Cassian woke before the sun rose. He lay still, his silver hair fanned out against the dark silk of the pillows. Usually, the palace at dawn was filled with noise, servants scrubbing stone and guards rotating shifts with a rhythmic clatter of armor.
But today it was all quiet.
Beside him, Elias was already awake. He was sitting upright with his back against the headboard, his green eyes reflecting the dim, pre-dawn light. The fever was completely gone, but the resonance they shared had mutated into something more profound.
The bond hummed—a steady, low-frequency vibration that sat in the marrow of Cassian's bones. Testing it, Cassian sent a controlled pulse of his resonance toward Elias. A week ago, such a pulse would have made Elias flinch or spark; today, he simply absorbed it, his own current swirling around the intrusion and weaving it into his own rhythm.
