Housebound with the Blackridge Heirs novel Chapter 96

Chapter 96

Chapter 96

Maya

Aelera didn’t move like my other bonds.

There was no sharp edge to her presence, no pressure against my thoughts, no sense of something vast and cold leaning too close. When Aelera stirred, it felt like warmth blooming slowly behind my ribs, like someone settling beside me instead of standing over me.

I was curled on my bed with my knees pulled close, the house quiet in that way it only ever was late at night, when even the walls seemed to be listening. My senses were still too loud. I could hear movement three floors down. I could smell the damp earth beyond the windows. I could feel the bonds humming beneath my skin, overlapping and tangled, each one alive in its own way.

It was overwhelming in a way I didn’t have language for yet.

‘You can breathe, Aelera said gently.

Her voice was smooth and calm, feminine but steady, like water flowing over stone. It didn’t echo. It didn’t scrape. It settled, sinking into me until my shoulders eased without my permission.

‘I am breathing, I muttered, pressing my palm to my chest. ‘It just doesn’t feel like enough.’

‘That will pass, she replied. ‘Your body has never carried this much awareness before. It’s learning how to hold it.’

“Learning,” I repeated aloud, a weak huff of a laugh slipping out. ‘I feel like I’m unraveling.’

A soft pulse of reassurance brushed through my thoughts, the mental equivalent of a hand squeezing mine.

‘You’re not unraveling, Aelera said. ‘You’re expanding.’

I tipped my head back against the pillow and stared at the ceiling. ‘You make it sound poetic.’

‘I’m not trying to diminish how hard this is,’ she answered calmly. ‘But fear doesn’t suit you.’

That pulled a snort out of me despite everything. ‘You don’t even know me.’

‘I know you better than anyone ever has, Aelera said. ‘I’ve been with you since before you had words for what you were missing.’

That landed somewhere deep and sore in my chest.

I swallowed. ‘Why didn’t you talk to me before?’

‘You weren’t ready to listen, she said simply. ‘And I wasn’t free.’

My chest tightened at that. ‘Are you free now?’

‘More than I was, she replied. ‘Not completely. But enough to stand with you instead of behind you.’

I turned onto my side, curling inward again as the house creaked softly around me, ‘Astrid hasn’t… done anything!

At her name, something distant shifted, like a shadow moving behind a wall. No voice followed. No pressure. Just awareness.

‘She’s quiet, Aelera said. ‘Watching.’

‘I don’t like that.’

‘You aren’t meant to like everything that’s true.’

I sighed. ‘Figures!

We sat like that for a while, her presence steady and warm, and it struck me how strange it was that silence could feel companionable even inside my own head. Eventually, another sensation pushed forward, one I’d been circling carefully without touching.

‘Can I ask you something?’

1/3

Chapter 96

‘You can ask me anything.’

‘Can you still feel Caden?’

The question slipped out before I could soften it. The bond answered before she did, flaring warm and aching beneath my ribs, distant but unmistakable.

‘Yes, Aelera said. ‘I feel him.’

My throat tightened. ‘He blocked me.’

‘He withdrew,’ she corrected. ‘There’s a difference.’

‘It doesn’t feel different from where I’m standing’

She didn’t answer right away, and that pause twisted something uneasy in my stomach.

‘Do you…’ I hesitated, then pushed through. ‘Do you like him?’

The warmth didn’t disappear, but it shifted, becoming more measured, more guarded.

‘Liking isn’t the word I’d use, Aelera said.

My breath caught. ‘Then what is it?’

‘He’s powerful,’ she replied. ‘Protective. Devoted in a way that borders on self-destruction. Those things matter.’ ‘That sounds like you’re listing qualities, not feelings.’

I’m being honest.’

I frowned. ‘Then why haven’t you spoken to him? If he’s our mate, shouldn’t you be connected to him too?’

Her presence firmed, not angry, but unyielding.

‘Trust isn’t granted because of fate, Aelera said. ‘It’s earned.’

I pushed myself up on one elbow, heart pounding harder. ‘Earned? He nearly tore himself apart trying to keep me alive.’

‘And yet,’ she said calmly, ‘he closed himself off from you when you needed him.’

‘That’s not fair,’ I snapped. ‘He’s hurt. He’s confused. Everything he believed just shattered.

‘Pain doesn’t excuse disappearance, Aelera replied, her voice still gentle but no longer indulgent.

I went still.

‘He didn’t abandon me.’

!

‘Take now as an example, she continued softly. ‘You reached for him. He shut the door.

The truth of it settled heavy and uncomfortable in my chest.

‘He thinks he’s losing me,’ I whispered.

‘Loss doesn’t justify silence, Aelera said. ‘Especially not when bonds are shared.’

I rubbed my eyes, exhaustion finally bleeding through the heightened awareness. ‘You’re asking too much of him.’

‘I’m asking him to meet you where you are,’ she replied. ‘Not where he wants you to stay.

I didn’t have an answer for that.

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