Chapter 24 · If you let go

He held out his hand.

The gesture should have looked harmless. It didn't. His palm was cut and glowing, his arm still trembling from the grid. Behind him, the red lines waited like drawn blades.

Mara looked at his hand, then at his face.

"If you let go," she said, "I will break your fingers."

"If you let go, the grid takes your bones apart."

"You keep saying that like it's supposed to make me trust you."

"No. I'm saying it because you need to understand the rules."

"And what's the rule you haven't told me?"

His eyes sharpened. "Once we cross, the seal won't let either of us leave until the lock is opened."

Mara's laugh came out thin. "Forced proximity. How romantic."

"I can make it worse."

"Try me."

"The lock may only open for one of us."

She stared at him. "Then why bring me?"

"Because it won't open for me alone."

There it was. The truth he had kept folded beneath every joke.

He needed her.

Not her name. Not her old authority. Her hands.