"Don't just stare at it, Doctor. Cut me open or get out of the way," Julian spat, his voice sounding like grinding gravel.
He was pinned to the operating table, his chest heaving, but his skin wasn't acting like skin anymore. Around the collarbone, the flesh had gone a matte, polished white. Ivory. Not the kind you find in a shop, but something living, hard, and hungry.
Kael didn't move. He gripped the scalpel until his knuckles turned white. "If I nick the wrong vein, you don't just bleed. You crystallize. You'll be a very expensive statue in about six seconds."
"A risk I'm willing to take," Julian sneered. He tried to sit up, but the shackles rattled, pinning him down. He leaned his head back, eyes locking onto Kael's with a predatory intensity. "Or are you too scared? Maybe the great exiled genius is actually just a coward in a dirty coat."
Kael stepped closer, the scent of ozone and old blood clinging to the room. He leaned in, his face inches from Julian's. He could feel the unnatural cold radiating off the man—a chill that didn't come from the air, but from the bone. "I'm not scared of you, Julian. I'm scared of how much I actually want to see you turn to stone."
Julian’s lips curled into a thin, dangerous smile. "Then do it. Prove you're worth the price I paid to kidnap you."
Outside, the city of Oakhaven was screaming.
It started with a low hum that rattled the windows, then escalated into a full-blown riot. Kael could hear the distant crash of iron gates and the rhythmic chanting of the Church Inquisitors. They weren't just searching the district; they were purging it. The Bone-Plague was a heresy, and Julian was the ultimate sin.
"They're coming for us," Kael said, glancing at the heavy oak door. "And when Silas walks through that door, he isn't going to ask for your medical records. He's going to burn this entire block to the ground with us inside."
"Then we make a deal," Julian rasped. He shifted, the ivory patches on his skin catching the dim light. "You save me. You stop the screaming in my head. In exchange, I give you the one thing you actually care about."
Kael froze. "What is that supposed to mean?"
"Your sister," Julian whispered. "The one the Church told you died in the Great Purge. You think they just buried her? You're a doctor, Kael. You know how the Inquisition handles 'special' cases."
Kael’s hand shook. The scalpel dipped. "You're lying. You're just trying to get me to focus."
"Am I?" Julian’s voice dropped, becoming a low, vibrating hum that seemed to echo in Kael's own teeth. "I can hear the dead, remember? They don't lie. And they've been talking about a girl who looks just like you, kept in a cellar where the sun never touches the floor."
Kael slammed the tray of instruments down. The clang echoed through the sterile room. "Where is she?"
"Cut. Me. Open," Julian commanded, his eyes widening. Suddenly, he gasped, his body arching off the table. A horrific, screeching sound erupted—not from his throat, but from inside his chest. It sounded like a thousand glass needles scraping together.
"Shut up!" Kael yelled, though he wasn't sure who he was talking to.
He lunged forward, pinning Julian’s shoulder down with his forearm. The contact was electric. Kael could feel the vibration of the plague, a rhythmic pulsing that felt like a heartbeat made of stone.
"One second of silence," Kael hissed, his face pressed close to Julian's. "Give me one damn second of silence, and I'll do it. But if you move, I'll leave the wound open and let the air rot you from the inside."
Julian stared up at him, the arrogance momentarily stripped away by sheer pain. For the first time, he looked less like a monster and more like a man drowning in his own body. He stopped fighting. He stopped speaking. He just breathed, shallow and ragged, his gaze locked onto Kael’s.
In that silence, the tension shifted. It wasn't just about survival anymore. It was the proximity—the way Kael’s warmth clashed with Julian’s unnatural cold, the way their breaths mingled in the small space between them. Kael felt a surge of something that wasn't just anger. It was a desperate, forbidden curiosity.
Kael didn't hesitate. He pressed the blade into the ivory-white skin of Julian's chest.
There was no blood. Not at first.
Instead, a thin, silver fluid seeped out, shimmering like liquid moonlight. Kael leaned in, his eyes scanning the incision. He had to go deeper. He had to find the core of the crystallization.
"Careful," Julian whispered, his voice barely a thread. "I can feel you... inside me."
"Stop talking," Kael snapped, though his own heart was hammering against his ribs.
He used a retractor to peel back the layers of calcified tissue. As he worked, the sounds from the street grew louder. The chanting was right outside. The door groaned under a heavy blow, the wood splintering.
"Almost there," Kael muttered. He reached the center of the plague-node, a jagged piece of bone that had grown into a spiral.
But as he touched it with the forceps, he saw something.
Etched into the surface of the bone, beneath the silver fluid, were letters. Not natural growths. Not accidental scars. They were carved. Precise. Clinical.
Kael leaned closer, his breath hitching. He recognized the notation. It was a registry system used by the Inquisition’s secret labs.
He read the numbers aloud, his voice trembling. "Case 7-1-2..."
Kael stopped. He recoiled as if he’d been burned.
7-1-2. That was his sister's case number from the intake forms he'd stolen years ago. The same number was carved into the bone of the man he was currently cutting open.
"What is it?" Julian asked, his voice regaining its smug edge. "Find something interesting in there?"
Kael looked at Julian—really looked at him. The noble heir wasn't just a patient. He was a map.
*CRASH.*
The operating room door flew off its hinges.
Standing in the doorway was Silas, the Inquisitor, draped in heavy white robes that trailed blood on the floor. He wasn't carrying a weapon; he didn't need one. His eyes were glowing with a pale, sickly light, and the air around him seemed to warp.
"Step away from the specimen, Doctor," Silas said, his voice smooth and terrifyingly calm.
Kael didn't move. He kept the forceps clamped on Julian's bone. "Who did this to him? Why is my sister's number in his chest?"
Silas smiled, a slow, thin expression that didn't reach his eyes. He stepped into the room, the temperature dropping instantly.
"The boy is a vessel, Kael. A very expensive, very fragile vessel," Silas said, glancing at Julian with utter contempt. "And you've just opened the door for me."
Silas raised a hand, and Kael felt an invisible force slam into his chest, throwing him backward against the wall. The scalpel clattered across the floor.
"Now," Silas whispered, leaning over the table toward Julian, "hand over the heir, or I'll make sure you both burn in the same fire."
Julian looked at Kael, a flicker of something—fear, or maybe a challenge—crossing his face. "Well, Doctor," Julian gasped, "are you going to save me, or am I just a specimen?"