Chapter 2 Marked by Crimson

Lyra didn't notice the blood until the third breath.

It wasn't hers.

She sat on the warped floorboards of her attic, staring at the blade now dark and silent beside her. But a slick trail of red stretched from her wrist to elbow, seeping into the frayed cuff of her coat. It wasn't a cut. It wasn't even real blood. It shimmered slightly iridescent, glowing faintly in the candlelight like oil on water.

A mark.

Etched into her skin just below the curve of her wrist: a twisting rune shaped like a serpent biting its tail, carved in crimson.

The Pact had branded her.

And it wasn't coming off.

She scrubbed at it. Hissed. Bit her lip hard enough to taste copper. But the mark didn't even fade. Instead, it pulsed once, twice before stilling again.

Something in her stirred. A whisper not quite a thought. Not yet.

Lyra staggered up and stumbled to the mirror above her rusted desk.

She didn't recognize herself.

Dark circles hollowed her eyes. Her usually warm-brown irises now held threads of burning gold. Her lips were pale. Her cheekbones are sharper. The magic had touched her from the inside out.

She clenched her jaw.

"I didn't ask for this."

The dagger pulsed.

You took it anyway.

She didn't sleep.

Not really.

The rain pattered endlessly against the slanted glass, and her thoughts spun like wheels in mud. Kael had seen her. And if the wolf prince had seen her, then it wouldn't be long before the vampires knew as well.

The Crimson Pact wasn't a myth anymore. It was active. It had chosen a vessel. Her.

And now?

The hunt had begun.

By morning, posters had already gone up.

WANTED: HALF-BREED FEMALE POSSESSION OF FORBIDDEN ARTIFACT.

Dead or alive.

Preferably dead.

The bounty was enough to feed the lower quarter of Eldemire for a year.

Lyra burned the first poster she saw.

Then the second.

The third she tore into thin strips and tossed into the river where the witches once drowned liars. But none of it changed the truth.

They were coming.

She had to run.

Or fight.

She didn't go far.

Only as far as the underground market beneath Thorne Chapel. It was neutral ground, protected by old blood magic and ancient oaths that even the royals respected.

Maybe.

The air smelled of cloves and steel. Stalls packed shoulder to shoulder sold everything from curses to compacts of bottled fire. Hooded vendors spoke in dead languages. Shadows flickered with lives of their own.

She found who she was looking for beside a row of hanging skulls: an old woman wrapped in red and black shawls, her eyes clouded white.

Madam Iron.

Seer. Smuggler. Blood witch.

"You shouldn't have touched the dagger," Irin rasped before Lyra even spoke.

Lyra folded her arms. "Too late for warnings."

The old woman gave a dry chuckle. "You carry it now. Like a wolf carries its first kill."

"I need answers."

"You want absolution."

Lyra leaned closer. "I want to know what it's doing to me."

Irin reached out and seized Lyra's wrist with a speed that didn't match her age. Her fingers were dry as parchment, crackling with power. She turned Lyra's arm over and exposed the mark.

The old woman recoiled.

"That's not a rune," she said slowly. "That's a seal."

Lyra's blood went cold.

"A seal for what?"

Irin looked up, and for the first time there was fear in her blind eyes.

"For whatever it was made to bind. Or unleash."

That night, Kael came again.

But not in dreams.

In person.

He didn't knock. He didn't roar. He was just suddenly there, in her attic, standing beside the guttering candle, soaking wet and breathing like he'd just run through a war.

She lunged for the dagger.

He didn't stop her.

She gripped it, holding it between them like a ward.

Kael didn't flinch.

His silver eyes locked onto hers, dark hair plastered to his face.

"You don't understand what you've done," he said again.

"Then explain it."

"You're marked."

"I noticed."

He stepped closer.

"You didn't just activate the Pact. You reawakened it. You let it bond with you."

She frowned. "So?"

Kael leaned in, voice a low growl. "That means you're its new Warden. The last one destroyed half the continent before she tore out her own heart to seal it again."

Lyra swallowed. Hard.

The dagger pulsed in her grip like it agreed.

"Then I'll unseal it again," she said. "I'll use it."

"Don't be a fool. That thing doesn't grant power it feeds on it. The more you use it, the more it takes."

"And what happens when it's done talking?"

Kael's expression darkened.

"Then there's nothing left of you but a weapon with your face."

He left without another word.

Just disappeared into the fog of Eldemire, as if he'd never been there.

But Lyra could still feel the heat of his presence, lingering like the echo of a fire not fully out.

For the first time since touching the dagger, she felt something besides power or fear.

She felt watched.

Desired.

Not in the fragile, hungry way of street boys or smugglers. No this was ancient. Territorial. Something carved deep into bone and blood.

Kael wanted the dagger.

But he wanted her more.

And that scared her more than death.

She couldn't sleep.

The mark burned.

The dagger hummed.

And in the shadows of her room, something moved.

A shape.

A man no, not quite.

He stepped from the wall, a mist trailing his boots, and the room dropped ten degrees in a breath.

Lyra reached for the dagger but it was already gone.

In his hand.

Held between two fingers like a gift or a threat.

"You stole something of mine," the stranger said, voice like velvet smoke.

Lyra's mouth went dry. "Who the hell are you?"

He smiled.

No fangs. No claws. Just cold perfection.

"I am Lord Verenthas of the Crimson Court. And you, little thief, just woke me up."