Page 48 of To Vanquish Darkness

The members of his coven no longer laughed.

“If you’re going to run, I’d do it now. Seems he’s in a poor mood. Bit distracted.” Ren grinned, then turned and crossed the rooftop toward Clémentine.

Amalie had to run to catch up to Theo. She barely saw him disappear through the door and bolted after him, taking the stairs down to his quarters as fast as she could without slipping on the narrow steps. She was breathless when she put out a hand to stop his bedroom door from slamming shut in her face.

"Why did you do it?" She slipped in, and the door closed behind her. She kept her hand on the knob. After Theo had allowed her to do her worst, she doubted he'd turn on her now, but she was still wary.

"You wanted proof of my integrity. Now you have it."

Pain. He felt it.Amalie's hand rose to her neck. Her cheek. She'd burned him alive, then sliced through his flesh and bone. He'd felt all of it, and it was as if the ghost of his wounds hovered over her own skin.

Ren’s goading had worked. Not in the way he’d hoped, no doubt. But despite her commitment to not believe a word out of Theo’s mouth, her resistance was weakening. She was alive after being bitten, and Theo had proven definitively that he couldn't die.

Her questioning mind had gone silent.

Theo stalked to the washbasin and plunged a cloth into the water, then wrung out the excess water and began washing his own blood off his skin.

“Do you not have a tub?” Amalie asked.

Theo glanced up, his eyes hooded as he shook his head.

Amalie frowned. “You’re the master of the house, and my room is better outfitted than yours?”

Theo rinsed his blood from the cloth. “This isn’t my normal room.”

Amalie’s heart stuttered. She couldn’t ask the question that sat on her tongue because hearing the answer would only confuse her further. Monsters didn’t give up their rooms for humans. Even if they wanted their help.

Theo dragged the cloth over his side. Over the marks on his hip that she’d never seen the end of.

He didn't look like a monster.

He never had.

That was the problem.

"Tell me more about the sword." Amalie's heart began to pound, and she lowered her eyes. She didn't want to see more of him. Not when his glamour still drew her in like a moth to a flame.

“All it took was a severed head and you believe me?”

Amalie’s stomach churned. Standing near him felt more difficult than it had before. Heavier. Everything she’d done on the roof had leached her anger, and she couldn't even cling to fear. Theo wasn't going to hurt her. It didn’t make sense, but she knew it with a surety.

He’d allowed her to set him aflame. To slice through flesh and bone.

Amalie's hands moved to her middle as she curled into herself. It was only then that she became aware of a strange pulse through her center.Had that been there before?It felt like a hum, a warmth. Sitting directly over her spine.

“There’s something wrong with me.” Amalie stumbled forward, bracing herself on the edge of his bed. In her peripheral vision, Theo set down the blood-soaked cloth and dried his hands and chest with a towel.

“What do you feel?”

Amalie froze. The words he’d used. Not, “Do you feel faint?” or “Would a cool compress help?” but“What do you feel?”

Theo watched as if waiting for something, and her skin pricked.

She hunched over her knees, forcing a deep breath. “Just start talking. I need a distraction.” What was happening to her? Was she breaking down like she had after stabbing Theo the first time? As much as she’d trained with the Pourfendeurs, she didn’t seem to enjoy the realities of violence.

Theo turned and stalked toward his armoire. "It's said that in the fifteenth century, a female warrior discovered the sword within the depths of an old church. The walls were crumbling, ivy curling between stonework, overtaking what had once been holy ground. There was no light inside save for the slivers pushing through stained glass windows high above." Theo paused and glanced up through his lashes, studying her face. "She brought it back to their castle, discovering almostby accident that it was capable of vanquishing creatures of the dark."

"Creatures like you," Amalie murmured. She had never heard this story, and the detail in which he told it was unnerving. The Grimoire spoke of ancients, but nothing in the last century.

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