She squints at me, studying me like she’s deciding whether this is another joke at her expense.Then, slowly, she gives me a crooked smile.
“Vex,” she says, voice softer, “please come into my home.”
The words slide over my skin like a warm hand.I step through the doorway, and her scent hits me, vanilla, coffee, a hint of something uniquely her I’ve memorized over two years in Betty’s Café.
The place is small but warm, with soft lighting, mismatched furniture, and a stack of dog-eared books on the coffee table.It feels lived-in.Safe.
A stark contrast to what has marked her now.
It smells like home.
No.Focus.
Tessa stands in the middle of the room, arms crossed defensively.“Well?”
“The mark,” Blade says.“We need to see it.”
She hesitates, then slowly pulls off her sweatshirt.Underneath, she’s wearing a tank top, and I can see the bandages on her front shoulder.But it’s the other shoulder, the back one, that makes Prophet suck in a sharp breath.
The mark is exactly what I feared.Not a tattoo but black frost spreading across her shoulder blade in an intricate pattern that matches the symbol on her porch.It’s not static, as I watch, it pulses faintly, like something alive.
“May I?”I ask, stepping closer.
She nods stiffly.
I reach out, my fingers hovering just above the mark.The cold radiating from it is intense, unnatural.But underneath it, I can feel her warmth, her life.The scent of her blood calls to me, strong and sweet, and I have to fight down the hunger that rises in response.
Not now.Not ever.She’s not food.She’s—
She’s everything.
The thought hits me like a physical blow, and I force it away.I can’t afford to think like that.Can’t afford to want her the way I do when she’s in danger.
My fingers brush the edge of the mark, and she flinches.Not from pain, I can tell by the way her breath catches, by the spike in her heartbeat.She feels it too, this electric current that runs between us whenever we touch.
I withdraw my hand quickly, stepping back before I do something stupid like pull her against me and promise to keep her safe forever.
Prophet moves forward, examining the mark without touching.His face is grim.
“This is a seal-mark,” he says.“A claiming.Whatever left this on you...it’s marked you as its own.”
“Its ownwhat?”Tessa demands.
“Anchor.Vessel.Prey.”Prophet looks at her with something close to pity.“All of the above, depending on what it wants.”
“What is it?”she asks, her voice smaller now.
Prophet glances at Blade, then at me.“We should sit for this.”
“No,” Tessa says.“Just tell me.”
So, Prophet tells her.About the things that sleep in the deep cold.About ancient beings sealed away by alliances between angels and monsters.About how the permafrost is melting, and old prisons are breaking open.
With every word, Tessa gets paler.
“And this thing,” she says when he’s done, “it wants me specifically?”
“Your bloodline,” Prophet corrects.“You’re a warden.Your ancestors helped seal it away.Now it wants revenge.Or freedom.Or both.”
