Bound by the Mark of Lies (BL)
Chapter 396 - 390: Gabriel and the shard (2)

Chapter 396: Chapter 390: Gabriel and the shard (2)

"...Olivier."

The man who should have been six years in his grave stood there in polished regalia, royal blue and silver catching the light, alive and impossibly whole.

Gabriel felt the weight of déjà vu press down, an old wound torn open in the space of a heartbeat. His fingers tightened against the bedding, the strategist in him already pushing past the shock, sharpening thought against the blur.

"You’re supposed to be dead," Gabriel said, his voice low, dangerous, and steadier than he felt.

Olivier stepped closer, unhurried, the medals on his chest catching the light with each measured movement. Then, with a gesture so familiar it carved through six years of silence, he reached out and let the back of his gloved knuckles brush against Gabriel’s cheek.

"This isn’t the first time I’ve been poisoned, Gabriel," Olivier said softly, almost amused, "but I didn’t expect they would dare touch you as well."

Gabriel went still.

The words dug into old scars, dragging with them a memory so sharp it almost hurt. He had been poisoned once, years ago, back when he was foolish enough to follow Olivier through every shadowed corridor and whispered conspiracy. Back before the rebellion tore everything apart.

But this, this moment, this room, this man alive and unaged, was wrong.

It wasn’t real.

The thought struck cold through his chest as the edges of the world seemed to blur. A dream... or memories resurfacing in ways they never should.

Gabriel’s breath caught as Olivier’s hand lingered, the brush of leather against his skin far too intimate, far too intentional.

It wasn’t the careful, measured touch of a comrade.

It was something older, heavier, possessive in a way that made Gabriel’s pulse thrum with unease.

Olivier’s thumb traced the line of his jaw, slow, deliberate, as if committing it to memory. His eyes, impossibly blue, softened with a warmth that didn’t belong to the battlefield or the council chamber.

"You were always too clever for your own good," Olivier murmured, leaning in just enough that Gabriel could feel the ghost of his breath. "Even then, you were mine. And I see you still are."

Gabriel’s stomach tightened, a rush of old instinct screaming through the haze.

This wasn’t right... it never was.

"Olivier," he said carefully, forcing his tone flat, "you’re dead."

"And yet," Olivier whispered, close now, his fingers brushing Gabriel’s hair back from his forehead in a gesture that felt far too practiced, "you remember what we were before you ran."

His gloved hand settled against Gabriel’s neck, just below the bond mark hidden beneath his collar, his thumb pressing lightly as if testing its existence.

"You’ve changed," Olivier said softly, eyes darkening in thought. "But you still feel the same."

Gabriel’s grip on the bedding tightened, nails digging into the fabric to keep from flinching. He felt the press of Olivier’s presence like a shackle, the wrongness of it gnawing at the edges of his mind.

"Let go," Gabriel said, voice low, dangerous, but beneath it was the sharp crackle of something brittle.

Olivier only smiled, tilting his head, as if humoring a petulant child. "I did once. And I won’t make that mistake again."

The room felt smaller, his senses dulled and sharp all at once, the weight of memories twisting into something far more dangerous than a dream.

And for the first time since waking, Gabriel felt a flicker of fear run cold through his veins.

—

The clinic smelled faintly of clean ether and sterilized brass, a scent Damian had always associated with failure and endings.

He had never thought Gabriel would be the one tethered to a bed here, quiet and still, his presence reduced to the soft, uneven rhythms of a monitor.

Damian paced the length of the chamber like a caged animal, his boots striking against the polished floor in steady, controlled steps that only betrayed how tightly he was holding himself together. His jacket was thrown over the back of a chair, his sleeves rolled to the elbow, and the faint shimmer of his own ether coiled around him in restless threads, golden sparks that flared and faded like dying stars.

Gabriel lay beneath the lantern light, short dark hair mussed against the pillow, the curve of his cheek marked by the dull shadow of exhaustion. Wires, delicate but relentless, fed from the ether monitors into the headboard, tracking the ebb and flow of energy like the Empire’s most fragile current. Each pulse on the screen reflected what remained of him: steady, then stuttering, then steady again.

Damian’s hands clenched at his sides. He had fought wars, toppled governments, and burned enemy strongholds into ash with his own power, and here, now, in the palace clinic he had always despised, he was useless.

There was no enemy to strike.

No order to give.

Only time, slow and merciless, and the sound of ether monitors whispering Gabriel’s heartbeat into the room.

A physician murmured something about stabilizing levels, about how Gabriel’s ether output had been catastrophic but not irreversible. Damian barely heard it. His golden eyes remained fixed on the man in the bed, the one who had outwitted death too many times to be stopped by this.

He moved again, pacing back to the foot of the bed, then to the window, then back, like he could wear a path into the stone and drag time with him.

"Damn you," he breathed, so soft none of them heard. Not a curse, not really, more a plea wrapped in anger, a helplessness he would never let anyone see.

Damian stopped at Gabriel’s side at last, standing over him, fingers brushing the rail as if he could will strength through it. The bond between them hummed faintly in the back of his mind, muted but not gone, like a thread stretched to breaking but still holding.

That thread was all that kept him still. All that kept him from tearing down the clinic brick by brick until Gabriel opened his eyes.

A knock broke through the relentless rhythm of the monitors, and Damian’s head snapped toward the door with the precision of a blade being drawn.

Dr. Marin stepped in, shutting the door behind him with careful quiet. He was not a man easily unsettled, he’d treated dying soldiers and arrogant nobility alike, but standing under Damian Lyon’s golden stare made even seasoned men tread lightly. His coat was immaculate, his hands folded behind his back, yet his expression betrayed that he’d rehearsed every word before crossing the threshold.

Damian straightened from where he’d been leaning against the rail, the motion controlled but sharp enough to make the other attending physicians outside instinctively fall silent.

"Well?" Damian’s voice cut through the low hum of the clinic, calm on the surface but laced with something volatile.