The raised skin sat there, its lines more defined than they had been a week ago, the darkness holding a pattern that shifted when viewed from certain angles.
“How long?” she asked.
“Since before the first murder.”
She held his arm for a moment, her thumb not quite touching the darkened skin, hovering just at its edge. The warmth intensified slightly — not painful, just present, aware of her proximity in a way he didn’t have language for.
“Does it hurt?”
“No.” He paused. “Not exactly.”
She released his arm. He pulled his sleeve back down, and she let him, which was one of the things about her he couldn’t adequately account for—the way she knew when to press and when to give him back his space.
“I brought something,” she said, returning to her bag. “It may not be relevant, but I thought you should see it.”
She withdrew three books—bound volumes, leather covers cracked with age, spines labeled in faded gold leaf. Bastien recognized the formatting before he read the titles.
“Archive collections?”
“The Beaumont papers I mentioned. I pulled them yesterday, after you reacted to the Marchande-Levesque name.” She opened the first volume to a marked page. “I couldn’t read them properly before. But I remembered certain patterns. Certain names that appeared repeatedly without explanation.”
The page showed a letter dated February 1891—one month after the purge. The handwriting was unfamiliar, but the content stopped him cold.
The matter is resolved. House Marchande-Levesque no longer exists. Their properties have been divided according to our agreement. Their allies have been dealt with. Their proposals will not trouble us again.
But I must confess to unease, Henri. The manner of their destruction—the bodies left intact, the symbols carved into their flesh—troubles me more than I anticipated. We meant to send a message. I fear we have created a ghost.
What we did was necessary. What we did was just. History will record us as protectors of our kind.
But ghosts do not care what history records.
Yours,Marcel Beaumont
Bastien read the letter twice, then looked at Delphine.
“Where did you find this?”
“Buried in correspondence the Archive cataloged as ‘family business matters.’ No one thought to examine it closely—it looks like every other letter from the period.” She turned to another marked page. “But there’s more. References to ‘the arrangement.’ Lists of properties transferred after the purge. Names of vampires who received shares of the Marchande-Levesque estate.”
“You’re giving me evidence of a conspiracy that’s been hidden for over a century.”
“I’m giving you records that belong in proper historical context.” Her voice carried the neutrality of someone accustomed to handling sensitive materials. “What you do with them is your decision.”
She was helping him. She had recognized his distress, had connected it to research she had encountered in her professional capacity, had brought him documentation illuminating exactly what he needed to understand. All without asking questions that would require lies.
The generosity of it—the trust it implied—tightened something in his throat.
“This is dangerous,” he said. “These records implicate families that still hold power. If anyone knew you had taken them from the Archive?—”
“I’ve handled dangerous materials before.” She smiled, brief and sharp. “I’m an archivist. Dangerous materials are what we do.”
“Delphine—”
“Bastien.” Her voice cut through his objection with the quiet authority she used when handling materials requiring respect. “I understand you want to protect me. I understand that protection is how you express care. But I’m not asking for your protection. I’m offering my help. Those are different things.”
He thought of Delia—her easy certainty on a November street in 1906,I don’t need to understand everything about you to know that I love you.He thought of the ring he had never given her, the morning that had come and taken her before the evening could. He thought of every version of this moment across what felt like lifetimes, always arriving at the same wall between what he wanted to say and what he could actually guarantee.
Delphine was not Delia. She was standing in his apartment in the twenty-first century, refusing to be sent home with the calm certainty of someone who had decided what she was willing to risk, and she had not asked him to promise anything he couldn’t keep.
