The memories of every lifetime washed over Axel like an unforgiving tide. Each life blurred into the next, their faces—his and Lila's—wearing different expressions but haunted by the same fate. In their first life, it had begun innocently enough, a marriage of convenience, devoid of any spark of affection. They were bound by duty, their paths aligned by the choices of others, and they navigated it as strangers, linked by a thin thread. But when their son was born, that thread had briefly strengthened, a fragile bond woven from shared responsibility.