I honestly hadn't expected her to say something like that. Not even a little. Hearing her put her loyalty on the line like that—pledging it to me until her life ended—felt heavy in a way I couldn't immediately describe. It wasn't romantic in the way people liked to imagine loyalty. It was weighty, almost suffocating. The kind of promise that lingered in the air long after it was spoken, pressing down on the chest.
To be blunt, it was the sort of vow that was impossible to guarantee. Promises like that only worked in stories or fairy tales, or when someone had a leash tight around another person's neck. And even then, it wasn't real loyalty—just fear dressed up as devotion.
"Are you sure you want to say something like that?" I asked her, my voice quieter than usual. "I don't even know if you're truly sure, or if you're just saying this in the heat of the moment. If you don't really mean it, you can still take it back. There's no shame in that."
