The Thread Between Worlds

To become a Binder is to tempt death for power, fame, or fortune. For Sway, it's the only way out.

In a world where people forge bonds with spirits to gain supernatural strength, Binders are both revered and feared. The risk is simple: if the spirit overpowers you, you lose everything-your body, your mind, your soul.

Sway enters Aether High, the most prestigious academy for spirit Binders, determined to prove that someone from the gutters can rise above it all. But when the Binding Ceremony begins, what answers his call isn't a protector.

It's something ancient. Cold. Hungry.

And it chooses him.

Now bound to a parasitic force that whispers in his thoughts and claws beneath his skin, Sway must navigate a school that already sees him as a threat. Students avoid him. Teachers watch him. The spirit inside him watches everyone.

As the bond tightens, and the line between who he is and what it wants begins to vanish, Sway faces a terrible choice: control the darkness he's linked to, or become its next puppet. Because this spirit doesn't just want power.

It wants a body.

And it's learning how to wear his.