Calla's POV
I run through the village streets clutching the forbidden book, my heart pounding so hard I taste blood.
The sound of wings is getting closer.
I can't see what's making that sound, but I feel it—a presence so cold and vast it makes my bones ache. The air pressure changes. My witch-sight flares painfully, showing me ripples in reality itself, like something massive is tearing through the fabric between worlds.
Whatever the book awakened in that temple, it's hunting me.
I duck into an alley between two houses, pressing my back against the wall, trying to catch my breath. The festival music covers the sound of my gasping, but it won't hide me for long. Not from something that can track magic.
The book pulses against my chest like a second heartbeat. The silver chains are ice-cold, burning through my dress. Words keep appearing on the cover in that blood-red ink, different messages flickering past too fast to read:
Run. Hide. They're coming. Too late. Should have listened. Death is awake. The Prince knows. Run faster.
"Shut up," I hiss at the book. "I'm trying!"
A shadow passes overhead—something huge blots out the moon for three full seconds. The temperature drops so fast that frost forms on the ground around my feet. My breath comes out in white clouds.
Not human. Definitely not human.
I wait until the shadow moves on, then sprint toward home. I have to get back to Papa. I have to perform the spell before whatever that thing is finds me.
The streets are empty—everyone's still at the festival. I run past the baker's shop, the blacksmith, the well where Helena pushed me last month and laughed while I cried. My lungs burn. My legs scream. But I don't stop.
I'm three houses away from home when I see her.
Helena Corwin stands in the middle of the street, arms crossed, wearing her fancy festival dress. Her blonde hair is perfect. Her smile is cruel.
"Well, well," she says sweetly. "The useless Thorne is running around like a scared rabbit. What's wrong, Calla? Finally realize nobody wants you here?"
I try to go around her, but she steps sideways, blocking me. "I'm busy, Helena. Move."
"Make me." Her eyes drop to the book I'm clutching. "What's that? Steal something from the temple? I should tell the magistrate. My father would love to finally have a reason to arrest you."
Something inside me snaps.
I've spent two years taking Helena's cruelty. Two years letting her insult me, hurt me, humiliate me in front of everyone. Two years being the good girl who never fights back.
But tonight, my father is dying. Tonight, something is hunting me. Tonight, I don't have time for her games.
"Get. Out. Of. My. Way."
My voice comes out wrong—deeper, colder, vibrating with power I didn't know I had. The book flares with heat against my chest. My witch-sight explodes outward, showing me Helena's thread—bright pink and healthy and completely untouched by any suffering.
She's never lost anything. She's never fought for anyone. She's never had to choose between damnation and love.
She's just cruel because she can be.
Helena's smile falters. She takes a step back. "What's wrong with your eyes?"
I don't know what she's seeing, but I feel different. Stronger. Like the book is feeding me power just by touching my skin.
"Last chance," I say quietly. "Move, or I'll move you."
For the first time in two years, Helena looks scared. She stumbles backward, tripping over her own fancy dress. "You're crazy! You're—you're doing dark magic! I'll tell everyone! I'll—"
But I'm already running past her, leaving her shouting threats at my back.
I reach our cottage and slam the door behind me, breathing hard. Papa is exactly where I left him—lying in bed, his thread down to almost nothing. But he's awake. His eyes find mine.
"You got it," he whispers. Not a question. A statement.
I nod, pulling out the black book. "Papa, there's something you need to tell me. The book says I'm the last Guardian. Grandmother's note says 'they' will find me when I perform this spell. Who are 'they'? What am I really?"
Papa tries to sit up and fails. He's too weak. "No time to explain everything. But listen carefully, Calla. Our family was meant to protect the Loom of Time alongside the Reapers. We balanced each other—they harvest souls, we repair threads. Together, we kept reality stable."
"Was?"
"A hundred years ago, someone betrayed us. Accused us of trying to control the Loom. The Reapers hunted our family to extinction. We've been in hiding ever since, our magic suppressed so they couldn't find us." His hand grabs mine desperately. "When you perform this spell, that suppression will break. You'll awaken fully. And they'll know exactly where you are."
Ice floods my veins. "The Time Reapers will come for me."
"Yes. But you're stronger than you know. You have to be—you're the last one." His breathing becomes more labored. "Do the spell, Calla. Save me. Then run. Get as far from here as—"
He stops mid-sentence. His eyes go wide with terror, looking past me at the window.
I turn around slowly.
A face is pressed against the glass.
Not human. Not even close.
The face is beautiful and terrible—perfect bone structure, silver eyes that glow like trapped moons, skin so pale it's almost translucent. But there's something wrong about it, like looking at a painting of a person rather than an actual person. Too perfect. Too still. Too dead.
The thing smiles at me, showing teeth too sharp to be human.
Then it speaks, and its voice comes from everywhere at once—inside my head, outside the cottage, from the walls themselves:
"Hello, little thief. I've been looking for you."
The window explodes inward in a shower of glass.
I scream and throw myself over Papa's body, shielding him. The black book falls from my hands and hits the floor. Its chains shatter with a sound like breaking bones.
The moment those chains break, the spell page glows so bright I have to close my eyes. When I open them, the words are floating in the air between me and the creature, written in fire:
THE THREAD SEVERANCE RITUAL REQUIRES BLOOD, WILL, AND SACRIFICE. SPEAK THE WORDS AND CUT THE THREAD. BUT KNOW THIS: THE MOMENT YOU SEVER TIME ITSELF, HE WILL COME. THE REAPER PRINCE. AND HE SHOWS NO MERCY.
The creature at the window laughs—a sound like breaking glass and dying stars.
"Too late, Guardian child. He's already here."
Behind the creature, the air tears open like paper. A gateway of swirling darkness appears, and through it steps something that makes the first creature look like a harmless puppy.
Tall. Impossibly tall. Dressed in armor made of shadow and starlight. Silver hair falling past broad shoulders. A face so beautiful it hurts to look at—perfect and cold and absolutely merciless.
His eyes lock on mine—mercury-bright, ancient, furious.
"Calla Thorne," his voice is death itself, beautiful and terrible. "You have violated the cosmic order. Step away from the stolen thread. Your execution begins now."
The Reaper Prince has found me.
And I haven't even performed the spell yet.