Page 30 of The Devil's Canvas

My mother watches me closely, unreadable. "You can see her emotions despite the bargain you made with her father? Well, that’s good, that means your bond is strong."

My uncle exhales. "It’s progressing faster than it should."

My father nods, his gaze unwavering. "A bond this strong, this early—it means you’re already sinking into each other. Soulmates can sense each other in ways no one else can."

I don’t move. "Explain."

My mother folds her hands in her lap. "When a bond starts, the connection is weak, like a thread barely tied together. At first, it’s the unshakable knowledge that they exist and that they are yours."

"It will grow," my father continues. "The bond strengthens over time, weaving the souls together, letting them sense each other. And once it’s strong enough, soulmates can do more than just feel each other."

"They can hear each other," my uncle says, his voice measured, deliberate.

"Read each other," my aunt adds. Her gaze lingers, steady but distant, like she’s remembering something she can’t forget. "Not just surface thoughts. The deepest parts of them. The pieces no one else can touch."

My mother’s voice is steady, absolute. "And once the bond fully solidifies, distance doesn’t matter. You will always know where she is. If she’s in pain, you’ll feel it. If she speaks to you, you’ll hear her—no matter where she is."

The room feels smaller. I already feel her. Already see her emotions when no one else can. And if this is moving faster than it should… "So what does that mean for me?"

My father’s expression darkens slightly. "It means whether you wanted this or not… you’re already tied to her in a way you can’t undo."

I roll my shoulders, inhaling slowly. "This is complicated."

My aunt exhales softly. "Soulmates are never supposed to be easy."

The room stays silent. No one disagrees.

Because we all know—this will break something before it fixes anything.

Chapter Six

Ophelia

It'sopeningnightatmy friend, Emilien Marchand’s, gallery. I’ve never missed one of his openings, and although he's been begging me for years to let him put my art on display, I just can't. It's not good enough.

I straighten my earrings and adjust the high collar of my jumpsuit. I’ve been trying to cover the ‘Mark’ as I’m calling it, but nothing is working other than clothes. When I tried to put makeup over it, it literallymeltedoff, as though there’s some sort of heat source inside it. I’ve tried scrubbing, wiping, scar serums, the only thing I haven’t tried was burning it off and scar removal surgery.

His name is burned into my very being.

The pressure in the room plummets, the air growing dense, suffocating, pressing down on my skin like something unseen is closing in. My lungs tighten, my pulse skitters, a slow, creeping awareness settling deep in my bones. The mirror trembles, a ripple moving across the glass—slow, deliberate—like a breath exhaled onto frozen air, like something stirring beneath the surface.

It shifts again. The reflection warps, bending inward, stretching like liquid metal, its edges pulling in on themselves. It should stop there, should snap back to normal, but it doesn’t. Shadows coil at the edges, thick and shifting, blurring the line between real and fantasy, smearing the glass like ink bleeding into water. My chest tightens, my fingers curling against my sides as my stomach twists, and for a second, I think it’s a trick of the light, some distortion from my own movement—until I blink and realize that my reflection is gone.

A slow dread creeps over me, settling deep, a weight in my chest that refuses to let go. The mirror moves, the glass swirling like a storm caught beneath the surface, silver and black churning together. The frame vibrates, a faint hum rising from it, not from the walls or the floor but from the mirror itself, a pulse, an exhale, something waiting on the other side. The center darkens, stretching open, swallowing the light in the room. My heart pounds against my ribs as I step back, my legs locking in place, because this isn’t normal, this isn’t possible. But it is happening, whether I understand it or not.

It looks like an office. The hazy flicker of bookshelves, the gleam of dark wood, shadows pooling where they shouldn’t be. The image distorts, as though I’m looking through water, shifting between clarity and something else entirely. My pulse hammers, breath unsteady, body locked between the instinct to run and the pull to stay.

Julian.

I stop breathing.

Not the Julian I know. His eyes are deep red, swirling like molten fire, shifting like embers caught in an unseen wind. His features are too sharp, too sculpted, as though carved by forces older than time. Not human. Not even close. The air around him distorts, a slow ripple, like heat rising off pavement, but it’s cold, the temperature in the room plummeting as though something is draining the warmth from the air itself. The shadows behind him pulse, shifting, coiling, like they have a mind of their own.

Julian Duvain. In my mirror. Watching. Waiting.

I whip around, searching the room, my breath a sharp, uneven thing scraping against my ribs. But I’m alone. No one is here. Just me. Just him. Just the impossible weight of this moment pressing into my chest. Slowly, I turn back.

He’s still there.

---