The Khorvath actually pauses, its hand inches from her face.
“You threaten me, little Warden?”
“I promise you.”She lifts her chin, meeting those impossible eyes without flinching.“You think you’re inevitable?You think you’re unstoppable?You’re wrong.Because I come from a line of people who bound you once, and we’ll do it again.And again.And however many times it takes until you get the message that you’re not welcome here.”
“You are mortal.You will die.”
“Yes.”She doesn’t even hesitate.“I will die.Probably soon, given the life I’ve chosen.But before I do, I’ll have loved and been loved.I’ll have fought for something bigger than myself.I’ll havelivedin ways you cannot comprehend.”
She reaches back, finds my hand, laces our fingers together.
“You offered to make me immortal.To make me powerful.To make me yours.”Her smile is fierce and beautiful and absolutely unafraid.“But I already chose.I chose Vex.I chose the Kings.I chose this messy, complicated, terrifying life over your cold, empty eternity.”
“You choose death.”
“I chooselife.”She squeezes my hand.“However long or short it might be.”
The declaration hits me with the force of revelation.
She’s choosing me.Not the immortal version the Khorvath offered, not some eternal, untouchable ideal.She’s choosingme, a vampire and monster with all my flaws, knowing exactly what it means.
Knowing she’ll die while I continue.Knowing I’ll carry the grief of losing her for centuries and she’s choosing it anyway.
Through the bond, I feel the depth of her love, the absolute certainty of her choice, and something in me breaks.Or maybe it finally heals.Maybe for the first time in five hundred years, I understand what it means to truly be chosen.
Not for what I can offer.Not for immortality or power or protection.
But formyself.
The Khorvath recoils, and for the first time, I see something in those terrible eyes that might be confusion.
“This is not how the prophecy unfolds.The Warden surrenders.The seal breaks and I rise.”
“Prophecies can go to hell,” Tessa says flatly.“I’m writing my own ending.”
Prophet’s voice suddenly rises, stronger than before.The ritual hits a crescendo, symbols on the stones blazing with light that’s painful to look at directly.
The Khorvath realizes too late what’s happening.
“No.You cannot—”
“We can.”Prophet’s smile is beatific and terrible.“Because she didn’t surrender.She didn’t give you what you needed.The prophecy is broken, and with it, your power over her.”
The ritual completes.
Light erupts from the stones, forming a dome of pure power that encompasses the entire circle.The Khorvath screams, a sound that shatters ice and cracks stone and sends the ice shades outside the circle dissolving into mist.
But we’re not done yet.
Not even close.
Because the Khorvath isn’t going back willingly.
And now, trapped inside the circle with us, it’s going to fight with everything it has.
Reality warps.
Bullets freeze mid-air, hanging suspended before reversing trajectory and flying back toward the brothers who fired them.The air crystallizes, each breath becoming razors that cut from the inside.Time stutters and skips, making movement disorienting and unpredictable.
