Page 56 of Hollowed

Not because I was told.

Because I wanted to see what it looked like from the place I had first belonged to him.

He stood behind me, silent.

But the silence wasn’t empty.

It was full of reverence. Of need. Of a ritual he hadn’t spoken but had already begun.

The circle wrapped around the letters of my name, drawn unevenly, with lines that trembled like even the stone couldn’t believe I had survived this long.

He crouched beside me.

Placed a hand at the center of my back.

Not to push.

To anchor.

“Say it,” he murmured.

I closed my eyes.

Breathed in the dust.

And said it.

“My name is Aven.”

His hand flexed.

“I was sent here to be erased.”

His breath caught.

“But I stayed.”

He lowered his head to mine.

“Because you weren’t a sacrifice.”

“What was I, then?”

“A vow I hadn’t written yet.”

I turned my head.

Found his mouth.

Kissed him.

It wasn’t soft. It wasn’t savage.

It was scripture.

His hands slid down my spine, beneath the robe, until they found the backs of my thighs. He lifted me without effort, without hesitation, and laid me down in the center of the circle.

My name beneath me.

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