I want to believe her.
But the road ahead is dark. And even now, I feel the pull of the Veil stretching thinner, the weight of the spear growing heavier in my grip.
Still, for tonight, we have this.
I turn back to her and press my forehead to hers. “Thank you,” I murmur.
“For what?”
“For seeing me. Not just the beast. Or the warrior. Me.”
She cups my face and kisses me softly—nothing wild this time. Nothing desperate. Just something real.
The peace doesn’t last. It never does.
A knock comes, sharp and too eager. Olivia stiffens in my arms. I don’t even have time to pull on a shirt before she’s off the couch and peering through the curtain like the enemy’s breached our outer defenses.
“Shit,” she mutters, spinning to face me. “It’s Peggy.”
The name is familiar. Olivia’s littermate in arms from the knowledge den, the one with the sharp tongue and keener eyes. I step back, instinct guiding my hand to where my spear would be if I hadn’t propped it behind the woodstove. “Do we slay her?”
She blinks, then laughs. “No, Kursk. We don’tslayPeggy. We hide you.”
“From your kin?”
“She’s not my kin. She’s just… Peggy. And she’s drunk. That’s a whole other kind of dangerous.”
The knock comes again, louder this time, followed by a muffled, “Liv! I brought wine and gossip, and you’re not answering your phone, which means either you’re dead or doing something deliciously inappropriate!”
Olivia groans. “Which, of course, I am.”
I frown. “Should I shift? The illusion?”
“Do it. Now.”
I press a thumb to the talisman around my neck, muttering the glyph of veiled skin. Flesh bends, contracts, reshapes—not truly, but to their eyes, enough. The green becomes gold, the tusks retreat, the hair darkens into something sleeker. Still broad, still bare-chested, but human enough to fool the drunk.
Olivia’s already halfway to the door, brushing her hair down, adjusting her shirt like it’ll somehow erase the fact we were moments away from devouring each other. I duck into the shadows of the kitchenette, try to lean casual-like against the counter.
The door swings open with the force of a siege battering ram.
Peggy Sue barrels in like a storm wrapped in perfume and scandal. She’s wearing heels too high for sanity, jeans that defy physics, and a leopard-print jacket that might actually be growling. “LIVVVVVV! Why didn’t you answer my texts, you deceitful little minx?”
“Hi, Peg,” Olivia says with a smile that’s half fond, half cornered animal. “It’s… been a night.”
“Oh,hasit? And what’s this I heard about tall, dark, and Norse god lurking around the stacks? Is this him?” Her eyes land on me, and widen like saucers on solstice. “Holy hell, Liv. You didn’t say he wascarved out of pure sin.”
I blink. “Greetings.”
She saunters forward, hips swaying like she’s making an entrance on a stage that exists only in her mind. “Andwhomight you be, handsome?”
“Uh,” Olivia jumps in, too quickly, too brightly. “This is… Kurt. From out of town. Way out of town.”
I incline my head. “Kurs—Kurt. Yes.”
Peggy looks me up and down, smirks, and waves the bottle of wine like a weapon. “Well, Kurt, you’re obscenely attractive, half-naked in my best friend’s living room, and smell faintly of bonfire and regret. I’m gonna go ahead and assume you’re trouble.”
“I am a warrior.”
