Page 33 of Petrified

Several weeks later, Gerald stopped calling it probable.

Bonded sexual contact confirmed as accelerant. Response strongest following simultaneous exposure to both Basilisk signatures.

Heat crawls beneath my skin, but there is nothing pleasurable about it. I think about our bed, Lev between us, the way he sometimes settles afterward as though every restless piece of him has finally found somewhere to stay. Gerald took that and turned it into a fucking data point.

Amand takes the page from beneath my hand before I can crumple it. “Rowan, leave it intact.”

“He tracked us.” I look at the columns again, at dates attached to moments that should belong to the three of us and no one else. “Every time Lev came back here after being with us, Gerald measured what changed.”

“He tracked Lev directly, but this file makes all three of us part of the experiment.” Amand’s voice has gone colder as he turns another page. “Our venom, proximity, bond contact. Even whether one or both of us were with him.”

The next section is waiting beneath it.

Venom saturation appears cumulative. Mate bond may be modifying Chameleon adaptation threshold. Recommend continued observation under controlled stress variables.

Something inside me goes very still when I read the last three words. The anger is still there, but it stops rushing through me and settles somewhere much more dangerous.

“Controlled stress variables,” I say, looking at Amand. “That isn’t observation.”

“No.” He holds my gaze for a second before turning the file back toward me. “Which is why we need the rest.”

I hate him a little for making me keep reading when every instinct in me wants to find Gerald now. I hate that he is right more, so I stay beside him and keep turning pages.

Gerald documented Lev’s disappearance abilities, scent reproduction, and the first time his camouflage stopped behaving like ordinary visual blending and became something closer to absence. Every change has measurements attached to it: duration, trigger, recovery time, whether one of us was present, whether Lev had been exposed to venom recently, how much physical contact occurred before his magic stabilized.

Then I reach an entry whose date makes me stop.

Projected Stage IV: sustained visual displacement beyond dermal camouflage likely under sufficient predatory threat.

I check the date once, then again because I know when Lev first vanished completely. Gerald wrote this months before it happened.

“Amand, look at the date.” I push the page toward him rather than trusting myself to explain it.

His eyes move from the prediction to the timestamp. “I see it. Keep checking the projections.”

I turn the next page faster and find another one buried beneath earlier observations.

Projected Stage V: replication of foreign designation presentation following repeated high-intensity exposure. Full structural imitation possible if subject is forced beyond current mimicry ceiling.

That entry predates the unicorn case.

My fangs press down hard enough that my teeth ache. Amand puts one hand flat against the desk between us when he sees the change in my face, but I keep my hands on the file instead of giving myself something else to break.

“He knew Lev could do it before Lev did.” I look between the prediction and the date again. “Before any of us knew that was even possible.”

“He predicted that Lev could do it.” Amand’s expression is grim as he draws the previous projection beside this one. “And then Lev was put into situations that required exactly those abilities.”

“That isn’t better.”

“No. It’s worse, because now we know what to look for.”

I keep reading, and three pages later, the unicorn case appears.

It is not recorded like the rest of our assignments. There is no client summary at the top, no ordinary case objective, and no discussion of why Essence took it. Gerald has categorized it according to what he expected it to do to Lev.

CASE SELECTION: high-density designation environment. Objective: force subject to sustain foreign magical presentation under prolonged social scrutiny.

My hand closes around the edge of Gerald’s desk before I realize I have moved. The wood creaks beneath my fingers, and Amand catches my wrist when my nails begin biting through the finish.