Chapter 32: The Thread That Never Was
Day Five
The world outside the window lay still beneath a velvet sky, wrapped in the quiet tension of waiting. It wasn't the peace of the calm before a storm—it was the quiet after it. The silence that settled like a second skin, suffocating in its stillness.
The city had fallen, but in its absence, the weight of its silence hung heavy. No snarls. No distant cries. No signs of life beyond the four walls of the apartment.
Selene sat on the edge of the couch, her figure as composed as ever. Her silver hair shimmered softly in the low light, a stark contrast to her pale skin. The bandages were clean now, snug around her side. The bleeding had stopped, but Aria knew better.
Selene was still hurting.
Aria watched her. The steady rhythm of her breath, the quiet grace with which she moved. It didn't matter how much Selene hid it—Aria saw the small tremors in her fingers, the slight sharpness in her eyes that would always betray her strength.
The wound wasn't the only thing that bled.
But it was the one that Aria could see.
Aria's fingers twisted in her lap. She couldn't hold still. Couldn't be quiet. Her gaze flitted between Selene and the wound that had marked her. She wanted to fix it, to do something—anything—to make Selene whole again.
And yet, all she felt was helplessness, an ache that sank into her chest like something darker than sorrow.
"It should've been me," Aria whispered, the words escaping before she could stop them.
Selene's eyes flicked to hers, her gaze sharp and cutting.
"Don't say that," she commanded, her voice firm.
"But I—" Aria protested, her throat tightening with emotion.
"No."
Selene's tone brooked no argument. The finality in it cut deeper than any wound.
For a moment, neither of them spoke. The air between them thickened, but not with the usual tension. It was something softer. Something real.
Selene turned slightly, her face betraying none of the cold composure she wore so well. But there was something else in her eyes—something that made Aria's heart catch in her throat.
"I would bleed a thousand times," Selene said, her voice low and deliberate, "before I let anything touch you."
Aria's breath hitched.
It wasn't just the words. It was the quiet reverence with which Selene spoke them. It was the truth hidden behind that calm mask—the truth that said Selene would do anything, endure anything, to protect her.
Aria's hand moved on its own. She reached forward, her fingers trembling, afraid to shatter the fragile silence. She hesitated for only a heartbeat before the words escaped her.
"Let me help this time," she murmured, her voice barely a whisper. "Let me do something."
Selene's eyes softened just a fraction, but her stillness didn't waver. She didn't answer right away.
And then Aria was unwrapping the bandage with tender fingers, each movement slower than the last, each tug of the cloth a promise she wasn't sure she could keep.
The world paused.
Aria felt it first—a pulse in her chest, a flicker beneath her skin. She couldn't explain it. Didn't have the words. But as her hand hovered near the wound, a light bloomed from her palm. It was soft—pale gold and delicate, like sunlight just after dawn.
It spiraled, like a ribbon of warmth in the air, until it hovered above Selene's side.
Selene froze, her eyes widening just slightly. The light hovered, its warmth spilling across her skin like a blanket woven from the stars themselves. Then, as if guided by something deeper than understanding, the light sank into her wound.
Selene inhaled sharply.
Her breath hitched, a flicker of something too vulnerable in her gaze.
And then the wound began to close. Slowly, methodically, as if the light itself had a purpose that Aria had never known. The torn flesh knitted together. Blood—bright and wet—vanished like it had never been there.
Aria's breath caught in her throat as she watched. She didn't understand it. She couldn't. But it was there, undeniable. The power, the energy—the thing inside her that she didn't know she could control.
And she could feel it now—more than before. Like a pulse of something ancient and strange, deeper than any memory, older than time itself. Maybe it was born of fear. Or maybe, just maybe, it was born of something else.
Love, perhaps.
But the words felt hollow in her mind. Too fragile to contain the enormity of what she felt.
Selene stared at her, her eyes wide and heavy with the same disbelief that had settled in Aria's chest.
"…That wasn't supposed to happen," Selene said, her voice low, almost reverent.
Aria blinked, unable to process the weight of those words. "What… what did I just do?"
Selene didn't answer right away. Instead, she stared at Aria as though she were seeing something that hadn't happened yet. A memory of the future, perhaps. Something that had been waiting to surface.
"You never awakened healing before," Selene said slowly, her gaze still fixed on Aria. "Not last time."
Aria's heart skipped a beat. "Last time?"
Selene opened her mouth. Then she closed it, the words hanging in the air between them, too heavy to say.
Aria wanted to push. To ask, to demand the truth. But something in Selene's eyes made her hold back. Whatever answer Selene was holding—she wasn't ready to speak it yet.
And Aria knew better than to force it. Not yet.
But something had shifted.
Not just in Aria. But in the very thread that bound them together.
A thread that wasn't supposed to exist anymore.
And yet—there it was. Unbroken. Unwritten. Refusing to let go.
A connection that neither of them had asked for. But neither could deny.
And as Aria sat there, her hand still lingering in the space where healing had just unfolded, she couldn't shake the feeling that everything—everything—was about to change.
Forever.