“I’m not wearing this.”

“You are,” Hermes said, already tying the soft black cloth around my head.

“I can’t see.”

“That’s the point.”

“I’m going to punch you.”

“You’d miss,” he said sweetly, giving the knot an extra tug.

Somewhere to my left, Astronaros was already blindfolded. I could tell because he was standing stock still, arms crossed, posture radiating distrust in all directions.

“Now,” Hermes said, clapping. “Here’s today’s lesson: trust. The kind where you literally have to rely on your partner’s voice, instincts, and squishy emotional judgment to survive.”

“What’s the catch?” Astro asked, deadpan.

“No catch,” Hermes chirped. “Except I enchanted the clearing with minor illusions. Sounds may lie. Touch might mislead. And there are some… let’s call them motivated training obstacles.”

“What kind of obstacles?” I asked, immediately regretting it.

“Let’s just say,” Hermes said, cheerfully backing away, “if you hear something breathing that isn’t your partner, it’s probably a vine lion. Or an aggressively affectionate dryad.”

“What—”

“Begin!”

And then the world blurred with sound.

Crackling leaves. Something snarling. A breeze that sounded like it had teeth.

I stood frozen in darkness.

“Pneumeros,” Astro said sharply. “Where are you?”

“Near the sound of doom, apparently,” I muttered. “You?”

“Behind you. Maybe twenty steps.”

“How can you tell?”

“I know your voice.”

That shut me up for a second.

“Okay,” he said. “Turn right. Three steps. You’ll hit a slope—careful. Trust me.”

I did.

My foot slid on pine needles, but I steadied. Not bad.

“Now what?”

“Left. Listen. There’s something moving—wait.”

We both froze.

A low growl.

Then something brushing leaves—too heavy to be wind.

“…That’s not you,” I whispered.

“Nope,” Astro replied. “Back-to-back?”

“Blindfolded?”

“We’ll look amazing if we survive.”

I turned until I felt him behind me, our shoulders brushing.

Gods. Even without seeing, I felt him—every line of tension, every breath. He was warm. Steady.

“I hate that Hermes is good at this,” I muttered.

“He’s a menace,” Astro said. “But effective.”

The growling grew louder.

Then—

Silence.

And then—

A soft, warm hand slid into mine.

I flinched.

“I’m guiding you out,” he said, voice low. “We move together. I speak, you listen. You speak, I trust.”

I swallowed. “Okay.”

Step by step, we moved—his hand in mine, our backs brushing, every sense straining to make sense of a world filled with illusions and breathless tension.

Once, he stumbled. I caught him.

Once, I panicked. He steadied me.

And when the dryad whispered something obscene in my ear (thanks, Hermes), Astro yanked me so close I could feel his heartbeat through both our shirts.

“That wasn’t me,” he growled.

“I figured.”

We didn’t speak of the way our fingers stayed laced after that.

Eventually, Hermes snapped his fingers—and the illusions vanished.

Sunlight returned.

The clearing was empty, peaceful, full of birds and not a single man-eating vine creature.

I ripped off my blindfold, blinking.

Astro did the same. We looked at each other.

Sweaty. Breathless. Still holding hands.

Hermes materialized beside us, grinning like a man who’d just lit two fuses and walked away.

“Well?” he asked. “Did you feel the trust?”

“No more illusions,” Astro said, glaring.

“No more blindfolds,” I added.

“No more making me touch his soul through my hand,” Astro snapped.

“Too intimate,” I agreed, very unconvincingly.

Hermes just laughed and disappeared in a puff of cackling mist.

To Be Continued...