Page 66 of The Bound Blood
He watches me for one long, venomous breath.
“You will regret this,” he says.
“Maybe,” I answer. “But not today.”
My father doesn’t speak again. He turns away. Each footstep he takes echoes with ritual finality. And when he reaches the edge of the temple hall, he lifts a hand—andcuts me out. Not from Lindsay.
From the Kitsune clan.
From the bloodline that raised me. From the magic of the name I’ve carried like a second skin since the day I shifted.
The severing of the bond isn’t loud. It’ssilent. The kind of magic that unravels so cleanly you almost don’t know you’re bleeding until the cold rushes in.
It tears through me, right down the center of my chest. A spiritual amputation. A weight lifted, but not in a way that feels free. More like being unmoored. Adrift.
The ancestral tether snaps.
And something in my magic wails.
But I don’t fall. I force my legs to hold. My spine to stay straight. I keep my eyes open and fixed forward as he walks away, cloak trailing behind him like a shadow of every expectation I’ve failed to meet.
The temple doors open without a sound. And when they close behind him—without hesitation, without a backward glance for the son he just cut off—I fall to my knees.
Pain slams through me, quiet but brutal. Because everything I’ve ever beenwas built on belonging. And now—I don’t.
My palms brace against the floor. I breathe in, then out, ragged. The altar glows faintly in the dim light—a sacred space untouched by clan or politics. Just stone and offerings. A place for reverence. For surrender and seeking forgiveness. I lift my gaze to it, throat tight.
“I did the right thing,” I whisper.
It’s not a question. Iknowit’s true—feel it rooted somewhere beneath the grief. But it still feels like I need to say it aloud. To give it weight.
To let something older than blood hear it. Not my father. Not the clan. Somethingelse.
Because if they won’t see me—if they cast me out for protecting her—then maybe this place will. I press my forehead to the stone floor. Not in worship. Not exactly. But in defiance of the silence building inside of me. In hope that something listens.
“I choose her.” The words come softer. Steadier. “Not for power. Not for magic. Because she’sworthchoosing.”
The lanterns above me flicker, just faintly, like the breath of the room shifts around me.
I’m still here. Even if I’ve been stripped of name and legacy. Even if the tether to my people has been cut like a root torn from the earth—I’m still here.
And if the gods watch. If the Veil listens. Let them know this: I don’t regret it. Not a single second. Not a single choice. Not even now.
Because even alone—even on my knees in the hollow silence of a temple that’s seen a thousand supplicants more loyal, more obedient?—
I’m still his son, even if he’s cast me out. I’m still her tether and soulmate. And I will not break.
The glow of the altar warms. Just slightly. Not exactly in approval or absolution. But something closer to acknowledgment. As if the temple sees me. Not what I’ve lost. But what I’ve become.
And for the first time in my life…I’m not asking to belong.
TWENTY-SIX
LINDSAY
Nolan’s heartbeatis still racing under my cheek, wild and stunned and impossibly sweet. He hasn’t stopped holding me. One hand stays tangled in my hair, the other curled at the small of my back like he’s afraid I’ll vanish if he lets go.
I could stay like this.
