Chapter 5 - Iris

I cataloged the house the way I always did unfamiliar spaces. 

Clinically. Efficiently. Without attachment. 

Entryway wide enough for two people to pass without brushing shoulders. Sightline from the front door straight through the living room to the back windows, a vulnerability if anyone ever forced entry. Wards layered lightly but competently, designed for coexistence, not defense under siege. Windows reinforced against weather, not impact. Exits at the back and side. Stairs creaked on the third step from the bottom. 

I filed all of it away in seconds. 

This was not a home. It was a structure. A set of variables. 

Kaia stood across the room, far too still, watching me like she expected me to bolt or break. I refused to give her either. I nodded politely to my mother and Crew, acknowledging their smiles, their hands still linked as if they were the only two people in the room. 

I was not going to react. 

“Your room’s upstairs,” my mother said, gentle, careful. “Opposite end of the hall.” 

Of course it was. 

I inclined my head. “That’s fine.” 

I picked up my bag and moved past Kaia without looking at her. That took effort. Every nerve in my body was screaming awareness, my magic humming too loud beneath my skin, pressure building like a storm trapped behind glass. I locked it down through sheer force of will. 

I was good at that. 

The hallway was narrow but serviceable. Neutral paint. New wood. Wards stitched into the corners to dampen magical bleed. Smart. Necessary. I noted the faint resonance where witchcraft and something else intersected, a blend that made my teeth ache if I focused on it too long. 

I did not focus on it. 

My room was clean, empty, and already prepared. Bed against the far wall. Desk by the window. Shelves bare and waiting. I set my bag down and immediately began reinforcing personal wards, quiet ones, subtle enough not to draw attention. Grounding sigils etched beneath the bed. Sound-dampening material is layered along the doorframe. 

Control returned in increments. 

This was manageable. 

I could do this if I treated it as a problem set rather than a living arrangement. Shared kitchen meant scheduled usage. Neutral living space meant no claiming. Distance down the hall meant fewer points of accidental contact. 

Kaia Greaves was a variable. Dangerous, volatile, but predictable in her own way. Loud. Direct. Instinct-driven. 

I could account for that. 

I closed my eyes briefly, breathing slowly and measured until the pressure in my chest eased. Whatever had flared between us downstairs was irrelevant. A reaction. Proximity. Stress layered on stress. 

Winter break would pass. 

I would recalibrate. Reassert control. Keep my distance. 

I opened my eyes and looked around the room again, stripping it of emotion, of expectation. This was a temporary arrangement. A logistical inconvenience. Nothing more. 

I refused to consider the way the house itself seemed to hum beneath my feet, like it was aware of the tension threading through its walls. I ignored the pull at the back of my mind, the sense of a presence down the hall that my magic insisted on tracking no matter how I tried to shut it out. 

This was not fate. 

This was not a bond. 

This was a problem. 

And problems could be solved, managed, and contained. 

Even if every instinct I had was screaming that this one would not stay neatly in its box. 

I stayed in my room longer than necessary. 

Not hiding. Regulating. 

By the time my mother called us down for dinner, my wards were stable, my breathing even, my magic compressed beneath my ribs into something manageable. I told myself that was enough. I told myself I was prepared. 

The dining room proved otherwise. 

The table was set with deliberate care, candles lit, plates arranged as if this were an occasion rather than a collision. My mother sat close to Crew, their shoulders brushing, hands finding each other without thought. They smiled too much. Spoke too gently. Tried far too hard. 

Kaia took the seat across from me. 

The air shifted immediately. 

I felt it like a pressure change before a storm, my magic reacting before my mind could intercept it. I locked my jaw and forced my focus to my plate, cataloging details the way I always did when control threatened to slip. The clink of cutlery. The crackle of the fire. The cadence of my mother’s voice as she asked Kaia about her classes. 

“Combat theory was fine,” Kaia replied, too casual. Too sharp. “Same as always.” 

Heat flared. 

Not visibly, but I felt it, a subtle spike in temperature that made my frost magic stir, eager and unwanted. I pressed my foot flat against the floor, grounding myself, willing the reaction down. 

This was ridiculous. 

“So,” Crew said, cheerful in a way that felt forced, “spring semester will be busy for both of you. Junior year isn’t easy.” 

I nodded politely. “I’ve already reviewed the course load.” 

Kaia snorted. “Of course you have.” 

I ignored it. Or tried to. The irritation rolling off her hit my magic like a challenge, frost creeping along the edge of my awareness before I could stop it. I tightened my grip on my fork until my knuckles whitened. 

My mother noticed nothing. Or pretended not to. 

“We thought it might be nice,” she said brightly, “to have dinners together while you’re home. A chance to reconnect.”

 Reconnect implied something had existed before. 

“That sounds… nice,” I said, choosing the word carefully. 

Kaia’s gaze flicked up, dark and intent. The tension between us hummed, low and dangerous, and my magic responded again, pressure building behind my eyes. Every shift in her mood sent a ripple through me, heat answered by cold, emotion mirrored by instinct I did not want. 

I hated that. 

Crew launched into a story about the house, about how long it had taken to find something neutral, something that would work for everyone. My mother laughed at the right moments, fingers brushing his arm, their bond a constant presence at the table. 

They were happy. 

They wanted us to be happy, too. Or at least functional. 

“Have you two talked about house rules?” my mother asked, hopeful. 

Kaia opened her mouth. I spoke at the same time. 

“We’re fine,” I said. 

Kaia said, “We’ll manage.” 

Our eyes met. 

The air snapped tight, my magic flaring hard enough that the candle flames flickered. I forced it back down, pulse racing, anger, and something else tangling in my chest. 

This was not normal. 

This was not going to become normal, no matter how carefully my mother set the table or how many times Crew smiled, as if this were a victory rather than a warning sign. 

I focused on my plate again, appetite gone, magic restless, acutely aware of Kaia’s presence across from me like a live wire I could not cut. 

Dinner dragged on under the weight of forced conversation and unspoken tension. I smiled when expected. Answered questions. Suppressed every reaction my body insisted on having. 

Normal, I decided, was a concept that did not apply here. 

And whatever this was between Kaia and me, it was already bleeding through every careful boundary I tried to maintain. 

I escaped the table the moment it was socially acceptable. 

No slamming doors. No sharp words. Just a polite excuse and a steady walk back upstairs while every nerve in my body screamed. The hallway felt longer this time, the house quieter, as if it were listening. I shut my bedroom door with deliberate care and leaned my forehead against the wood for a brief, shameful second. 

Then I got to work. 

I reinforced my personal wards first. Quiet ones. Precision-crafted. Grounded to my own magic signature so they would not draw attention or provoke questions. I traced sigils along the doorframe, under the windowsill, and beneath the bed. Each line was exact. Each anchor placed with intention. Control layered on control. 

The magic resisted me. 

Not openly. Not violently. It slipped. Bent. Responded a fraction too slowly, as if distracted. I clenched my jaw and tried again, pushing more power into the weave, tightening the lattice until the air hummed faintly. 

Better. Not perfect. 

I moved on to grounding spells, breath synced with movement, muscle memory taking over. In through the nose. Out through the mouth. Pull the storm inward, compress it, bind it behind ribs and spine and bone. I had done this a thousand times. It always worked. 

Tonight, it held for seconds at best. 

Something tugged at the edges of my focus, a pressure that did not belong to me alone. My magic strained toward it like a compass needle jerking off true north. I shut my eyes, forcing the sensation away, erecting mental barriers with ruthless efficiency. 

Walls. Doors. Locks.

They slid into place. 

Then something knocked.

I froze, breath caught halfway between inhale and exhale, listening. Not for sound. For resonance. The house hummed beneath my feet, a low vibration threading through wood and stone, through wards layered by two different hands. Witchcraft. Werewolf territory. Bound magic braided together until it was impossible to tell where one ended and the other began. 

And beneath it all, something else. 

Her. 

I pressed my palms flat against my thighs, grounding through physical sensation, through the solid reality of my body. This was ridiculous. Kaia Greaves was down the hall, not inside my head. Any reaction I was experiencing was stress. Proximity. Residual magic from the semester. 

I repeated it until the words lost meaning. 

Outside, the wind picked up. 

I felt it before I heard it, the shift in pressure, the way the air leaned against the house. My magic answered instinctively, stirring despite every barrier I had thrown up. Frost kissed the edge of my awareness, eager, responsive. 

I stood and crossed to the window, fingers curling into the sill. The night sky stretched wide and heavy, clouds moving fast, restless, and charged. A storm was building somewhere beyond the trees, distant but undeniable. 

So was the one inside me. 

The realization settled cold and unwelcome in my chest. No matter how carefully I calibrated, no matter how many wards I layered or rules I imposed, something was reaching for me through the walls. Something my magic recognized even as my mind rejected it. 

I stepped back, drawing the curtains closed with more force than necessary. 

This was not surrender. It was strategy. I could outthink this. Outlast it. Distance myself emotionally, even if physical distance was impossible. 

But as I lay back on the bed, staring at the ceiling while the house creaked softly around me, the truth pressed in from all sides. 

The storm inside me was not self-contained. 

And it was answering something just as relentless on the other side of the wall. 

Sleep refused to come. 

I lay on my back, staring at the faint shadows on the ceiling as the house settled around me, every unfamiliar sound too loud in the quiet. Footsteps moved down the hall once, slow and measured, then paused. My pulse jumped despite myself. I listened harder than I meant to, tracking weight, rhythm, distance. 

The low thrum never stopped. 

A steady, insistent awareness pressing against the edges of my wards, not breaching them, just… there. Like something waiting with infinite patience. 

I tightened my barriers again, layering thought over thought, control over instinct. The pressure dulled but did not disappear. My magic shifted restlessly beneath my skin, responding no matter how firmly I told it not to. 

This was temporary. 

I repeated it like a mantra, like an equation that would balance if I solved it often enough. Winter break would end. Circumstances would change. Distance would return. 

I am in control. 

The words felt hollow even as I clung to them. The truth pressed heavier with every passing minute, with every creak of the floorboards, with every slow breath that refused to steady. 

The lie was thin. 

And beneath it, something unyielding waited for me to stop pretending.