Chapter 24 · One Lives, One Dies

"Step back, Mara. Just do it and walk away."

Cael didn’t look at me. He was staring at the jagged line of black fire pulsing beneath the skin of his forearm, the mark of the pact we’d accidentally forged in a mess of blood and desperation. His voice was flat, dead. That was the sound of a man who’d already decided where he was going to be buried.

"I'm not leaving you to bleed out in a basement because you have a martyr complex," I snapped. I grabbed his wrist, pulling him back toward the center of the room. My palm hit his skin—scorching heat, like he was running a fever that could melt lead.

"It’s not a complex if it actually works," Cael said, finally meeting my eyes. His pupils were blown wide, swallowing the iris, making him look more like a monster than a man. "The bond is unbalanced. One of us is draining the other. If I drop out of the equation, the black fire settles. You survive. The Crown loses their leverage."

"Screw the Crown," I hissed, shoving him hard against the damp stone wall. The impact made him grunt, but he didn't move.