"Don't even breathe, Vey. One twitch and I'll snap your wrist like a dry twig."
Riven Holt slammed me against the damp brick wall so hard the air left my lungs in a pathetic wheeze. His forearm was a steel bar across my throat. I could smell the rain on his leather coat and something sharper—cold iron and ozone. Spellbreaker.
I clawed at his sleeve, my boots scuffing the grime of Gallowglass City. "Get... off... me," I managed. It sounded more like a plea than a demand.
"Where is it?" His voice was a low grate, vibrating right against my collarbone. He didn't budge. Those predatory gray eyes scanned my face, hunting for the lie.
"The living contract," he pressed. "You don't just walk out of the High Vault with a sentient piece of fate and think you're going for a stroll."
I forced a grin, even as my windpipe closed. "Maybe I just like the scenery in the slums, Holt. Ever been here? It's lovely this time of year."
He tightened his grip. The brick dug into my shoulder blades. "I'm not in the mood for courier wit. Give it to me, or I'll let the Council's hounds tear the skin off your back to find where you hid it."
"I don't have it," I lied.
Copper taste. That was the taste of the lie. The contract wasn't *with* me. It was *in* me. I could feel it pulsing under my skin—frantic, living ink that had crawled into my veins the second I touched the scroll. Liquid fire. It was humming a song only I could hear, and it was hungry.
Riven shifted, pressing me deeper into the wall. He leaned in, lips inches from my ear, breath warm against the night chill. "You're a terrible liar, Mara. Your heart is hammering like a trapped bird. I can feel it through your chest."
It was suffocating. I could see the tiny scar cutting through his left eyebrow, the hard line of his jaw. He was too close. Too much heat for the city's coldest weapon.
I stopped fighting. I looked him dead in the eye. "What's the matter, Riven? Afraid the Council will find out you're actually capable of feeling something for a thief?"
He didn't flinch. His hand moved from my throat to my wrist in a crushing hold. He yanked my arm up, pinning it above my head.
"You think this is a game," he whispered, his voice dropping an octave. "You think you're the first little rat to try and cheat the system. You're not. You're just the first one I'm actually tempted to break."
My breath hitched. The air between us turned thick, charged with something that had nothing to do with the arrest. I hated him. I hated the badge, the blood, the way he looked at me like I was a smudge on his boot. But as his thumb pressed into the soft skin of my inner wrist, a spark of electricity jumped between us.
Then the contract woke up.
A scream tore through my mind. Not a sound, but a vibration. The ink in my veins surged, reacting to the spellbreaker. It roared toward the point of contact—a tidal wave of black magic crashing into Riven's skin.
"What the—" Riven gasped.
He didn't let go. He couldn't.
A blinding flash of violet light erupted. Not a spark, but a tether. A thick, obsidian chain of magic slammed into existence, fusing our arms together with a sound like a closing vault. The force threw us both sideways into a pile of rusted crates.
We hit the ground hard. I groaned, head spinning. I tried to pull away, but the chain held. It wasn't just holding us—it was sinking in.
"Get it off!" Riven roared. He scrambled up, dragging me with him. He slammed his free hand against the black link, trying to shatter it with a burst of energy.
The magic recoiled. The chain pulsed. A shockwave blasted outward, knocking over a trash bin and raining glass shards over us.
Riven froze. He looked at his wrist. The black ink was bleeding into his skin, swirling in a pattern that mirrored the mark on my own arm.
"You... you idiot," he hissed, voice shaking. "What did you do?"
"I didn't do anything!" I yelled, struggling to balance while literally tethered to the man who wanted me in a dungeon. "It chose you! Why would it choose you?"
"Because it's a parasite," he spat. He yanked his arm back, but the chain shortened, pulling us flush against each other.
I slammed into his chest. My face pressed against the rough fabric of his coat. I forgot to breathe. I could hear his heart—fast, heavy, loud. He was heaving against me. The dominance had shifted into something chaotic. We were trapped in a deadly, intimate circle.
"Let go of me," I whispered. There was nowhere to go.
"I can't let go," he snarled, eyes flashing. "The link is active. We're bound, Vey. If you move, I move. If you bleed, I bleed."
I looked down. The ink was settling into sharp, jagged letters that glowed with a sickly light. A brand. No. A sentence.
Riven read the words aloud, his voice trembling. "*Two souls, one debt. One life, one price.*"
"That's not all of it," I said.
I pointed to the line beneath, the letters burning a deep, bruised purple into both our skins.
"*One of you dies before dawn,*" Riven read. His grip on my arm tightened until it hurt. "What the hell did you steal, Mara?"
A heavy metallic clank echoed from the mouth of the alley. A squad of Council Enforcers stepped into the light, armor gleaming, rifles leveled.
"Holt!" the lead officer shouted. "Perimeter's sealed. Do you have the target?"
Riven looked at the soldiers, then at me. His expression was unreadable, but his fingers slid almost imperceptibly against mine, deciding whether to hand me over or pull me into the shadows.
"I've got her," Riven called back. He didn't let go. He leaned down, his voice a ghost of a whisper against my ear. "If we survive the next hour, I'm going to kill you myself."
The lead officer stepped forward, eyes narrowing at the glowing chain. "What the fuck is that on your wrist, Holt?"