h already fading from his fingers. He doesn't remember breathing. Doesn't remember standing. He only knows that everything that tethered him to this world has just been torn away. The bridg

violently. Just still. I gasp, as if breathing for the first time in centuries. My body aches, though I don't remember hitting anything. My mind is splintered glass, catching fragments of light that make no sense. Wherever I am, it isn't the astrarium. It isn't my world. And it isn't his. The air tastes different. Cold, but sweet-like rain over ancient stone. The stars above are too close, like they've fallen from the sky to hang just above the earth, shimmering in colors I don't recognize. And ahead of me, on a slope of pale, glowing sand- A gate. Not made of metal or wood, but woven from threads of light, shifting and reshaping like it's half-aware of its own purpose. I step toward it, my legs trembling. Every movement feels like waking from a dream I haven't finished dreaming. The closer I get, the more I feel the bond-our bond-still humming in my chest. It hasn't broken. Which means Kairos is alive. And that means something-some part of me-might still reach him. I stop in front of the gate. There are symbols carved into the ground beneath it. I recognize them. They're the same as the ones in the astrarium. The same as the runes that flared when Kairos and I stood together. I whisper his name. The gate flickers. And then opens. Beyond it lies a path of starlit stone that vanishes into a violet mist. But before I can take a step-before I can even breathe- A figure appears on the other side. Tall. Cloaked in smoke and firelight. No face, just a shifting mask of memory and shadow. It doesn't speak with words. It thinks. And I hear it as if it's inside my mind. "You gave yourself to time. Time has given you a debt." I feel the weight of those words settle on my shoulders. "The choice is made. But the cost is not yet paid." "I don't care," I whisper, my voice shaking. "I would do it again." The figure tilts its head. "You will." Then it vanishes. The mist swallows the light. And I step through the gate, into whatever comes next. The moment I step through the gate, the air shifts. It smells of something familiar-charred paper, rain on stone, lavender at dusk. But there's nothing around me but mist and that so