Chapter 28 · The Pact She Left Behind

The candle's down to a stub when I realize I can't feel Drake anymore.

Not the way I could an hour ago. The pact's still there—I'd know if it snapped, it'd rip half my ribs out—but the thread's gone thin. Like he's pulling away on purpose, trying to smother his end of it.

I'm in the monastery's east wing, the room where my mother used to mix her inks. The table's still here. Stone, knee-high, covered in stains that never came out. I've been scratching at the surface with my nail for the past twenty minutes, trying to find the sigil she carved underneath. The one that would've anchored the pact if she ever needed to rewrite it.

My phone buzzes. I don't look. It's been going off since Lucas broke into the Guild archives, and I can't deal with him right now. He wants answers I don't have. He wants me to fix Drake.

I can't even fix myself.

The sigil's here. I feel the groove under my fingertip, and I press down until the stone bites back. It's small. Smaller than I remember. My mother's handwriting was always tight, controlled. She never wasted space.