Chapter 5 · The Name Behind the Pact

"Who put my family's engine in your house?"

"Someone with keys."

The breach slammed into the hall again.

Marble cracked under Kane's knees. He caught himself with one hand, but his other arm stayed locked around my waist, keeping me pinned against his burning body.

"Your guards?" I demanded.

"Someone closer."

"One of your councilors?"

Kane didn't answer.

He didn't need to.

His silence hit harder than the blast.

The black tear above us shrieked. Glass rattled in its frames. Somewhere behind the sealed doors, people screamed.

Kane dragged in a rough breath. "I need your blood on my seal."

I looked down at him. "Not on the door?"

"On me."

"Try that again."

His jaw tightened. "The city seal is tied to my body. Press your blood into the mark on my chest, and I can force the breach back."

"And what does it do to me?"

"It shares the damage."

"With you?"

"With me."

I grabbed the front of his shirt and hauled him closer. His breath brushed my lips, hot and uneven.

"So you want me to make myself part of the thing killing you?"

"You're already part of it. The contract saw to that."

The words punched straight through me.

I shoved him back, but he caught my wrist before I could pull away.

"You don't get to use our fake marriage like a weapon."

"You signed it for access."

"You signed it because you needed my blood."

"Yes."

The blunt answer stole half my breath.

His eyes dropped to my mouth.

Only for a second.

Then he looked back at me like he hadn't just made the air between us too hot to breathe.

"You wanted the truth," he said. "There it is."

"You could've told me before you put a ring on my finger."

"You would've walked away."

"You don't know me."

"I know you walked into a sealed wing while injured because nobody had the nerve to stop you."

"And you liked watching me make your guards panic."

A muscle jumped in his cheek.

"I liked that you didn't look afraid of me."

That admission sat between us, sharp and hot.

Then the engine roared.

Kane tore open the rest of his shirt. Buttons struck the marble and skittered into the smoke.

The mark over his heart wasn't a scar.

It was a black seal carved into his skin, ringed with thin silver lines. It pulsed with every beat of his heart.

I should've looked away.

I didn't.

"Press your palm here," he said.

"If I do, you tell me everything you know about the pact."

"If we live through the next minute."

"No. Before."

His stare hardened. "You're negotiating now?"

"I'm setting terms."

"The building is coming apart."

"And you're still trying to decide everything for me."

His hand closed over mine.

His palm was rough and hot. He guided my bleeding hand toward his chest, dragging my fingers over bare skin. Heat soaked through the blood coating my palm.

"I do decide," he said. "I'm the Warden."

"And I'm your legal wife."

His eyes snapped up to mine.

"Don't say that like you enjoy it."

"Don't hold me like you do."

For one raw second, neither of us moved.

His thumb brushed the inside of my wrist.

My breath caught. So did his.

His mouth was close enough that I felt the heat of every word before he spoke it. The noise around us blurred beneath the hard beat of his heart against my hand.

Then the seal opened.

Pain ripped through my palm.

I cried out and tried to jerk back, but Kane caught my wrist and forced it harder against his chest.

"Don't move!"

"Get off me!"

"If you break contact, it takes your arm!"

"You might've mentioned that!"

"You would've argued."

"I am arguing!"

Black lines spread beneath my skin.

The mark drank my blood.

Kane jerked like I'd driven a blade between his ribs. His forehead struck mine. His breath broke against my mouth.

Then his pain slammed into me.

Burning lungs. Crushed bones. Years of pressure packed behind one stubborn heartbeat.

I saw his city through him—every locked gate, every body counted, every night he'd stood beneath the breach and held it shut alone.

And he saw mine.

The failed rescue.

My family's faces.

Mara turning away.

The room where they stripped my badge from my coat and called me a liability.

Kane's fingers dug into my back.

"Evelyn," he rasped.

"Don't you dare pity me."

"I don't."

"Then what the hell is that look?"

His forehead stayed against mine. His voice dropped low enough that only I could hear it.

"Recognition."

The breach shrieked above us.

"Get me out of your head," I snapped.

"You're the one in mine."

"Then shut the door."

"I can't."

"You'd better learn fast."

I forced my bleeding palm deeper into the seal.

Kane's arms closed around me. His bare chest pressed to mine, heat bleeding through my torn clothes. Black light tore over our shoulders and burned across my skin.

His heartbeat slammed against my palm.

Mine answered it.

"Push with me," he said.

"Tell me where."

"Down. Into the center."

"If this kills me—"

"It won't."

"You don't know that."

"I know the seal."

"You know how to lie."

His grip tightened around my waist. "Evelyn. Now."

I shoved everything I had into the mark.

The breach folded inward.

Fire vanished.

Broken glass dropped from the air in a glittering storm. The iron door slammed shut with a blast that rattled every window in the hall.

For three breaths, no one moved.

Then the contract ring on my finger split open.

A thin crack ran through the black iron. Blood-red letters crawled across the sealed door.

The gala guests stared from the far end of the hall. Their whispers rose behind us.

Kane stood at my back, one arm still locked around my waist. His bare chest pressed against my spine. His breath touched the side of my neck.

"What the hell is that?" I whispered.

Kane went still.

"Kane."

"Don't read it."

The first line burned brighter.

I read it anyway.

MARRIAGE BINDING: ONE SIGNATORY MAY COMPLETE THE PACT.

My stomach dropped.

A second line carved itself beneath the first.

THE SIGNATORY WHO STANDS ALONE SHALL LOSE THEIR HEART AT DAWN.

I turned in his arms. "You knew."

His face had gone pale.

"No."

"Your name is under the clause."

"Evelyn—"

"You knew what this marriage would do to me."

"I didn't know about that clause."

"But you knew the pact needed a second signatory. You knew I was walking into a trap."

"I knew I needed you alive."

"That's not an answer."

The final letters began carving themselves into the door.

One line.

Then another.

The guests fell silent.

Kane grabbed my hand before I could touch the writing.

"Don't say it," he warned.

"Say what?"

His fingers crushed mine. For the first time since I'd met him, fear broke through his control.

Not fear for the city.

Fear for me.

"If you speak my true name," he said, "the contract will—"