The Forgotten Pulse of the Bond-Chapter 28: Camille’s Confession

"I thought you’d ignore the pull," Camille said, voice soft.

Magnolia stepped closer. "I couldn’t. You wrapped it in too much pain."

Camille offered a humorless smile. "You always were good at feeling what I tried to bury."

She motioned for her sister to sit.

Magnolia eased down opposite her, knees brushing the edge of the bench. "What is it, Camille?"

"I’ve been dreaming," Camille said. "But not the way I used to. This isn’t just sleep pulling loose memory. It’s deeper. Like drowning."

"Tell me."

Camille exhaled shakily. "I’m in water. Every night. Dark water, endless and freezing. I can’t breathe, but I’m not struggling either. It feels... expected. Like I was meant to sink."

Magnolia’s eyes didn’t blink. She knew better than to interrupt.

Camille went on. "I hear a voice. A girl’s voice. She’s not screaming, but it cuts through everything like metal under my skin. She whispers one word over and over. At first I thought it was my name. But now "

She faltered.

Magnolia reached out slowly, placed a hand on her arm.

Camille swallowed. "She’s calling for the gate."

The lantern flickered as if on cue.

Magnolia drew back, her heart tightening. "The gate?"

"She says I left it open. She says... I never sealed it. That it’s still bleeding."

"You’re not responsible for Ashriel."

Camille looked up sharply. "Aren’t I? We stood at the edge together. We made a choice together. You held the seal. But I let him through. Even if it was for a moment. That might have been enough."

"You’re not him, Camille. And you’re not the grief."

"I know that."

"Then what do you think the voice is?" freeweɓnovēl.coɱ

Camille glanced toward the window, though the shutters were drawn.

"A memory that wasn’t mine. Or maybe a version of me that didn’t survive."

Silence spun thick between them.

Magnolia finally asked, "Why now?"

Camille’s lip trembled, just barely. "Because the bond isn’t sleeping anymore."

That sent a jolt down Magnolia’s spine.

"I feel it too," she admitted. "It scratches just beneath the surface. Like it’s looking for something."

"Or someone," Camille said. "I think it’s her."

Magnolia frowned. "The voice?"

"Yes. The girl calling me to the gate. I think she’s real. Or... she was. And I think she’s angry."

They sat in the stillness for a long time.

Magnolia broke it gently. "Do you want me to bind you tonight? Anchor you in case you sleepwalk again?"

Camille looked at her hands. "No."

"Why?"

"Because if I drown again, maybe I’ll finally reach her."

Magnolia stood suddenly. "Don’t say that."

Camille’s voice didn’t rise. "You’re afraid I’ll become what I was never supposed to be."

"I’m afraid you’ll lose yourself chasing someone else’s echo."

"I think that already happened."

Magnolia leaned forward, voice a whisper. "Then let me help you come back."

Camille nodded once, slowly.

"I want to. But you have to know... if I go under again, don’t follow. Promise me."

"No."

"Maggie "

"I said no."

Camille gave the smallest smile.

Then leaned into her sister’s shoulder, resting her forehead there.

They stayed like that for a long time, the lantern burning lower, the bond between them pulsing softly two hearts holding each other above a tide neither fully understood.

She was dreaming again.

The lake was endless.

A flat sheet of onyx that didn’t ripple with wind or tremble under weight. The trees around it were shadows no bark, no branches, only silhouettes that bent in unnatural directions.

Camille stood barefoot at the edge.

Her breath left no mist.

Her reflection did not match her.

She was taller in the water. Thinner. Pale eyes hollowed out and black as smoke. The reflection’s lips moved, but the sound came from behind her.

A whisper.

"She’s coming."

Camille turned.

No one.

She turned back to the water.

The reflection smiled.

"She never left."

Then it stepped out of the surface.

Camille jerked upright in her cot.

But her body didn’t stop moving.

Her feet hit the floor before her mind caught up. Her fingers wrapped around the wool shawl. She didn’t grab shoes. She didn’t light a lantern. Her eyes were wide but unfocused.

She was still dreaming.

But now she was walking.

The forest behind the keep was thick with roots and coiled fog. The path to the lake was hidden known only to hunters and born wolves. It had been sealed twice by the elders.

Camille found it in her sleep.

She didn’t trip.

She didn’t flinch.

The night parted for her.

Magnolia shot awake the moment the pulse snapped.

She sat bolt upright, hand to her chest, the bond flaring beneath her ribs.

Not pain.

Something else.

Urgency.

She threw on her coat, grabbed her blade, and ran barefoot into the corridor, breath fogging in the sudden cold.

Elara intercepted her at the outer gate.

"She’s gone," Magnolia said.

"I know."

"She’s heading for the lake."

Elara’s eyes darkened. "We sealed it."

"Not well enough."

Camille stood ankle-deep in the freezing water.

She didn’t feel it.

Her nightdress clung to her skin, soaked to the hips, but her arms were still folded, expression calm. The voice in her head no longer whispered.

It sang.

"You opened it. You left it open. She’s still there."

Camille’s eyes closed.

"She’s waiting for you."

The reflection returned.

Now it had her face.

Her voice.

But not her heart.

The reflection raised one hand.

"Come deeper."

Camille stepped forward.

Magnolia broke the treeline seconds later, heart pounding.

"Camille!"

The girl didn’t turn.

The water was to her waist now.

Magnolia dropped the blade and sprinted.

"Camille, get out of there!"

"She’s calling me," Camille murmured.

"She’s not real!"

"She’s more real than I am."

"No," Magnolia said, wading in. "She’s memory. She’s poison. She’s not your voice."

Camille’s lip trembled.

"I need to know who she is."

"You already do."

Camille turned slowly.

"She’s me."

Then she sank.

Magnolia dove.

The cold hit like knives, slicing through cloth and thought.

She reached blindly, arms flailing, chest seizing.

Then a hand.

She gripped it.

And pulled.

Camille gasped back to life on the bank.

Her lips were blue.

Her eyes wide.

Magnolia collapsed beside her, shaking, hair plastered to her face.

"You idiot," she rasped.

Camille stared at the sky.

"She was crying."

Magnolia sat up. "What?"

"The reflection. She was crying blood."

"Camille "

"She said I was the door."

Beckett arrived minutes later with Elara.

They didn’t ask questions.

They saw the water. The bond marks. The frost on Camille’s lips.

"She’s not safe here anymore," Elara whispered.

Magnolia stood.

"No. She’s not."

Beckett looked to the dark water.

"What now?"

Magnolia’s voice didn’t waver.

"We find out who put that voice in her head."

She’d been here once before.

But only in dreams.

The dust had settled thick over the entry handle. She brushed it away with a rag and used the small iron key Rhett gave her after their first secret hunt together.

The door groaned open.

Inside, the scent of forgotten time filled her lungs aged ink, scorched vellum, the scent of lavender that someone must’ve once burned to ward off mice.

She didn’t hesitate.

She stepped in.

The archives were kept in stone-wall recesses. Scrolls. Folded seals. Cloth-bound ledgers lined floor to ceiling, many of them tagged in a now-defunct system created before her grandfather’s era. Most bore simple names: Bloodline Requests, Ceremonial Logs, Pack Contributions.

Magnolia scanned shelf after shelf, until one thin spine caught her eye.

A pale leather-bound book marked: Custody: Trial Admissions.

Her fingers stilled.

She pulled it gently.

Inside, names. Dozens of them.

Each with dates. Lineage signifiers. Trial outcomes.

She flipped faster.

Until she found it.

"Voss, Camille entered under proxy custody (non-parental), transferred from North Hollow at 3 months. Affiliation: Confidential. Notes: Assigned new designation."

Magnolia stared at the ink until her vision blurred.

Proxy custody. Confidential. Assigned new designation.

She flipped the page.

Found a list of alternate aliases.

And there beneath one folded tab:

Birth name: Caelia Maren.

Not Camille Voss.

Her stomach twisted.

She sat down hard on the floor.

The words pulsed in her mind.

You weren’t supposed to survive the bond.

Now she understood.

Camille hadn’t just been shielded.

She’d been buried.

Magnolia took the ledger and slid it beneath her coat.

She locked the archive behind her and didn’t stop walking until she was inside her chamber, door bolted, window shuttered.

She lit a single candle and read it again.

Then she opened her second drawer.

Inside, her mother’s seal still rested in velvet: a crescent moon nested between two blades. The mark of the Madrigal line, kept in secret after her mother’s death and her father’s disgrace.

She pressed it against the paper.

The ink beneath the seal warped.

A hidden message bled to the surface.

"Blood subject unstable. Terminated in council order. Contained in daughter’s bond."

Her breath hitched.

She read it again.

Terminated in council order.

Contained in daughter’s bond.

"Camille..." she whispered.

They hadn’t just buried her name.

They buried something in her.

Footsteps outside made her jolt.

A knock.

She hid the ledger, slid the drawer shut.

"Magnolia?" Beckett’s voice.

She opened the door.

He frowned. "You look like you’ve seen the grave split."

"Something like that."

He stepped inside, glanced around. "Camille’s still under."

"I know."

He nodded toward the bundle in her coat. "What did you find?"

Magnolia didn’t answer immediately.

She handed him the page instead.

Beckett read it once.

Then twice.

When he finished, he looked up.

"They didn’t just mark her for containment," he said. "They planned it. They assigned it."

Magnolia clenched her jaw. "And they sealed it in her before she even turned three."

"She’s a carrier."

"Of something none of us understand."

They stared at each other.

Then Beckett said, "We have to tell her."

"No," Magnolia said. "Not yet."

"Why?"

"Because if she knows... she’ll break."

That night, Camille woke screaming.

Magnolia was already there.

But Camille didn’t see her.

Her hands clawed at her chest, at her throat, eyes wild with terror.

"They’re inside me!" she cried.

"Cam Camille, look at me."

"They’re inside! I saw her face! She had my voice! She laughed when I sank!"

Magnolia held her tight.

And whispered, "You’re here. You’re with me. You’re not alone."

Camille’s breath slowed.

But her voice cracked.

"She said... I was just a seed."

Magnolia’s heart shattered.

"I don’t want to be planted."

Magnolia kissed her forehead.

"You’re not."

"You promise?"

She hesitated.

Then said what she had to.

"I promise."

Even if the truth weighed like iron in her throat.