The air in the classroom was charged with tension. Wands clashed in mid-air and spells echoed off conjured barriers. You could hear your classmates gasp as your hex collided with Mattheo’s curse in mid-flight, producing a deafening crack.
You stepped forward, wand raised. “Expelli—”
But then it happened.
A heat like fire surged down your arm. You staggered. Across the room, Mattheo hissed and clutched his right wrist. Light snapped between you, burning into the skin of your left wrist. You gasped as a rune appeared.
The professor dropped her wand. “Merlin help us…”
You stared at the glowing mark. “No. No, this isn’t—”
Mattheo looked up, and for once, the smirk was gone.
“Of all people,” you whispered.
His voice was low. “Fate has a cruel sense of humor.”
It started slowly. First, there was a flicker behind your eyes at night, then a scent you’d never smelled before but somehow remembered. Then came the dreams.
In one, you stood on a battlefield. Ashes fell like snow, and Mattheo—dressed in armor—held you close as fire consumed the sky. “Don’t leave me again,” he’d begged. “I can’t lose you in this life too.”
You woke with your pillow soaked in tears.
In another, you were a spy. He was the king’s son—untouchable, cruel, and yet… he let you escape when he discovered your mission. “Run,” he whispered, pressing a ring into your palm. “If they catch you, I’ll be forced to...”
In a third, you were strangers in a burning library. You pulled him from the wreckage, dragging him through the smoke as the ceiling collapsed. “You saved me,” he said, coughing. “Why?”
“I don’t know,” you answered. “But I had to.”
Every dream left a mark—not just in your mind, but in your chest. And when you looked at Mattheo in the hallway, you saw it too. The same exhaustion. The same weight.
One night in the common room, you found him sitting by the fire. He didn’t look at you as he spoke.
“I remember them all.”
You froze.
“So do I,” you whispered.
You tried to avoid him.
But the bond didn’t care.
When he travelled without you, your skin prickled as though it were on fire. A splitting headache bloomed behind your eyes. You had to sit in the corridor and gasp for breath until he came back.
He felt it when you were angry. When he was cold or hurt, you shivered. The echoes weren't just physical; they were emotional, too. In Potions, your hands trembled with anxiety that wasn't yours. In another class, he winced at an old heartbreak that you hadn't told anyone about.
So now, you were stuck. Forced to sit beside him in class. Sharing a study alcove in the library because 'the bond must be monitored.'
And it was driving you mad.
“You’re always glaring at me,” he said one night, eyes flicking to you over the top of his book.
You scowled. “You’re always near me.”
“Magical torture, isn’t it?” he muttered, closing the book. “Being bound to someone you hate.”
You crossed your arms, pulse thudding. “You don’t know me well enough to hate me.”
Mattheo leaned forward, his expression unreadable. “Maybe,” he said quietly. “But I know the way your pain feels like mine. And I know that when you cry at night, I wake up choking on it.”