The supply closet shelves mock me with their neat little rows of ingredients, not a single vial of Firelda root or nightshade tonic in sight. My hands sift through jars, parchment labels, dried herbs, and nothing even remotely close to helping me sleep. Frustration coils tight in my chest until it boils over. I slam the closet door shut harder than intended, the sound echoing down the empty corridor. A glass potion bottle rattles off the counter and drops to the floor with a dull, rolling thud. Thick glass, too solid to shatter. Even that feels like an insult.
I press my palms into my eyes, counting my breaths, trying to settle the thread of unease that’s been vibrating through me since morning.
And then a voice cuts through the quiet.
“Unpredictable and whiny. Two more things your father failed to mention.”
The air leaves my lungs in one sharp rush.
Ares.
He stands across the classroom as though he materialized from the shadows themselves, leaning casually against a desk, one leg crossed over the other, arms folded loosely. His hood is down, revealing raven-dark hair that falls in careless waves around a face too sharp and too striking to belong to someone who enjoys causing fear. His mouth tilts at one corner, half amusement, half challenge, entirely predatory.
I straighten slowly, heartbeat quickening for reasons I refuse to examine too closely. “How did you get in here?”
His smile widens. “You’d be surprised how few locks in this school are designed to keep me out.”
He pushes off the desk, walking toward me with a pace so unhurried it’s insulting. “You look exhausted,” he says under his breath, as though it’s a secret between us. “Sleepless nights… nightmares… magic fraying at the edges.” His gaze drags down my form, lingering at my throat, then lower. “You wear exhaustion like a perfume.”
I force myself not to step back, even as my pulse betrays me. “What do you want, Ares?”
“What I always want,” he murmurs, stopping only a few feet away, close enough that the faintest hint of smoke and wintergreen coils around me. Close enough that I feel the low hum of magic beneath his skin. “To talk.”
“That’s not what you came here for,” I say, voice low.
He tilts his head, studying me with unsettling intensity, as though mapping the shape of every fear and desire I haven’t voiced. “You’re sharper tonight,” he notes, almost pleased. “Agitated. Dangerous. You’re starting to wake up, Harper.”
I hate the shiver that moves through me at the way he says my name, threaded with something that isn’t quite admiration and isn’t quite threat. Something in between. Something far riskier.
“You shouldn’t be here,” I snap. “If anyone sees you-”
He laughs softly. “If anyone sees me, they’ll be dead before they can shout.”
My breath stutters.
Ares steps closer, close enough that the space between us heavy. “Relax,” he murmurs, reaching past me with one gloved hand. A strand of my hair brushes his knuckles as he picks up the fallen potion bottle. He turns it over in his hand, examining it as though it’s the most fascinating thing in theroom. “If I wanted you dead, Harper, you wouldn’t have heard me walk in.”
He sets the bottle upright. His hand stays there for a moment longer than necessary, fingers tapping the glass, as though considering something darker.
My throat tightens. “You can’t keep appearing like this.”
“Can’t I?” His eyes flick up, catching mine. Blue. Bright. Heated. “…Tell me to leave, then.”
I open my mouth, but no sound comes out.
Because the truth is terrifying:
I don’t want him to.
Not yet.
Not when he has answers I need.
He sees the hesitation, the fault line in my resolve, and steps into it with surgical precision. “That’s what I thought,” he says softly.
Anger rushes through me, hot and sharp. “Ares, I swear, if you think you can intimidate-”
“I’m not trying to intimidate you.” His voice drops lower, rougher. “If I were, you wouldn’t be standing.”
