Her hand presses flat against my chest.
“I want partnership,” she says quietly. “Not ownership. Not martyrdom. Not destiny.”
The heat under her palm is unbearable. I force myself to stay still.
“You understand what this means,” I say carefully. “Once we stop resisting it, the bond stabilizes. It doesn’t weaken. It doesn’t… loosen.”
“I know.”
“And if you wake up one day and decide you made a mistake?—”
“Then that’s my mistake to live with.”
I swallow.
“Vakutan pairs don’t separate,” I say. “It’s not cultural stubbornness. It’s physiological. If one leaves, the other?—”
“Declines,” she finishes. “I read that too.”
The silence stretches between us, thick and charged.
“This is your last chance,” I say. My voice comes out rougher than I intend. “If you want the transport, the new identity, I’ll see you protected. I won’t fight you on it.”
She studies me.
Then she does something that nearly unravels me.
She smiles.
“Vrok,” she murmurs, stepping even closer until there’s barely air between us, “if I wanted to run, I would’ve done it before I walked back in here.”
Her fingers curl into my shirt.
“You don’t get to offer me escape like it’s mercy. I’m not trapped.”
Her voice drops lower.
“I’m choosing to stay.”
The bond shifts.
Not violently. Not like before. It spreads outward from where she’s touching me, warm and steady, like molten metal poured into a mold and finally allowed to set.
I close my eyes for a moment.
“Say it again,” I murmur.
She rolls her eyes slightly but obliges. “I choose you.”
The restraint I’ve held for weeks—months—fractures.
But I don’t move until she does.
She rises onto her toes and kisses me.
Not tentative.
Not testing.
