the upper tunnels, the ceiling dripping with condensation. My body ached, but the mark had cooled to a faint shimmer. Adrian knelt a few feet away, his breathing ragged, eyes darker than I'd ever seen.
"You moved the curse," he said quietly. "Part of it's in you now."
My heart thudded. "Can it be reversed?"
He shook his head once. "It's never been done."
Silence pressed between us, thick with things neither of us dared to say. Finally he stood and offered his hand. "Then we protect you until we find a way."
I hesitated, then took it. His grip was steady—too steady for someone who looked that broken.
We made it back to the surface through a service lift that opened into the deserted underground parking of Northstar Tower. The city's night lights burned through the glass like veins of gold.
Adrian keyed open a private suite beside the elevator—a minimalist refuge built into steel and shadow.
He poured a drink, but his hands trembled slightly when he passed it to me. "You shouldn't have touched that mirror."
"I shouldn't have done a lot of things tonight," I said, managing a small, shaky smile.
He studied me, something unguarded in his expression. "You've seen too much now. The Syndicate will come for you."
"Then you'll stop them."
He laughed once—a low, exhausted sound. "You have too much faith in me."
"Maybe you need someone who does."
The space between us thinned again—quiet, electric. The city's glow painted his profile in silver and shadow, outlining the sharp angles softened only by fatigue and something I didn't dare name.
"I told myself I wouldn't cross this line," he said, voice rough.
"You already did," I whispered.
He reached out, brushing a strand of hair from my face. The touch lingered—nothing more than fingertips, yet it felt like an oath.
"We're bound now," he said. "That changes everything."
"I think everything changed the moment you walked into that boardroom," I replied.
His breath caught; the air turned molten with words unsaid.
Outside, thunder rolled over the city. Inside, silence stretched until it trembled.
He leaned close enough that I could feel the warmth of his breath. "This is dangerous."
"So am I," I said.
And then the storm took the rest of the night, washing the world into silver blur and shadow.
What happened between us wasn't gentle—it was inevitable.And when dawn broke, I knew nothing about my life—or his—would ever be the same again.
The first light crept across the skyline. I stood by the window, wrapped in one of his shirts, staring down at the waking city. The mark on my skin shimmered faintly—no longer painful, but alive.
Adrian emerged from the shadows, fully dressed again, composed but pale. "They'll come sooner than expected," he said. "We need to prepare."
"For what?"
"For the Syndicate's retaliation."
He paused at the door, looking back at me with an expression that was both a warning and a promise."Welcome to the war, Elara."