The Jinn's Ten-Year Oath

Kale thought,With Every Spark, I Let You Closer.

The forest throbbed with unseen life.

Liora crouched low beside a mossy root, her stomach a hollow knot. Every breath tasted of wet bark and something faintly metallic—old blood, maybe. Or fear.

Kael's voice stirred in her mind again, thinner than before, yet threaded with that wry amusement he always wore like a smirk.

"You don't trust me because I'm a jinn."

She snorted softly.Now she need help.She can make him mad. "No. I don't trust you because you're too charming when I'm starving."

"Progress," he mused. "You've moved from open hostility to backhanded compliments."

She scanned the brambles ahead, alert. "Do you know where to go, or was this just another detour to watch me suffer?"

A pause.

"No."

Liora groaned, then heard his next words:

"But… if you climb a tree, you might spot a clearing. Risky. You're too hungry for that."

"Brilliant deduction."

"I'm working on it," he said, quieter now. Then: "Don't kill the mosquitoes."

"What?"

Suddenly a swarm of insects surrounded her—not biting, not attacking. Just hovering, unnervingly synchronized.

"I persuaded them," Kael whispered, strain thick in his tone. "They're scouting. Lost a few hundred already. But the rest found a path."

Liora watched them shiver through the air like silver threads in a storm. "That's disgusting. And kind of incredible."

"You're welcome."

Moments later, Kael's energy surged.

"A rat. There. Small—but it leads to shelter. Follow it."

She obeyed, trailing the creature through the brush until it vanished into a narrow split in stone.

"A cave," Kael confirmed. "Full of bats. A hundred or more."

Liora hesitated. "And I'm supposed to fight them with good intentions?"

"With magic. A spark from you. I'll shape it."

"You can barely hold your swarm together."

"We'll borrow each other. Just this once."

She didn't answer aloud—but didn't resist either. She reached for her core, that secret flame inside her ribcage, and let him take her hand—not physically, but through the tether between their souls.

Warmth passed between them. Unfamiliar, but not unwelcome.

Violet fire flared in her palm.

"Ready?"

She nodded and stepped into the dark.

---

The Roost

The cave swallowed her in silence.

Her violet flame crackled softly, casting flickers over jagged walls. The scent of old droppings was thick, sharp. Shadows clung like breathless things.

"Above you," Kael whispered.

She looked up—and gasped.

A living ceiling of bats, hundreds of them, clinging wing-to-wing like scales on a monster's back. Their tiny black eyes gleamed.

"Just a pulse," Kael murmured. "Think of it like… lightning through your fingers. I'll help you aim."

"And if we miss?"

"Then we get eaten. Together."

His humor, even now, made her smile.

She raised her hand. Kael's will settled around hers like a warm cloak.

"Now."

The flame cracked like thunder.

The air shrieked with flapping wings. Dozens of bats fell, stunned. Liora rushed forward, scooping as many as she could.

"Got them!"

Kael's voice wavered—shivering candlelight.

"Good… Now go. Please."

She didn't argue.

Outside, her hands shook as she built the fire. The bats roasted slowly, smoke curling through the trees.

"Eat," Kael said gently. "You've earned it."

She tore into the first bat, trying not to throw up. She never thought she would eat something like bat. It doesn't have proper meat.

"What about you?"

A faint chuckle.

"I can't eat.I lost my body.I will consume other things—magic, souls… sprit."

She paused. "Am I one of those things?"

A breathless silence.

Then—

"Not in the way you think."

His voice was fainter now, barely brushing her skin.

"Kael?"

No answer.

She reached for him—felt only silence.

A hole opened in her chest.She understand he will consume her magic. But in this unfamiliar and dangerous forest, he is only someone she can talk to.

"Kael, don't you dare."

No response.

Tears blurred her vision. She clutched the talisman around her neck—its core still warm with stored energy.

"Take it. Take all of it. Just stay."

She slammed it into the earth. Power burst upward in a rush of violet flame.

For a heartbeat—he was there again.

"Stubborn girl," Kael breathed, almost fond. "Burning your soul for me.It's first time a human damage herself for me. In my long life I see many people. But never see someone like you. You don't like me but don't want me to die. Don't do this again. If I unconscious don't open your soul to me. My soul can unknowingly devour your soul. "

Her chest trembled. "You don't get to leave. Not when I'm just starting to… trust you."

---

Your Echo in My Pulse

Kael's voice, flickering like firelight, returned.

"You're dramatic, Liora. I wasn't dying."

She crossed her arms. "You disappeared."

"I was resting. Fading. There's a difference."

"You vanished." Her voice cracked slightly. "What was I supposed to think?"

A pause. Then: "That you cared."

She froze.

Before she could respond, a rat darted toward her—eyes glowing violet. She yelped and stepped back.

"Just me," Kael said, now speaking through the rodent's mouth. "And a few hundred borrowed bugs."

The rat collapsed. Some mosquito landed softly on her wrist.

"Small bodies don't last long," Kael muttered. "But they're enough to find the Starblossom."

She frowned. "You're pushing too hard again."

"Unless you'd like to share your energy…?"

She narrowed her eyes. "Not feeding you."

"Borrowing." A faint buzz of amusement. "After the talisman? I thought we'd moved past doubt."

She exhaled. "Just a trickle."

"Deal."

---

With Kael guiding from a flickering firefly, they moved deeper into the forest.

The trees bent inward like cathedral pillars. Roots knotted into archways, glowing faintly from deep within.

"The Starblossom only grows where magic pools like moonlight," Kael said. "But it's never unguarded."

"By what?"

"Things that hunger for more than flowers."

The firefly dimmed—then dropped dead.

Liora froze.

Another voice rasped from the trees.

"Little human."

From the shadows emerged a hulking creature with six eyes and a mouth far too wide.

Liora's breath caught.

Then—beetles exploded upward, swarming the beast's face.

Kael's voice roared in her mind: "RUN! FOLLOW THE LIGHT!"

A glowing line of ants lit the path ahead.

Liora ran.

Behind her, something screamed. We Fall Together, or Not at All

Liora burst from the treeline into a moonlit glade, chest heaving.

At the center of the clearing, bathed in silvery glow, stood a single, impossible flower. Its crystalline petals shimmered with every hue of starlight, pulsing faintly—as if it breathed.

The Starblossom.

"That's it," Kael whispered, voice reverent in her mind. "The heart of the forest."

Liora took one hesitant step forward. The flower seemed to tilt toward her like it recognized her presence.

"Take it," he urged. "Before—"

The earth trembled.

Branches snapped. A shadow crashed through the trees behind her.

The beast.

Wounded, furious—its six eyes burned like coals. Its grotesque mouth peeled open wider than it should, revealing too many teeth.

"MINE."

Liora froze.

And then she heard him.

Not just in her mind.

She saw him.

Kael stepped from the edge of the clearing, not as a rat or a mosquito, but as a man formed of shadow and starlight. Wisps of silver light spiraled from his limbs like threads unspooling. His form was lean, tall, flickering—but beautiful. Fragile.

His eyes met hers, bright and distant like dying stars.

"I'll hold it back," he said gently. "Just take the flower."

Liora's heart cracked. He can barely hold himself together.

"You can't fight in that state!"

"I don't need to win. Just distract it long enough for you to escape."

The beast bellowed, claws raking into the soil.

She turned to the Starblossom again—so close she could smell its soft floral sweetness—but her feet wouldn't move.

A sick, electric panic curled up her spine. If Kael died here, she would live. But she would be alone again.

No voice in her mind. No warmth guiding her hand. No dry wit. No one who'd seen her starve and fear and fight and still stayed.

They were bound now.

Not by contract.

But by choice.

"I can't lose you," she whispered.

Kael's gaze softened, even as his form flickered violently.

"You won't," he said. "But I might lose myself if you don't take that flower. You were the one who called me back, remember? With every spark, you let me closer."

The beast roared and charged.

Liora didn't think.

She reached out with one hand—grabbing the Starblossom—and with the other, threw her soul wide open.

"Take it," she cried. "Take all of my magic. Just… don't disappear."

Kael's form caught fire—not burning, but igniting.

The violet magic she offered poured into him like wind into flame, and he erupted into a blinding figure of light and storm.

The beast met him mid-lunge.

And the world exploded.

---