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"Get your hands off me!" I snarled, shoving against Cain’s chest.
He didn't budge. It was like trying to push a brick wall wrapped in leather. He had me pinned against the damp stone of the tunnel wall, his forearm pressing firmly across my collarbone. Not enough to choke me, but enough to let me know exactly who owned the air in my lungs.
"Stop fighting it, Mara. You're shaking so hard you're practically vibrating," he muttered. His voice was low, a rough grate that felt too close to my ear.
"I'm not shaking, I'm pissed," I snapped. But I was lying. The sigil in my chest was doing more than vibrating. It was screaming. A searing, white-hot heat was radiating from the center of my sternum, eating through my clothes and branding my skin from the inside out. It felt like someone had poured molten brass into my veins.
I gasped, my knees buckling. The world tilted. The gray tunnel walls blurred into a smear of charcoal and soot.
"Look at me," Cain commanded. He shifted his grip, his hand sliding from my shoulder to the back of my neck, forcing me to lock eyes with him. His pupils were blown wide, dark and predatory, but there was something else there. Panic? No, Cain Rook didn't do panic. It was urgency.
"It hurts," I whispered, the admission tasting like defeat. "It feels like... like it's trying to tear me open."
"Because it is," he said. He didn't move away. Instead, he leaned in, his chest brushing mine. I could feel the steady, heavy thrum of his own heart through the layers of our coats. "The oath isn't just a contract, you idiot. It's a bridge. And right now, you're trying to carry the weight of both us while your system is crashing."
I tried to pull away, but the heat spiked again. A jagged bolt of pain shot up my spine, and I let out a strangled cry. My fingers clawed at his sleeves, bunching the heavy fabric.
"What do I do?" I choked out. "Make it stop. Just make it stop!"
Cain didn't answer with words. He reached down, his palm slamming flat against the center of my chest, right over the burning sigil.
I shrieked, flinching back, but he held me fast. The contact should have been agony—like touching a hot stove—but the second his hand hit my skin, the fire didn't vanish. It shifted. It flowed. I felt a sudden, violent rush of energy leave my chest and pour into him.
It was an electrical shock that knocked the breath out of me. My head snapped back against the wall, and for a second, I saw something that wasn't there. A flash of a memory—not mine. A woman's face, blurred and weeping, a golden key turning in a lock that sounded like a scream.
I blinked, and it was gone. But the pain had dulled to a manageable throb.
Cain let out a sharp breath, his fingers twitching against my chest. He didn't pull his hand away. He stayed there, his palm warm and heavy, grounding me. His gaze was searching my face, scanning for something I didn't know I had.
"Did you see it?" he asked, his voice sounding strained.
"See what?" I panted, my heart still hammering against his hand. "The hallucination? The screaming lock? What the hell is happening to me?"
He slowly retracted his hand, but he didn't step back. The space between us was barely an inch. I could smell the ozone and old tobacco clinging to him, and the heat from his body was the only thing keeping me from shivering in the tunnel's damp chill.
"The sigil is eating your memories to fuel the bond," he said. He looked away, his jaw tight. "Every time it spikes, it takes a piece. A name. A face. A moment. It’s the price for the power it gives you."
I felt a cold pit open in my stomach. "What do you mean 'takes a piece'? I haven't forgotten anything."
Cain gave a short, mirthless laugh. "Right. Try this. Who was your father's first business partner? The one who taught you how to calibrate a pressure valve?"
I opened my mouth to answer. I waited for the name to surface. I waited for the image of a dusty workshop and a man with grease-stained fingers. But there was nothing. Just a vast, echoing hole where a memory should have been. A static-filled void.
I stepped back, my back hitting the wall again. "I... I don't..."
"You don't remember," Cain finished. He crossed his arms, his expression hardening. "You're glitching, Mara. And the more you fight the bond, the faster the void grows."
"I'm not fighting the bond, I'm fighting *you*," I spat, though the fire in my voice was flickering. "You're the one who took my brother. You're the one who serves the Council. Why the hell should I trust a dog who bites the hand that feeds him?"
Cain stepped forward again, closing the gap in one swift motion. He didn't grab me this time, but he loomed over me, his shadow swallowing me whole. "Because I'm the only thing keeping you from becoming a mindless husk. You think you hate me? Fine. Hate me. But do it while you still remember how to speak."
I glared up at him, my teeth clenched. "I'll find a way to break this. I'll find a gear-mage who can rip this thing out of my chest without taking my brain with it."
"Good luck with that," he said, his voice dropping to a dangerous whisper. "Because this isn't just a spell. It's a blood-lock. My blood is in that sigil. Your blood is in mine. We're wired together, Mara. Pulse for pulse."
I looked down at my chest, the fabric of my shirt still warm. "I don't believe you."
"Believe it or don't," Cain said, turning away to scan the tunnel. "But let's test the theory. If I walk twenty paces away from you right now, that burn will come back. And this time, it won't just be a memory. It'll be a piece of your consciousness."
I wanted to call him a liar. I wanted to tell him to go to hell. But the way he said it—with that cold, clinical certainty—made my skin crawl.
"So what? I'm just supposed to follow you around like a lost puppy?" I asked, stepping forward to keep pace with him. "Is that the plan? You lead, I obey, and we both pretend we don't want to kill each other?"
"Pretty much," Cain replied without looking back. "Except I'm the one with the gun, and you're the one with the ticking bomb in your ribs. That makes the power dynamic pretty simple."
"You're an arrogant prick," I muttered, but I stayed close. Too close. I could hear the rhythmic clink of his gear, the steady sound of his boots on the stone. Every time our shoulders brushed, a tiny spark of that brass heat flickered in my chest, a reminder that I was no longer my own.
We walked in silence for several minutes, the tunnel narrowing as we descended deeper into the undercity. The air grew thick with the smell of sulfur and old grease. Above us, the distant hum of the city's great gears groaned like a dying beast.
"Where are we even going?" I asked, my voice echoing. "You said we needed to find the records, but this looks like a sewer for clockwork scrap."
"Inez doesn't keep her archives in a library, Mara," Cain said. "She keeps them where the Council can't smell them. In the gut of the city."
Suddenly, Cain stopped. He whipped around, his hand snapping out to grab my wrist and yank me behind a rusted pillar. He pressed me back against the cold metal, his body shielding mine from the open path.
"Shh," he breathed.
I froze. From around the corner, the rhythmic *clack-clack-clack* of metallic feet approached. Not human. Something heavier. Something with too many joints.
"A Sentinel," I whispered, my heart leaping into my throat. "What is one doing this far down?"
"They're hunting you," Cain whispered back. His grip on my wrist tightened, his thumb pressing into my pulse point. I could feel his heart racing—not from fear, but from readiness. "The Council didn't just want you arrested. They want the core back, and they don't care if they have to peel you open to find it."
I looked at him, really looked at him, and for a split second, the hatred vanished, replaced by a terrifying realization. He wasn't just my jailer. He was the only thing standing between me and a metal claw through the chest.
Cain leaned in, his lips almost touching my temple. "Stay behind me. If I tell you to run, you run. Don't look back, don't stop, and for the love of god, don't try to be a hero."
"I can fight," I hissed, reaching for the small wrench tucked into my belt.
"You can't even remember your father's partner," he countered, his voice a low warning. "Stay put."
He stepped out from behind the pillar, drawing his weapon in one fluid motion. The Sentinel rounded the corner—a towering mass of brass plates and glowing red lenses. It let out a piercing shriek that vibrated in my very marrow.
Cain didn't flinch. He fired, the blast echoing through the tunnel like a thunderclap. The Sentinel lurched, its arm swinging in a wide, lethal arc that smashed the stone pillar inches from my head.
As the dust settled and the fight blurred into a chaos of sparks and shouting, I felt the sigil in my chest flare again. Not with pain this time, but with a sudden, overwhelming surge of energy. It felt like a door opening in my mind, a flood of power that wasn't mine, but was being offered by the man fighting in front of me.
Cain slammed the Sentinel into the wall, his shoulder colliding with the machine's chassis. He looked back at me over his shoulder, his eyes burning with a fierce, desperate intensity.
"Mara! Now! Use the link!"
I didn't know what he meant, but I didn't have time to ask. I reached out with my mind, grasping at that thread of brass heat, and pulled.
The world exploded in a flash of gold. The Sentinel froze, its gears grinding to a halt as if an invisible hand had seized its heart. Cain gasped, his body jerking as the feedback hit him.
He slumped against the dead machine, breathing hard. I rushed to him, my hands trembling as I reached for his shoulder.
"Did it work?" I asked, my voice shaking.
Cain looked up at me, and for the first time, he looked exhausted. Not just physically, but hollowed out. He grabbed my hand, his fingers digging into my skin with a strength that bordered on painful.
"It worked," he rasped. He pulled me closer, his gaze locking onto mine with a terrifying gravity. "But you need to understand something, Mara. The bond is a two-way street. If the link breaks—if I die—you don't just lose your protector."
I frowned. "What do you mean?"
Cain’s expression went stone-cold. "The sigil is anchored to my life force. If my heart stops, the oath doesn't just vanish. It collapses. And it'll shred you into a thousand pieces in seconds."