Kiss the witch hunter

**Blackthorn Orphanage – Midnight**

The orphanage always smelled like damp stone and regret.

Akira Vance pressed her back against the attic's slanted wall, her knees drawn to her chest. The acceptance letter trembled in her hands.

**BLACKTHORN ACADEMY** glimmered in raised ink under the flicker of her stolen candle.

*Full scholarship. Room and board. Effective immediately.*

Her throat tightened.

Eighteen years in this rotting house of whispers, and now-*freedom*.

But nothing good came free. Not here.

A floorboard groaned.

She shoved the letter beneath her mattress just as the door creaked open. Sister Marguerite stood in the threshold, her silhouette too tall, her shadow too long.

"You're awake." The nun's voice was a serrated thing.

Akira schooled her face into emptiness. "Nightmares."

Sister Marguerite stepped inside. The air thickened, the way it did before a storm. "Funny. The headmaster called tonight." Her bone-thin fingers brushed the mattress. "Said they've *never* offered a scholarship to an orphan."

Akira's pulse hammered.

A shriek tore through the halls below-not human, not animal. Something *hungry*.

The nun smiled. "Best pack, girl. The dark things are restless tonight."

---

**Blackthorn Academy – One Week Later**

The gates were iron and arrogance, twisted into thorned vines.

Akira gripped her single suitcase, her new uniform scratchy against her skin. The academy loomed ahead-a cathedral of secrets, its spires clawing at the bruised twilight sky.

*Her future.*

"You."

A hand clamped around her wrist. Cold. Certain.

She turned.

The boy was carved from privilege and poison. Golden hair, eyes like frozen mercury, a smirk that promised cruelty. His blazer bore the same crest as her letter-except his was edged in silver.

*Heir. Vanthorne.*

She yanked free. "Do you always grab strangers?"

"Only the ones who don't belong." His gaze raked over her-the secondhand shoes, the too-sharp collarbones. "Kyler Vanthorne. And you're the orphan they let in for *pity*."

Wind lashed between them. The lanterns lining the path guttered.

Akira clenched her fists.

The bulbs exploded.

Glass rained down. Kyler didn't flinch. Instead, he stepped closer, his voice a whisper against her ear:

"Interesting."

Her breath hitched.

He knew.

And the way he looked at her-like she was a riddle he'd waited years to solve-made her wonder if this was salvation.

Or a sacrifice.