Peter’s POV

I stumble away from Atieno the moment his magic whisps me away from the hall of thundering vampires and returns me to the small room I know, but even here, their outcries follow me. It nips at my heels, chasing me till the adrenaline still racing through me instinctively boils.

My heart pounds in my ears, its violent thump growing louder and faster until it is a battering ram that lives in my skull. I claw at my chest, feet searching for an escape from my own body, but there is none. There is only the panic already eating its way through me.

Dear Goddess, what had I done…

“Peter.”

My head snaps up, and my shifting eyes focus on the warlock still standing in my room.

Normally, I would be afraid, already trying to hide, but there is far more to fear right now.

“I-I-I s-s-said yes,” I breathe as a shaking hand lifts to cover my lips. “I-I said y-yes.”

Atineo nods. “Yes, you did,” he says before striding towards me. I scramble back, but he does not entertain my panic. “The Trials will be difficult, and no leniency will be granted to you in any shape or form,” he says, speaking quickly, his bright eyes fixed on me. “The mission of valour will be adjusted to your species’ capabilities, just as it is for us sages.”

I blink at him, trying desperately to follow when just a moment ago, I was surrounded by my greatest fears, but he simply carries on.

“You reserve the right to claim, at maximum, a week between each trial after the first, so claim them. None would think you weak for using your advantage. Use the time in between to learn the clan and those within it— study us until you find who you are meant to best in the final Trial.”

“W-Wait,” I pant, barely getting the word out. “H-How can I…” I pause, only to stare at him. “I c-can’t even—”

“You have abandoned your bravery already?” He asks, frowning for the first time as he considers me anew. “I thought it true, but was it mere pretence? A moment of courage?”

“I-I—” I stammer, but I don’t know what to say because I don’t know which it is, and this is all too much, and— “I-I don’t k-know what’s going on.”

I take a breath, almost sobbing when dread forces it back out.

Atieno stares at me, his gaze impassive. “You have agreed to face the Trials, and I have just told you what all should know before doing so.” He backs away from me, though his gaze never strays. “Use your time, wit, and trust your instincts. Rush nothing. Vampires are patient creatures. You must be the same to live amongst them.”

The doors open just as Atieno turns towards them, and while I startle, he does not hesitate to stroll through them as though it’s all he’s been waiting for. He passes Maeve on his way out, sparing no more words to her than he does to me, before he disappears as though he’d said nothing at all.

Maeve watches him go before she looks to me. Her stare is the same as always, cold and sharp, but the chorusing bellow of the clan behind her makes it feel lethal.

They’re still going. Celebrating, arguing, I don’t know— but this hidden world of ice is no longer as still as it once was. Before, it was as though sound offended. They did not raise their voices, did not let a single item cause a ruckus.

Now… something electric fills the air, charging it, and there is nothing silent about it.

“When the sun sets again, someone will collect you to help you perform the Rites before your first Trial. You have until then to change your mind.”

The doors shut firmly behind her, silencing the clan’s symphony and leaving me in the silence the magic in the walls demands.

But I still feel them where I do not hear them.

I feel the tremor beneath my feet, sense the tension in the air.

They are excited, I’m sure. Either to see me fail, or to watch me die.

I barely make it to the toilet before my stomach empties itself.

──────────✧──────────

I don’t sleep. I don’t even try to.

My mind is too busy for it, and even the safety of my nest can not calm it, though I don’t dare imagine what I would’ve done without it.

Returning to the forefront to find one had been a gift like no other, but that was Joseph. He somehow always knew what we needed before I did.

It was only my luck that my worst nightmare was what followed right after.

We shouldn’t do this — Joseph murmurs from the corner of my mind he’d burrowed into from the moment Maeve entered our room and informed me that I’d been summoned by the Clan. We don’t know enough about it, and even if we did, it’s not meant for us!

Atieno said it would be adjusted to our species’ capabilities.

And we are an omega, Peter — he reminds anxiously. Do you think we have the same capabilities as Damon and Theo?

…no — I murmur, curling tighter under the covers. But they would say that we do, and not just to be kind. They would mean it.

But even so, what we are capable of and what we can muster the strength to do are two different things — Joseph argues over a whine — I don’t know if I can do this, Peter. We don’t even know what we’re doing! Not really. You just said yes!

I’m sorry — I whimper as my chest tightens all over again. I didn’t mean to decide it all on my own, but it was happening so quickly, and what other choice did we have? ‘No’ meant leaving, and then it would all be over.

Joseph holds his tongue this time, silenced by the same misery that rises inside of me, the one that seems to come faster than joy now whenever I think about my mate.

I close my eyes, fisting the covers while my chest caves in on itself until I can hardly breathe.

I didn’t want it to be like this! I didn’t want to keep doing things that made him upset or sad when we were made to make each other happy, but I didn’t know how to make Luciel happy because he didn’t want me to.

I knew we didn’t seem like we’d fit— that I didn’t look like I would— but we were mates for a reason, and if we just had a little time together to talk like normal people, I was sure that we’d see it.

It was the only thing I was sure of, and the only thing I had to hold onto… or else there was nothing.

Nothing for us, nothing to us, and I just couldn’t entertain that possibility. Not after all this time, and all the years I spent waiting for him.

No, I’d keep fighting for us, even if I were the only one doing so.

✧

They come after breakfast is delivered along with a pale linen vest and pants, when the light streaming through the ice is at its brightest, just as Maeve promised. It is a man and a woman, both as imposing as every vampire in this clan has proven to be, and though I do not meet their eyes as I add to the space between us, I feel the bite of their stares all the same.

“I am Niamh,” the woman says, her voice like stone.

“And I am Radu,” the man adds. “We will assist you through the Rites and prepare you with knowledge of the Trials.”

I blink past my shock at that last bit, but nod quickly. “T-Thank you,” I mumble, bowing a little when nothing else comes to mind. “I-I am P-Peter.”

“We know,” Niamh says, already turning. “Come.”

Radu moves at her side, the two of them a synchronised unit that is— Goddess help me— so much taller than I assumed once my eyes lift to brave a glimpse of their backs.

They wear white linen, and while Radu’s hair is made of open curls that shimmer as though golden threads have been woven through them, Niamh has none at all. Her shaved head is the canvas for the intricate design of gold painted onto her skull and down her neck like a tattoo.

I stare after them and the open door they leave in their wake, hesitating for only a moment before I force myself to follow. I told Luciel I would learn not to be afraid of vampires, and I had to start somewhere.

Once out the door, I rush to catch up to them and their wide strides, and startle slightly when Maeve immediately falls into step behind me.

I glance at her, but her eyes remain fixed on the space above my head.

We, too, walk as a unit, only I have to take two steps for all of their one, and my heart pounds louder than all our feet combined.

“The Rites are a passage made to cleanse your skin of the outer world so that you are prepared to make the journey through the Trials and into ours,” Niamh explains as she strides confidently through the empty halls. “Once you are cleansed and oiled, you will receive a token of gold that you must keep with you throughout the duration of the Trials.”

“Forfeit your token, and the clan will do the same to you,” Radu adds.

I swallow, and my stomach turns.

Do not lose the token. Got it.

“You will be the one to commence your first Trial, but you must do so no more than a day after the Rites are completed. For the Trials that succeed the first, you will have the span of eight days to choose when to initiate the next within that period,” Radu explains smoothly while I almost stop in my tracks.

If I were about to perform the Rites right now, then that would mean I had until tomorrow to prepare for and start the first Trial.

“Your heart rate has accelerated,” Radu states as the pair suddenly stops and turns in motion, so smooth that I do not even see their feet move.

I stumble to a stop, feet stuttering as my breath catches and Joseph squeals.

“What words spoken are of an issue?”

Eyes fixed on the floor, I wring my fingers out while I try to think past the terror setting off alarms throughout my head, but they only grow louder because I’m surrounded by vampires, again.

But if I could speak surrounded by hundreds like I did last night, then I could do it again now.

“I-I have t-to s-start to-to-tomorrow,” I whisper, fingers paling as I force myself to continue. “I-I don’t know wh-what the m-mission in t-t-the f-first e-even is.”

“You will not until the moments before,” Niamh states. “None do.”

I force myself to nod even as my heart starts to beat so fast that my chest hurts. Niamh and Radu stare at me for a minute longer before they turn and continue onwards. I don’t move, not until Maeve makes herself my shadow.

The pair continue sharing all they must about the Trials while we travel deeper and deeper into the fortress, where the ice steadily becomes thicker and the walkways grow darker and smaller.

My skin itches, instincts screaming that I’m walking into a trap, but each time I pause, Maeve becomes a sentry until I start walking again.

Of all the Trials, only the first had a timer. The third, the match, ended only with a concession or the first draw of blood. I could not explore the clan’s dominion alone, but wherever another led me, I was permitted.

I could go above the ice, if a Trial called for it, and no weapons or tools to assist were allowed beyond whatever I was born with.

“That is all of it,” Niamh declares when we finally come to a lone door at the end of a dark hall that emits no light other than what seeps beneath the door. It illuminates the others’ silhouettes and is the only reason I don’t faint where we stand.

“T-Thank you,” I mumble, and I know they are only here because they have to be, but that doesn’t make me any less grateful. “T-Thank you s-so much.”

They say nothing in return.

Opening the door, the pair step inside, and I hesitate again, but it is dashed away the moment warm air breezes past the frame to greet me. Then, I am rushing after them and gasping in delight when heat seeps past my coat and into my bones in a way I have not felt in months.

The squared room is warm, hot actually, and it’s all because of the pool that takes up the majority of the room. Steam wafts from it, rising over the edges to curl against the low ceiling that I would only have to jump to touch. The ice there melts, dripping into the pool, and yet, somehow, the ceiling remains intact, like the rest of the room that’s perimeter is lined with deep, clay bowls filled with oils and paints, and—

I still, and my gasp thankfully dies in my throat when my eyes land on the figure propped stiffly against the furthest wall. Luciel.

Joseph perks, squirming as my heart leaps and climbs higher, excitement driving it to the surface before trepidation can bring it down. Our eyes meet and hold. His dark, but underlit by the light that seems to radiate from the pool’s floor. It makes him glow, illuminating the lines of his jaw and neck, his powerful arms and legs encased within his own simple linen, and—

Heat spreads across my skin, scorching my face, and I am forever grateful for the excuse of the pool’s heat.

Luciel’s eyes linger on me, his thoughts hidden until they drift to the pair that had entered before me. He frowns, but neither of them cowers under the stare.

“Bravery is to be rewarded,” Radu says. He adds nothing else, and neither does Niamh.

Luciel stares at them both, a trickle of shock flitting across his gaze before he glances over my head to the vampire standing behind me. Not even a second later, the door shuts firmly behind me, without her inside, Maeve’s apparent answer to the unspoken question.

Jaw twisting, he lets his gaze fall back to me, and I immediately look away.

After our last conversation and all that had happened since, I didn’t doubt that he didn’t like me very much. It hurt enough to know that. I couldn’t endure seeing it too.

His stare remains, and he’s quiet, but somehow, I know what he’s going to say.

“I-I’m doing this,” I say before he can offer the out. “I-I’m n-not changing my m-mind.”

There is a moment of silence, and then another. They hang over my head like a noose.

“Very well,” he eventually says, and then, tightly, to Niamh and Radu, “You can begin.”

Relief pours through me, but a rush of unease immediately follows as I watch them split, each making for one of the clay pots. They survey them, picking one each and bringing it to the pool’s edge, and then returning for more.

They perform their tasks silently while I hover in my place, and my mate, in his.

Every now and again, my eyes flit to him, only to fall when I find him already gazing at me from the corner of his eyes. Clinging to my coat, I try to muffle the sound of my heart, but it’s a lost cause. I’m sure he hears it loud and clear and reads my nervousness for what it is.

I want to say something, I think. I want to because he’s my mate, and he’s right there. I want to hear his voice and talk to him, because we haven’t once just talked. It’s been transactional or situational— the vampire Pylen to the werewolf intruder— and I just want to talk to him. To Luciel. And maybe, just maybe, share a moment that didn’t end more painfully than the last.

But I don’t have anything to say that will guarantee that, and the only thing I fear more than fangs now is watching disdain fester in his eyes.

“We are ready,” Radu says, drawing my attention to him. He kneels at the edge of the pool between five large basins, and Niamh does the same. “You can enter the pool as you wish, but not with the coat.”

I frown, confused. Did they mean physically?

“Nude or in the clothing beneath, it is up to you.”

My eyes lift, drawn to his and the bond that sings between us at simply hearing his voice aimed at me. He gazes back at me, and there is no hatred or anger in his eyes. There’s nothing, and I don’t know if that’s better or worse.

“Oh,” I breathe, and then my skin heats further as I look at the pool. “Oh.”

I didn’t have a problem with nudity, few wolves did with how we lived, but I wasn’t ready to be naked in front of my mate, especially not when we weren’t alone. Silently but quickly, I shrug out of the coat I have been living in since my first day, and sigh blissfully as the pool’s steam swaddles me.

I set the coat down, folding it beside the door before I step out of my boots and stand only in the linen given to me.

Luciel’s eyes linger on me, a tangible sensation that steadily trails lower. My entire body flushes, and I have to focus on each step not to embarrass myself as I get to the pool. It’s surprisingly shallow when I peek inside, with steps leading down into it.

I don’t mean to groan or make any sound when this all feels so serious, but from the minute I sink a toe in, it just slips out. I step in quickly, eager to be inside, and when I’m up to my shoulders in hot water, I forget all about where I am and who I’m with for a few seconds as I just soak it all in.

A throat clears.

I pop my eyes open, spotting Niamh and Radu’s upside-down smiles, and then Luciel’s questioning gaze. “Would you like a moment to float or…”

“N-No! Sorry,” I stammer. I didn’t even realise I’d done that. I spring to my feet and waddle over to Niamh and Radu, bowing a little again as I whisper, “Sorry.”

“All is well,” Niamh replies before she palms the basin closest to her. “Choose the two that call to you.”

I blink before my head tilts. Choose? Of the basins or what was in them? What even was in them? They’d mentioned oils before, but I swore I glimpsed paints, and also, why was I choosing now instead of when I could actually see inside the pots?

“It is not a test,” Luciel says when I just stare. “No answer is right. No answer is wrong.”

I glance at him, wondering if what he’s saying is true or an attempt to sabotage me, but the latter is too depressing a thought, so I choose to believe the former.

Staring at the clay pots, I sniff the air, but while I scent sea salt and burnt oak, there is no distinguishing them from one another with the steam fogging the trail. I look at the pots next, the designs carved into them, and something in my chest loosens slightly because they look like Levi’s murals when he takes a blade to something thick.

I study them, looking at the stories they tell, like his always do. One depicts a woman with a crown that drips blood that builds to form a river that then morphs into a set of lonely monuments with thin bridges between them. Another is ringed by a chain of bodies chasing one another. I skim over the third when something about them makes me shiver, and briefly linger on the fourth that depicts waves crashing over one another, binding and separating, and then settle on the last. It’s the simplest of them all, a blank canvas that has never been touched by a blade.

“This one,” I say, pointing to the last before I glance at the others, but my heart already picks it for me. “A-And this one.” It’s the one with the bodies chasing each other.

I look up, trying to gauge their reactions, but none of them gives any. Niamh stands and removes the ones I did not pick, returning them to their spaces against the wall, while Radu dips both his hands into the pot with the bodies. His fingers emerge coated in white paint.

“Come,” he beckons, and I drift closer without hesitation. I’m not sure why, when he’s a vampire and cold and scary, but that fear doesn’t rise right now, and maybe that has something to do with the man watching us like a hawk.

When I am in reach, Radu presses his thumbs to my temple. They are cold, but soon warm as he spreads them down either side of my face. He gazes only at his fingers, never at me, but I study him and the calm that settles over him as he works.

He likes this, enjoys the task, and that does not change because it is me he performs it on.

His fingers drift over my skin in circles, always gentle and fleeting, and I do not know what picture he paints, but it is soothing, and nice to be touched. Werewolves were tactile, and after all that had happened since I dug my way beneath the surface, I had craved that intimacy without even knowing it.

Radu’s fingers move to my neck and I startle a little, shifting when his fingers almost touch my scent gland. He stills, eyes dropping to mine for the first time.

“T-That is-is in-intimate,” I stutter out when they all stare at me like I just spoke another language.

There is a moment when they do nothing, but then they turn to Luciel, inquisitive. His stare remains fixed on me and the spot Radu had almost touched. The spot that was his.

“Avoid the neck,” he says, and that is enough.

My heart gives where it shouldn’t, deliriously pleased as I draw closer again, and Radu continues without nearing my glands. By the time he finishes my arms and adds two dots over my eyelids, I feel at peace in a way that feels almost foreign.

“Your story of how you came here,” Radu says, thumbs hovering over where he started and following the paths as he speaks. “Your journey around the world, your search over the surface and then beneath the tunnels. Your bravery in the Calling. Your fight for your mate.” His fingers hover over the two dots on my lids before he drops them. Again, his eyes meet mine, and I do not shy away from them as I spot something softer than indifference within them. “Your story so far.”

I stare back at him, my heart filling with something I don’t get the chance to understand as he nudges me gently. This time, I am not confused. I sink back into the pool and dip myself beneath the water.

I feel the paint already lift from my skin and mourn it, but it doesn’t feel like a major loss, his words still ringing true in my soul while the water comforts me with its warmth.

It is… strange how wonderful it all feels. They’re vampires, creatures I’ve always feared for the mere fact that my blood is what they crave, but it does not feel like that is what they are here. They feel like more, and as I rise from the water, blinking my eyes open, fear does not find me when I look at Radu.

He nods, easing back, and I let my gaze drift to Luciel.

His expression is the same— impassive, giving nothing of his thoughts or his feelings— but they are not disinterested. It is the opposite.

My heart thunders beneath the water.

“Come now,” Niamh calls, positioned at the opposite end of the pool by the steps with a towel ready.

I follow her instruction, forcing my gaze from my mate’s as I drift through the water and climb up the stairs, the paint leaving a swirling trail of white behind that slowly melts into the rest of the water.

I dry myself as best as I can, grateful for the warmth that remains inside as Niamh watches me until my hair is damp and skin is dry enough by her standards. She leads the way to the second basin I’d picked, the one with the blank canvas.

The scent that rises from the basin is strange and unfamiliar. Ashed yet salted, as though they refined the salt from the ocean only to burn it and somehow turn it into an oil.

Niamh gestures me forward until I’m pressed against the basin. There, she dips her hands in and spreads them up my arms, her hands calloused but in no way rough. She massages it in like she would a baby that needs lotioning, and I struggle to rein in my smile as she lathers me up from head to toe, scooping a small dollop into her hands that she lets rake into my hair.

When she steps back, she eyes me carefully while I stand with my arms stiff at my sides, not sure if I can move yet or should. With all this oil, I’d probably slip, and then I’d have to drown myself in the pool.

“What is your name?” She asks, voice clear and loud as though there are more listening than those present.

“Um, P-Peter,” I whisper, and when she waits, I add, “H-Heil Calderon. P-Peter Heil-Calderon.”

“Peter Heil-Calderon, you have performed the Rites and accepted the challenge of the Trials. May the Gods honour your path.”

I stall, not sure whether that ‘gods’ referred to all the supernatural entities watching over us, or theirs alone. Niamh doesn’t need me to know or reply, though, because she wipes her hands clean and turns in time with Radu to gaze at Luciel.

I do the same, and for the first time, he startles slightly. Not physically, because not an inch of him moves. It’s in his eyes and the way they widen an inch.

“His token will be bestowed,” he says finally, and it’s only then that I realise that he’s here not to watch over us or make sure the Rites are done well, but to give me the token of gold I can’t lose.

Niamh and Radu stall a little as if that is not right, but they do not argue as they bow to him before leaving the room without meeting my eyes when I try to tell them bye. I slump as the door shuts after them.

This clan was so confusing. They were cold and rigid, but they weren’t mean, not as mean as people could be. It was just sort of like my manners weren’t their manners, or they held no interest in being friends.

“They honour you,” Luciel whispers, and I startle before turning to him again. I hadn’t forgotten he was there— I could never— I just did not expect him to speak to me or stay instead of leaving as well. “The Rites are not always performed by those within the clan. Some are made to perform them on their own. By aiding you, they showed you respect.”

My brows hike up, surprise rendering me mute for a moment.

They’d honoured me? Helped me when they didn’t have to? But that didn’t make any sense. Maeve had said the night before that someone would collect me and help me, so why would she have said that if that wasn’t protocol?

“W-Why?” I ask, my curiosity and confusion helping me speak.

Luciel gazes at me, and for a second, he looks confused too, but then he says, “Bravery is to be rewarded.” I frown at him, but he does not explain further as he pushes off the wall. “I will tell you all you should know before the Trials commence. The first, you must commence by tomorrow, but those after you— what?”

I jolt, immediately dropping my gaze as I step back.

I hadn’t said anything. I was about to, lips parted and waiting for the chance, but I hadn’t yet. He’d caught it anyway, and now he was staring, waiting for me to speak when I could barely breathe as the scents in the room were slowly and steadily overpowered by his.

He smells like…

“T-T-They already t-told me,” I manage quietly, scared to tell the truth but also terrified that he might leave if he learned it. “N-Niamh a-and R-Radu.”

“How do you know their names?” He demands, striding towards me. I scramble back automatically, but you can’t run from a vampire, and he is on me after the second step.

“T-T-hey t-t-ta-told m-me,” I whimper, head falling, shoulders crouching.

It’s fear for the first time with him. Lots of it because he’d spat the question, scent twisting with distrust and venom, and it is suffocating coming from him. Joseph whines, hiding, and I try to do the same within my own body until… it suddenly clears, washing from the room as if water had been thrown over his fire.

“I apologise,” he says, stepping back, his voice returning to its usual timbre. “I… I am sorry.” He takes another step back, and though I hate it, I breathe a little easier for it. “I did not expect that they would have, just as I did not expect them to be here for the Rites. Again, I apologise.”

I force myself to nod, but my mind whirls with all he’s just said.

It was impossible to believe, and I hardly did, but from the sounds of things, what Niamh and Radu had done for me had been of their own volition, same as Atieno last night, but I had no idea why.

‘Bravery is to be rewarded’ they’d said, and Atieno had asked if it was a pretence. Clearly, I’d done something brave in their eyes that warranted help, but I was not brave. Not by nature, and all I’d done the night before was cry in front of them.

“You accepted the Trials,” Luciel suddenly says, breaking the silence, and when I risk looking at him, his expression is no longer impassive or enraged. It is hesitant and… beautiful. “You did not know what they were, or the lengths of them, but you accepted them anyway. Such a thing is brave. Foolish, but brave. There are those in the clan who respect that.”

“Oh,” I breathe, a trickle of surprise rushing into me that soon becomes a downpour when my mind puts the pieces together.

Niamh and Radu had come to help me, not because they wanted to, but because they respected what I’d done. Maeve had said someone would come because she knew someone would feel that way, and in the case that none did, Luciel had been here to help me instead.

That meant that Luciel respected what I’d done too, or at the very least, that he wanted to help me.

Hope explodes inside of me as though someone’s lit a match in my chest, and it takes everything in me not to scream and jump about. I can’t stop my heart from racing, though, and I can’t stop the way my body buzzes with delight as I glance at my mate.

He watches me with a slight frown, confused, and I force myself to be cool. “S-Sorry,” I say, fingers knotting themselves together. “I-I d-didn’t ex-expect that.”

Luciel hums. “Neither did I, but bravery is rewarded here.”

The words make sense this time, and I can’t stop my smile. Luciel stares at it, at me.

I look away, needing a break. I’m not yet bold enough to hold his gaze, even when it was his version of kind, and the moment allows me to think. “I-It wasn’t f-foolish.”

He makes a sound that helps me face him again. This time, his expression is openly challenging. “It was very foolish. You agreed to tests you are in no way prepared for or knowledgeable about, and you have gambled your life on them.”

“I-I have time,” I argue, and he makes that sound again. It’s almost a sigh, but short, as though he doesn’t have the air for it. It takes me a moment to remember that he doesn’t.

“The time between the Trials will hardly be enough for you,” he says firmly, head shaking. “You should not have agreed. The risks make none of this worth it.”

“I-It’s wo-wo-worth it,” I say, chin lifting as high as I dare as I meet his eyes. “Y-Your worth i-it to me.”

Luciel’s eyes bulge, growing so large I think they might pop, but they don’t. He just stands there, almost gaping at me, and while Joseph dives for cover, I brave the blood that rushes into my face.

I hadn’t meant to say that, or I did, but not like that. But it was out now, and it was the truth. I was doing all this for him, for the chance of getting to know him, to give our bond a shot, and to me, that made all the risks worth it.

Lips closing, he stands still for a long moment before he swallows and clears his throat. “…You do not know me.”

I nod because it is true, but I will get to know him. Slowly, and in all the time I can during the Trials and after, but I don’t say that. We’re talking, and I’m not going to ruin that.

Luciel seems to realise the same, because he shutters off and becomes his stony self again. “Maeve will lead you to your rooms.”

He heads for the doors, and my heart sinks. I want him to stay, and I want to keep talking to him like this instead of curling up under the covers until it’s time to face my first trial.

“Wait!” The word blurts out of me, loud enough to fill the small room. Luciel stops with his hand at the door, but he doesn’t turn around. I breathe quickly, mustering all my strength and courage. “D-Do y-you have a-a library?”

Atieno said I should use all the time I had to prepare for the Trials, and I had hours at this point to prepare for the first. I’d already seen the tunnels, but I needed to learn all I could about them, and the fastest way to learn anything was from a book.

“Yes,” he answers after a moment, gaze still fixed ahead.

I shift, taking a deep breath before I force myself to ask what I really want. “C-Can y-you sh-show it t-to me?”

He stiffens, just barely, but I notice it and hold my breath as I wait.

The others had said I could go anywhere in the clan I was led, and I already knew there was no way Maeve would. Unless I gathered up the courage to ask someone else on the way, it would be a no. But Luciel was here, and he had wanted to help before, so he had to care, even if it was a tiny, tiny bit. It was something, and I could work with something.

If Luciel led me to the library, then I could learn something and, more importantly, spend more time with him.

Luciel opens the door without a word, and as I watch him leave, my heart drops deeper than I know is possible. I feel the loss of it, feel the strings that try to pull it back into place while it drags my soul down.

I swallow, forcing myself not to be hurt when I knew that was a possibility.

“If you are coming, you had better follow.”

My head snaps up, neck almost breaking as I watch Luciel saunter ahead, moving swiftly up the narrow lane. Maeve stands just outside the door, her expression as unyielding as ever, but she hadn’t spoken, and clearly Luciel hadn’t been speaking to her so…

My heart leaps, slams against the roof, and I almost leave it behind as I exchange my damp clothes for my coat, shove on my boots and race after my mate.

————————————————

Luciel, Sir, you have officially begun the journey of folding. Godspeed

Thoughts????????

Thoughts on Peter’s POV??? The Clan’s Rites??? Peter and Luciel’s conversation at the end???

It is nice to have a chapter where Peter doesn’t cry, like genuinely. Happy for him.

I fucking adored writing about the Rites and their traditions, loveddddd how we see them as assholes until Peter kind of realises that they just don’t say things, but they’re actually doing nice things for him! AHHH Love love love

Luciel being shocked as hell to see them, hilarious, but makes me think… would he have been touching Peter up like that in the pool if they didn’t show up….

I hope y’all enjoyed this chapter! It was a long one but one of my favourites so far and I can’t fucking wait for the next one with the library tour and more moments from them!

Up next is Aiasthlyn, but if you want early sneak peeks of OMEGA chapters, they come on Patreon and my website for the Gold tiers! Link in my bio!

Until next time,
Byeeeeeeeeeee Humansssssssssssss