The chamber is colder than any place in Nox we've been.
Colder than the trials, the vault, the hollow spires.
Because this isn't a place for tests.
It's a place of endings.
Freyr stands in the center, hands folded neatly behind his back, that thin, patient smile stretched too wide.
The walls pulse with ancient symbols—-old words, old magic, old promises meant to force the truth from anyone who steps inside.
"Your final trial," Freyr says softly, as if he's giving us a gift. "Speak the truths you've been hiding from yourselves. From each other. From the bond."
The bond throbs between us now—-louder, sharper, burning under my skin like fire.
I can barely breathe through it.
Justin stands a few feet from me. Closer than I want.
Farther than I can stand.
Freyr gestures to him first. "The boy will begin."
Justin's jaw clenches.
He's silent too long, but the bond pushes him, pulling the words from him whether he wants them or not.
"I never wanted this bond," he says finally, voice tight, rough. "I told myself it was a mistake. Something forced on us."
He swallows hard.
"But I was wrong."
His gaze locks on mine.
"And the truth is…..I don't care what the bond is anymore. It's you, Sarah. It's always been you."
The words hit like a blade between my ribs.
He doesn't look away.
Doesn't give me a chance to hide.
He lets me see everything.
And that's the worst part.
Because I feel it too.
The bond burns with it—--twisting, invasive, overwhelming.
And when Freyr turns to me, smiling like a cat who already knows the mouse is cornered. I know what I'm supposed to say.
I know what I feel.
But I can't.
So I le.
"The bond was never real to me," I whisper, even though the words taste like ash. "It's a cage. That's all it ever was."
Justin flinches.
I feel the hurt down the bond, flickering under the weight of the lie.
Justin lets the silence swallow him.
He doesn't argue.
He doesn't fight.
He just lets go.
Freyr's smile stretches wide.
"Well done," he purrs. "You're ready now, Sarah."
He gestures to the door behind him—-the final door. The one only I can open.
I don't move.
Not yet.
Because the bond is flickering between us, fraying into threads, slipping through my fingers like something dying.
And I'm the one killing it.
Freyr turns away from us like he's already forgotten Justin exists.
He gestures to the final door, his voice soft, triumphant.
"You've severed the last thread, Sarah. You're ready."
But I don't move.
I can't.
I feel the bond flickering inside me—-weak, frayed, slipping.
It should be a relief.
But all I feel is hollow.
I turn—-because I have to—--because I can't stop myself—--and find Justin standing there, unmoving, silent, like he's carved himself into the floor.
His face is blank.
But I see it in his eyes.
The fracture.
The thing I did to him.
The thing I can't undo.
I force the words out anyway.
"Are you…..coming?"
His expression doesn't change.
His voice is quiet. Too quiet.
"You made your choice, Sarah."
He takes a step back, and it's worse than any scream.
"Now I'm making mine."
His gaze flicks to Freyr, cold and sharp.
"Send me home."
Freyr's smile stretches wider, pleased, smug, victorious.
"No….." I whisper.
"As you wish."
He doesn't even snap his fingers. He just lets Nox swallow Justin into mist, into silence, into nothing.
I stand there frozen, staring at the empty space where he stood.
The bond is quiet now.
Too quiet.
And when I finally move to follow Freyr, my legs feel like they don't belong to me.
I don't look back.
But the tears fall anyway.
Silently.
Freyr doesn't speak as I follow him through the last door.
But the moment I cross the threshold….
The bond disappears.
Completely.
And the emptiness it leaves behind is worse than anything I've felt in this realm.
Worse than the trials.
Worse than the lies.
Because I don't know if I made the right choice.
And now…..
I don't know if I'll get the chance to take it back.
********
Freyr's POV
She follows.
Silent. Broken.
Exactly where I want her.
I walk ahead, the doors of the realm closing behind us with a satisfying snap, sealing the severed bond, sealing the girl into the path I carved for her.
I don't look back.
I don't need to.
I feel the hollowness inside her now—--the ache, the space where the boy used to fill her.
Good.
She'll be easier to shape now.
I smile into the dark, letting Nox hum around me, drinking in the satisfaction of a plan finally falling into place.
But beneath the hum…..
Something stirs.
Faint.
Distant.
The pulse of a dying bond flickering.
Something the realm will not forget.
Nor the fates.