She looked at me, holding my gaze, and thrust that dagger into Clara’s chest like the woman never meant shit to her.
I’m both proud and terrified.
Proud that she didn’t break down, that she didn’t fail, that she proved herself for one last time.
And terrified of what she’s become.
A monster.
Like me.
Milus’s voice smashes through my thoughts, forcing my feet to move, “Step forward, children of The Obsidian. Stand before the altar where fate is carved and sacrifice is given.”
I step inside the circle of black candles, joining Penelope whose eyes are already lifted unto mine. There’s blood on hercheek, and a glint in her eye, but it’s the smile on her face that makes my heart pound harder than it ever has before.
In this moment, she’s saying so many things.
I did it, Billy.
For us.
For you.
“Tonight, two paths become one, two souls bared, two hearts feeding on one. To be bound by will, by blood, by sacrifice.” Milus’s hands lift, arms outstretched wide, he looks at me and for the first time in my life, he speaks to me like I’m worthy. “Speak, Two, and let us bear witness.”
I turn towards Penelope, take her hands, and they fit into mine like a sin I’ve been waiting my whole life to commit.
The moment we touch, something ancient, merciless, ferocious inside me settles, like a beast finally given permission to stop pacing its cage.
She’s shaking, just a little, but I’m not.
Not anymore.
The tremor in her palm only fastens my resolve, seals it into my marrow.
She thinks she’s the one surrendering.
That she’s giving something up.
Herself.
Her life.
She has no idea I’m doing the same.
I look at her, really look at her, and the world falls away, every robed figure, every whisper, every candle burning itself down to nothing, the hissing wax drips fading away. All I see is the woman who has ruined me so beautifully, so completely, that I can’t remember who I was before her.
And I don’t want to.
There is devotion in her eyes that matches the same inside my heart, but there’s fear there too. And I love her for both. Ilove her in the way a blade loves its sheath, deeply, dangerously, knowing the fit is absolutely perfect only because one was always meant to cut the other.
When her fingers lace through mine, hot, wet, bloodied, something dark curls around my spine, possessive and quiet and absolute.
I feel the vow forming before I speak it.
Not the one The Obsidian wants.
The one they fear.
