Men and women I’d trained with, drank with, stood shoulder to shoulder with until the calls stopped coming through the radio and the rifts between us did.
I wasn’t supposed to be doing this. Not to them and not like this.
Still, the truth that had been nudging at the edges of my thoughts finally pushed through, loud and ugly and honest. What had the Guild truly done for me?
They’d given me training, a purpose. They’d given me structure when my life could have fallen apart into something meaningless. But beyond that, what did they give me?
They weren’t family. Not really. The Guild was an institution. It ate loyalty and spat out wreckage.
My parents had been hunters. They’d died on a job. No one remembered them now but me. The Guild wouldn’t care if I lived or died, but Simon did.
The thought settled over me like a weight and a warmth all at once.
If this night ended badly, what would I do? For the first time I didn’t have a rehearsed answer. I realized then that I’d been acting on instinct more than plan.
I hadn’t just run to save Simon because it was the right thing to do in the moment. I’d run because I couldn’t imagine not running.
My hand went to the small scar along my knuckle. It was old and thin, an echo of an argument I’d had with a banshee years ago.
The Guild had given me that scar. They’d given me more like it. They’d given me awards that sat in boxes and certificates that looked good in fluorescent light.
They’d given me an identity, yes. But it was an identity that could be revoked after multiple screw-ups. A name that could be taken back if I disappointed them enough.
Simon, on the other hand, had given me something that couldn’t be filed away or reissued. He’d given me mornings I wanted to wake into.
He’d given me the stubborn little joy of seeing the way a fire caught the corner of his eye. He’d given me a reason to worry that wasn’t born from duty.
If the Guild found out and this went sideways, what would I do? I felt sudden, stupid clarity. I would quit. I would walk away.
Not because I was brave or noble. Staying meant waking up every day to the same empty rituals and pretending the hollow inside me hadn’t been filled by someone who wasn’t supposed to be mine.
We needed to disappear. A place where the Guild’s reach thinned. A small town where no one knew one.
Somewhere Simon could be safe. Somewhere I could wake up and not have to think about what or who I had to kill next.
The plan felt impossible, ridiculous even, but every thought of it tightened something in my chest and made me feel steady. I wanted to wake up beside him.
I imagined him laughing at some stupid sitcom in the middle of the night, his fingers tangled in mine.
I imagined a life where the Guild was a distant rumor rather than a set of shackles. But it wasn’t just daydreams.
A shout, dragging my mind back to reality.
“Found him!”
16
SIMON
The air smelledlike rain and wild grass that evening, the kind of scent that clung to everything after days of wind and damp.
I was halfway through the back garden, pulling out the last stubborn cluster of weeds that had grown between the cracked stones.
It sure is convenient being able to see in the dark while gardening, I thought. One of the perks of being a vampire, I suppose.
I tugged the earbuds halfway down my neck when I thought I heard something.
A sound too sharp, too human to belong to the wind. Laughter. Faint, then closer. It prickled the hairs on the back of my neck.
