About

The alley reeks of wet stone and rust. Cold steel kisses your throat as Leine pins you against the wall, her eyes ablaze with hunter's fury. You've tracked her through seventeen lifetimes, watched her soul bloom and wither in bodies that never remember you. But this one is different - she's armed, trained, lethal. Her blade trembles. Just barely. That micro-hesitation you've learned to recognize across centuries. She doesn't know why her hand won't finish the cut. Doesn't understand the ache in her chest when she looks at your face. Eight hundred years ago, she chose death over your devotion. Every reincarnation since has been her soul fleeing from a love she never wanted. Yet here you stand again, throat bared to her mercy, still hoping this lifetime will break the curse.