Page 9 of The Bound Blood
“I mean, honestly,” her voice continues, clear and undeniablyTamsin, “Kael is missing after brooding next to your bedside for twenty-four hours—what else is new, right? He's a demon, that's what they do… Nolan’s been hovering like a kicked puppy, I can barely keep him resting in his bed, and Raiden nearly ripped the runes apart when your magic flared last night. You’ve officially upgraded from a girl with secrets to a girl withthree emotionally compromised disasterstied to her.”
A breath shudders out of me. “Tamsin?”
“Not to mention,” she keeps going, “your bond with Raiden is glowing like a damn lantern that even I can see now. It looks like it needs some healing, and if you don’t wake up and deal with that situation, Iwill. And I’m not exactly the subtle one in this friendship.”
I glance around, searching for her, but the world shifts again—walls twisting, light bending. She’s not here. Not really.
“Oh, and in case you forgot,” her voice adds, flat, “you nearly blew a hole through half the school when the Veil breach happened, so you might want to stop soul-strolling through the magical subconscious death plane andwake the hell up.”
I almost laugh. It catches in my throat.
Something inside me stirs. A tug. A flicker of sensation I can’t fully name, but it feels like heat against my skin and the pull of breath returning to lungs that haven’t moved in too long.
“I want to,” I whisper. “I’m trying.”
The world ripples around me. But Tamsin doesn’t hear that part. Her voice keeps going like she’s pacing beside me, talking to me even though I haven’t opened my eyes.
“And just so we’re clear? You don’t get to float away from this. Not from me. Not fromthem. So get it together, Linds. Wake up. Choose a boy. Kisssomebody. Hell, kissallof them. That’s what I would do. But I’m greedy like that.”
A pause.
“Okay, enough distracting me—open your eyes. I need you to come back to your body now. It’s right here.”
My arm tingles, and I glance down.
It feels like she’s touching me.
“Tamsin,” I whisper.
She squeaks. “Holy void.Yes, Linds! Come to my voice. I’m here. Wake up, bestie.”
Something crackles beneath my skin. Light. Pressure. The shadows around methin. I feel her fingers on my arm—not just imagined anymore, butreal. Warm. Anchoring.
“Tamsin,” I whisper again, louder this time.
Then everythingshifts. My vision floods with white. The floor disappears. My bodyslamsupward—like I’m being yanked toward myself.
“She moved! She moved!”
Something cracks. Not loud, but deepinside me. The world shudders. I feel Tamsin’s hand tighten around mine. Warmth rushes up my arm. Magic threading through me as I try to respond to her touch.
And then—everything pulls me back into my body.
Like I’ve been hooked behind the ribs and yanked toward the surface. I don’t see light exactly, but Ifeelit, blinding and urgent, magic roaring in my ears like a heartbeat too loud.
The bonds that formed flare to life. Their magicslamsinto mine all at once, not violently, butthere. I don’t see them. I don’t hear them. Iknowthey feel it too.
My eyes flutter. A single breath escapes me.
And just like that—it slips away again. The shadows pull me back under, gentle this time. As though they were waiting, and they know I’m not ready yet.
They press in again, smoothing the edges of the light that almost reached me. The moment slips like water through my fingers, and I land gently—quietly—back in the distorted hallway.
But something’s different now.
The Academy iswrong-erthan before.
Where there was once just haze and echo, now timefracturesaround me. One hallway shows sunlight blazing through the windows—another glows with moonlight so cold it burns. A clock ticks backward in the corridor beside me. Students flicker in and out like ghosts. One version of me stands at the window, staring out. Another passes by without seeing me at all.
