Page 70 of Ghoul Me, Maybe

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“This isn’t a choice.”

And then I speak the incantation.

The words hit the air like thunder underwater—wrong and right all at once. They coil in my throat, rip themselves out like they were always there, buried in my blood. I speak in two languages: the one my mother taught me, and the one the sea never wanted me to know.

The beach stills.

No wind. No waves. No sound.

Only the circle.

Onlyme.

Only him.

My voice breaks.

My blood drips into the center of the sigil.

The sand drinks it like wine.

A vibration ripples outward—faint at first, then building into a low hum that reaches deep into my bones. The sigil ignites, ghostlight shooting from the lines like veins, stretching far out toward the wreck.

The sky splits open.

And I fall.

I don’t hit ground.

I fall intonothing.

Cold. Black. Endless.

A place beneath the world. A place not meant to be seen—justfelt.

And in that dark, he’s there.

Not mist. Not an illusion.

Him.

Whole. Barefoot. Shirtless. Covered in the sea.

His eyes lock with mine. The shock on his face is something between awe and agony.

“What did you do?” he whispers.

“I found the way,” I say, voice trembling.

“Youcan’tbe here?—”

“I can.”

“You tied your life to mine,” he says. “That kind of binding—itchanges you.It doesn’t undo. Ittakes.”

“I don’t care.”

He steps toward me. “You don’t know what you’ve done.”

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