She thought about eighteen generations. Her grandmother’s parents, who she’d never met. Her own children, who didn’t exist yet but would be born into bondage if she did nothing.
And then she thought about her grandmother’s kitchen. Flour everywhere. The smell of ginger and pork. Small hands learning to fold the edges just right. “Like this, Bao Bei. You have to pinch it closed or all the goodness escapes.”
The pendant going around her neck. Cool jade against her skin. “This is for protection. So you’ll always know you’re loved.”
“I don’t know if I can,” Ava whispered.
“You don’t have to,” Samael said gently. “You can walk away. Keep your memory. Try another path.”
“Is there another path?”
His silence was answer enough.
Thirteen days. Eighteen generations. Her parents’ souls.
“Tell me,” she said, and her voice cracked on the words. “Tell me who did this.”
“Is that your answer?”
She closed her eyes. Saw her grandmother’s face one last time: the crinkles around her eyes, the flour in her gray hair, the love that needed no words.
“Yes.”
Samael’s smile held no triumph. Only a collector’s satisfaction.
“The binding was cast by Marchosias. A Duke of Hell, one of the oldest, most patient. He wove this trap on your family decades ago, along with dozens of others across the world. A net of souls, waiting to be harvested when the time was right.”
“Why my family?”
“Proximity to power they couldn’t have predicted. A daughter who would one day bind to Victor Morningstar.” He leaned forward. “But there’s a way to sever it. A loophole in the old magic. Someone else can take the binding. Willingly. Someone whose soul is worth as much or more than those already caught.”
The words sank into her like stones into water.
“Someone like me.”
“Yes.” He held out his hand, palm up. “The knowledge is yours. Shall we complete our transaction?”
Ava looked at his hand. Thought about what she was about to lose. Thought about what she was about to gain.
She placed her hand in his. His fingers were ice-cold.
He pressed his thumb against her forehead, and everything folded inward.
Visions flooded through her, not memories, but knowledge. A clay tablet covered in cuneiform. Words in a language older than Babel. Marchosias’s own hand, three thousand years ago, carving the ritual into stone. The binding could be severed if another soul took its place. Equal value. Willing sacrifice. The words had to be spoken at the moment of moonrise on the fifteenth day of…
She memorized it all. Every syllable. Every gesture. Every requirement.
The knowledge burned itself into her mind, sharp and permanent.
And then Samael took his payment.
It didn’t hurt. That was the cruelest part. No pain, no tearing sensation. Just a gentle unraveling, like a thread pulled from fabric so carefully you couldn’t even feel it leaving.
She stood in Samael’s library, hand still in his grip, and something was missing.
“It’s done,” he said.
“I don’t feel any different.”
