Moonlight illuminated the ruins deep within the forest past the magical border of Arcanis Academy with an otherworldly glow. Centuries-old trees stood sentinel, their gnarled limbs reaching out as if to warn intruders away. The crimson-lit stone archway before pulsed with a faint light, too weak to behold—but Elira felt it in her very marrow. The same pounding, alluring pull that had tortured her sleep for days. The same voice which summoned from beneath the stone.
Kael stood by her side, jaw set and arms crossed. He'd hardly said a word since they'd escaped the Council's dark hands, and the charged air between them now thrummed like stretched bowstring.
"You're sure it's here?" he inquired quietly, his voice husky but tinctured with warning.
Elira nodded, eyes on the arch. "It called me. In my dreams. This place. it's not just some ruin. There's something alive beneath it. Or trapped."
Kael narrowed his eyes, his void-scarred mark glowing faintly under his collar. "Then we're not alone."
Suddenly, the ground trembled.
Elira reached out with her hand to the pendant around her throat—a splinter of Aetherion crystal that her mother had bequeathed her. It pulsed in rhythm with the scarlet light. Her light magic flared instinctively, casting a weak glow about her. Beside her, Kael summoned coils of void, coiled upon his fingers like water on ink.
From the shadows of the ruins, a figure emerged. Tall, clad in scarlet, masked in bone-white, with markings carved into the mask from the cursed Grimoire of the Depths.
"Then the Bonded have come," the figure declared. His voice resonated unnaturally, as if two men were speaking together. "The Crimson Veil reads the prophecy in your blood."
Kael stepped ahead to shield Elira. "What are you?"
The figure bowed. "A Keeper of the Veil. Guard of secrets best buried. And now, a witness to the return of the Void and Light convergence."
The runes on the arch burned wildly, lighting up the clearing in a fiery red. Elira reeled as a wave of visions crashed over her mind—snatches of war, red skies, and a colossal gate constructed of living rock tearing apart. Amidst it all, a foul silhouette, wrapped in shadowfire and starlight.
"It's coming," she gasped.
Kael supported her, holding her tight with a grip. "What did you see?"
"A gate. A prison. Something beyond this world. it's trying to breach through."
The Keeper turned his gaze upon her. "The Void hungers. But it cannot pass while the Veil holds. Unless one of the Bound breaks the seal."
Kael's grip on her arm tightened. "We're not breaking anything."
But Elira was drawing near. She felt the hum. The arch had been built of the same material that had originally sealed the Temple of Starlight—one of the ancient temples of her bloodline. It had been corrupted.
The Keeper extended a red scroll. "The decision is yours, Elira Thorne. Heir of Aetherion. Keeper of Light."
She took the scroll in trembling hands. The moment she unrolled it, the air thickened and golden glyphs floated into the air, dancing around her like fireflies.
Kael's eyes widened. "This is soulcraft. Not prophecy—it's a spell. One that ties time and fate."
Elira cast the spell, her warm magic reacting with shining light. Her joy was short-lived—the light warped as void energy from Kael exploded, blending with hers without either intending to.
The spell recognized them both.
The glyphs blended and shot into the archway. With a cracking boom, the stones reformed. A portal shook open—not red, but swirling silver and black, promising truth and forgetfulness.
The Keeper knelt. "It has begun. The Trial of the Twin-Bonded. Only those who go in as a pair can decide the fate of magic itself."
Kael gazed at Elira, his eyes black. "If we go in, we have no way of knowing what we'll find."
"We've already been chosen," she replied. "Whatever comes next… we face it together."
Together, side by side, they stepped into the portal.
---
The world they found themselves in was not made of earth and stone, but essence and memory.
They floated through a realm of shattered mirrors and whirling stars. In each mirror, shadows of their pasts—Kael's burning kingdom, Elira's lonely childhood, their shared life—fluttered like dying embers.
And then the voice returned. No longer a whisper, but a thunderous echo that shook Elira's bones.
"Two souls, one bond. Will you survive, or will you break?"
The stars wrapped and curled together—huge, its face veiled by light, its arms smoke and shadow. It was not god, nor animal, but something older.
The Arbiter of Bonds.
"To prove yourself worthy, you must walk your counterpart's pain," it said to her.
Elira whirled—and Kael was nowhere in sight.
Instead, she stood in an ice and ash throne room. A child knelt on the stairs—Kael, no more than ten, covered in bruises, silently weeping as soldiers removed his mother's lifeless body.
She flinched, feeling every sting of his grief. The agony of being powerless, of watching everything be taken from him.
And then she lived it.
Time ceased to have meaning. She was Kael—feeling mockery, betrayal, the weight of a cursed heritage.
When she woke up, crying, Kael was beside her, holding her, pale and trembling.
"I saw yours too," he whispered. "The orphanage. The nights you cried by yourself. The way the world tried to make you believe you were nothing."
Their connection throbbed.
The Arbiter came back. "You have suffered. You have comprehended. And now… you must decide."
A final mirror revealed itself. Through it, Elira glimpsed a future where she broke the bond—freeing them both, but weakening their combined power.
In another, she embraced it completely—but their souls would be forever bound, no escape, no do-overs.
Kael looked at her, eyes bloodshot. "Whatever you choose… I'll follow."
Elira stepped forward and shattered both mirrors.
"We create a new path. Together. Not bound. Not broken. Chosen."
The Arbiter chuckled. A shattering of stars.
"Very well. Let it be known: the Bonded have created a third path. The Soulfire Way. Light and Void, not in opposition, but whole."
A burst of energy surrounded them, and the portal re-opened.
They stood within the ruins, gasping.
The Keeper of the Veil was nowhere to be found.
But encircling the arch, ancient sigils now burned with silvery fire. A message left behind in glowing Aetherion script:
"The future is no longer written. The Bonded shall decide the fate of the five kingdoms."
Kael turned to her, a slow smile breaking across his face. "I guess we're rewriting history now."
Elira smiled back. "Let's make it a good one."