My girlfriend is trapped in my superpower

The voice slithered through the air again, closer this time, though it seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere at once.

"Strangers. Trespassers. Or prey?"

Mira's sword was in her hand before the last word faded, her stance tight, protective. Bram shifted closer to me, muttering, "Yep. Definitely not a party."

Lyra's smirk returned, but it didn't reach her eyes. "Oh, this is rich. Shadow tricks. Whoever she is, she's got flair. Almost reminds me of—" She stopped short, her tone sharpening. "Kael. Careful."

The shadows along the village walls stretched unnaturally, twisting like living tendrils. Windows were hollow eyes watching us, doorways yawning mouths. The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end.

"Show yourself," Mira snapped into the silence, her voice firm. "Cowards hide in shadows. Warriors stand in the light."

The laugh that answered her was soft, bitter, and unmistakably female.

"Light?" the voice mocked. "Light blinds. Light burns. Light dies. But shadows… shadows endure."

The air shifted, colder now, as if the night itself had drawn breath. From the edges of the square, figures began to take shape—shadows thickening into silhouettes, neither solid nor smoke. Their eyeless heads turned toward us in perfect unison.

Bram muttered, "Oh, that's just great. Creepy shadow army. Can we ever stumble into a normal village, or is cursed settlement number three just tradition now?"

I swallowed, my throat tight. The tug in my chest—the pull that had been guiding me—roared alive. It wasn't just pulling anymore. It was screaming.

Lyra's voice dropped low, almost a whisper in my ear. "Kael… it's her. Whoever's hiding in those shadows… she's the reason you've been burning forward."

The shadows parted. A figure began to emerge, slow, deliberate, her form cloaked in black that seemed woven from the night itself.

And then—silence.

Her voice again, sharp enough to cut the air.

"Answer me. Who dares walk into my land?"

The figure stepped forward, her cloak spilling shadows like smoke. A face emerged from the veil—a young woman, maybe my age, with pale skin kissed by moonlight and eyes so dark they seemed to swallow everything they touched.

My breath caught. I'd seen her before. Not here, not in the waking world, but in the place between fire and sleep. The dreams that haunted me. The whispers that pulled me.

My lips moved before my mind could stop them.

"Selene."

The name cracked in the air like a spark.

Her steps faltered. The shadows that coiled around her wrists trembled. For the first time, her mask of cold authority slipped. "…How do you know that name?"

I swallowed hard, my chest burning. "Because I've seen you. In my dreams. And because—" My voice nearly failed me. "Because I think you are my sister."

The silence that followed pressed against my ribs. Mira stiffened at my side, her blade raised but her eyes flickering with something like disbelief. Bram blinked twice, then muttered, "Well, didn't see that coming."

Selene's expression was unreadable. Her gaze sharpened, cutting into me like a blade. "You think blood makes us kin? That names spoken in the dark are proof?" She scoffed, bitter. "You're a stranger walking into a land you don't understand. A land cursed. You can't possibly be who you claim."

I stepped forward despite Mira's sharp inhale of warning. "I don't claim it," I said, my voice low but firm. "I feel it. Every pull, every dream, every fire in my veins—it's been leading me here. To you."

For a moment, the world seemed to hold its breath.

And then Selene's shadows receded, curling back like a tide. She searched my face, as if hunting for lies, but whatever she found left her still, silent. Finally, she whispered, "If you are who you say… then you've been gone far too long."

Mira's grip on her sword loosened but didn't fall. "So are we allies now, or do I still need to carve through your shadow pets?"

Selene's lips twitched into something that wasn't quite a smile. "Allies… for now."

The shadows dissolved completely, and suddenly, the empty village was no longer empty. One by one, figures stepped out of doorways, out of alleys, even out of the shadows themselves. Villagers. Dozens of them. Faces pale, eyes wide, all staring at me.

And then, as if rehearsed, they dropped to their knees.

"The heir," one whispered.

"The flame returns," another breathed.

"Our savior…"

The air thickened with reverence. My stomach twisted. Savior? I was no savior. I was a boy who barely understood the fire inside me, who had run from chains and questions I couldn't answer.

Bram muttered, "I don't like this. I really don't like this."

Lyra tilted her head, her ember-lit eyes glinting with something between amusement and unease. "Oh, Kael. Looks like your family reunion comes with a crown you didn't ask for."

Selene didn't kneel. She stood tall among them, her gaze never leaving me. For the first time, her voice softened—not with kindness, but with the weight of inevitability.

"Mother spoke of you," she said. "Of the brother hidden away. The one with fire in his veins. The one who would return when the seal began to tremble. Kael"

My chest burned hotter, the pull inside me gnawing sharper at her words. "Seal?" I echoed.

Her eyes darkened, her voice low enough to make the villagers shiver. "The monster that sleeps beneath our blood. The thing our line was bound to hold back since the first night shadows learned to breathe. Mother said only you could keep it from breaking free. That without you…"

She glanced at the villagers, at the kneeling crowd, her jaw tightening as though even speaking the words was dangerous. "…that without you, the world would not fall to the Devourer's children, but to something older. Something worse. A hunger even the shadows fear."

The murmurs among the villagers swelled, a wave of reverence and dread crashing together. "The tether," they whispered. "The fire-tether has returned."

My breath caught, the sound ragged in my throat. My blood burned with each syllable, as though the word tether tugged at something inside me that had always been there, waiting. I pressed my fist against my chest, trying to steady the storm within.

I wasn't ready for this. I didn't even know what I was.

"I…" My voice faltered. The words stuck like ash on my tongue. "I don't understand any of this."

Selene's gaze hardened, though her voice held no cruelty, only the sharpness of truth. "You don't need to understand. You need only to be."

Mira stepped forward, the point of her blade catching the dim glow of Lyra's embers. "And what if he doesn't want to 'be' what you claim he is? What if he chooses his own path?"

Selene's shadows stirred at the challenge, curling like snakes around her hands. Her eyes narrowed at Mira. "Then he condemns us all."

The tension stretched taut, dangerous.

Bram, wide-eyed but standing firm, threw his hands up. "Okay, ladies, maybe less death-glares and more… breathing? Anyone? No? Just me?"

Lyra smirked faintly, though her voice lacked its usual venom. "This is going to get bloody. I almost hope it does."

Selene's attention slid back to me, sharp and unrelenting. "You've been gone all your life, Kael. Mother said your absence would make the seal weaker. Now you stand before me, flesh and fire. And I need to know…" She stepped closer, her shadows curling tighter, whispering like a storm at her heels. "…are you truly him? Or just another echo meant to break us?"

The villagers lifted their heads, their eyes wide, their whispers falling to silence. Every gaze pressed onto me, heavy and suffocating.

I wanted to run. I wanted to scream. I wanted to burn the question away. But instead, all I could do was stand there, feeling the fire writhe inside me like it knew her words were true.

"I don't know what I am," I admitted, voice raw, trembling. "But I know this—I didn't come here to break you. I came because I couldn't stay away. Something in me dragged me here. To you."

The crowd stirred at that. Hope, fear, desperation—all mixing into a single, restless hum.

Selene's expression flickered, the faintest fracture in her mask of shadows. She studied me for what felt like an eternity before whispering, almost to herself:

"Then the tether has finally returned…"

The villagers rose slowly, reverently, surrounding us in a circle of pale faces and trembling hands. Some reached out as though to touch me, to prove I was real. Others wept openly.

And as the chanting began again—my name echoing through the dead village—I realized something that chilled me more than any shadow.

They didn't just see me as Selene's brother. They saw me as their last salvation.

And salvation was something I had no idea how to give.