“You’re scared something is going to go wrong,” he said.
“Something always goes wrong,” I said. “But this feels… bigger. Like something’s leaning over my shoulder and waiting to say ‘oops and snatch something away from me that’s important.’”
He brushed hair from my cheek with a thumb, gentle. “Is that your magic talking, or you?”
“Both,” I admitted.
He leaned back against the pillows, dragging me with him until my back was pressed against his chest and he could rest his chin on my shoulder. “So. What did we learn at three in the morning from the book of Magical Doom?”
“That circles fail when one of the anchors is unwilling,” I recited.
He huffed a dry laugh. “So, Gideon.”
I elbowed him lightly. “At least pretend optimism.”
“Might be easier,” he murmured, “if he hadn’t spent the last months trying to manipulate you, threaten me, and dance around Malore.”
The name made my skin crawl. “And now he’s volunteering to help end the Hunger Path.”
“Which is suspicious,” Keegan said. “Even by Gideon standards. But it’s also a move to save himself.”
It was.
Everything he did was either a smirk or a weapon.
The moment he’d said yes to joining the circle, the Hollows had accepted it. Which meant something. But the way he’d looked at me—like he knew something I didn’t… that haunted me.
I pushed the book aside and rubbed my face. “What does he want? What does she want? The priestess. What does she think I have?”
Keegan hesitated. That alone told me he had thoughts he didn’t want to feed me before breakfast.
“Say it,” I demanded softly.
“I think,” he said carefully, “that Malore wanted the same thing she does. Power.” His hand curved around my waist. “And you’re connected to both of them now. Through lineage. Through the Academy. Through whatever the Academy saw in you.”
“That’s what scares me,” I whispered.
He pulled me closer—not possessively; protectively.
“You’re not a tool,” he said. “Not a vessel. Not a pawn for someone else’s story.”
“Try telling that to the mirrors,” I said.
His jaw tightened against my shoulder. “If I could punch a mirror dimension in the face, I would.”
A brief, ridiculous image of Keegan tackling a mirror like a bar fight gone enchanted made my lips twitch. “You’re ridiculous.”
“And you’re stalling,” he murmured, pressing a kiss to the curve of my shoulder. “What else?”
I sighed. “What if Gideon is counting on the circle to be the moment he takes… something.”
Keegan stilled. “Something like what?”
“Like power. Or advantage. Or me.”
He growled—low, soft, the wolf rising like a shadow under his skin.
“Try,” he said, “and I’ll tear him apart.”
