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AURELIE

I stretch my fingers against the wicker basket handle, its rough texture grounding me. The market buzzes with life I've only glimpsed in snatches during the past few months. Today, though—today I'm not hiding. Today I'm just another face in the crowd, and the sensation feels foreign but welcome.

Even if Rolfo was pretty adamant about me staying out of the market—which was unlike him. But he promised to never take away my choices or force me so in the end, he just promised to accompany me.

"Look," I nod toward bright banners crisscrossing overhead, dyed in colors so vibrant they seem almost defiant against the permanent crimson sky of Ikoth. "I've never seen the market like this before."

Rolfo's mercury eyes scan the crowd, always alert, but when he glances down at me, something in them softens. "Harvest festival. Only happens once a year."

Sephy coos against his broad chest, tiny fists grabbing at his shirt. The sight of my daughter nestled so comfortably against him still takes my breath away sometimes. Her pale violet eyes—so unlike my hazel ones—peer out curiously at the world. She's bundled in a soft blanket Rolfo found somewhere, her silvery-blonde curls peeking out beneath.

"She likes it." I reach up to touch her cheek, and she immediately wraps her tiny fingers around mine. "All the colors, the sounds."

"Takes after her mother, then," Rolfo says, his low voice barely audible above the crowd. "Always watching, taking everything in."

Heat rises to my cheeks, and I busy myself with adjusting my basket. There's something in his tone lately that I don't know how to respond to. Something that I feel but can't process yet—despite the way he has me sharing his bed because it's what I want.

The musicians strike up a lively tune somewhere ahead, the beat infectious. Smiling faces pass us by—demons of all kinds, celebrating something older than any of them. They pay us no mind. Here, I'm not property. Not someone's escaped possession. Just a woman walking with... with what? My protector? My friend? Something more that neither of us has dared name?

"Want to try this?" Rolfo gestures toward a stall selling steaming cups of something that smells like spiced nimond.

"Yes," I say, perhaps too eagerly.

The vendor, a blue-skinned woman with eyes like liquid gold, hands us two cups. "For the little one, when she's older," she says with a wink, dropping a sweet wrapped in wax paper into my basket.

"Thank you," I murmur, still unused to casual kindness from strangers.

We continue forward, the crowd thickening as we approach what must be the central square. I stay close, fingers lightly holding onto Rolfo's coat. The leather is worn soft at the edges, just like the man himself—rough exterior, unexpected gentleness beneath.

A stall to my right catches my eye—glass beads that catch the light, throwing rainbows against the dark stone buildings. Just for a moment, I pause, drawn by their simple beauty.

"These are lovely," I say to the merchant, picking up a strand of beads in deep amber that remind me of autumn on worlds I've never seen.

The merchant launches into a story about how they're made, each one blown individually over open flame. I listen, momentarily captivated, my fingers tracing their smooth surfaces.

"What do you think of—" I turn, question dying on my lips.

Rolfo is gone.

My heart stops, then hammers against my ribs. Sephy is gone too. The space where they stood moments before now filled with unfamiliar bodies, pressing, moving.

"Excuse me," I say, voice thin as I push back toward where we were standing. "Excuse me, please."

The crowd seems to swell suddenly, bodies pressing from all sides. Banners that seemed festive moments ago now wave like warnings. The music turns discordant in my ears.

"Rolfo!" I call, rising to my tiptoes, scanning above heads. His height should make him visible, but there are too many people, too much movement. "Rolfo!"

My fingers clutch the basket handle so hard it might snap. Panic rises, thick and choking. Without him, without Sephy in my arms—I'm exposed. Vulnerable. The scar on my arm where Kaelith marked me seems to burn anew.

"My daughter," I say to someone, anyone. "My daughter?—"

But no one stops. No one listens. I'm invisible again, but not in the way that keeps me safe.

I spin in place, desperately searching each face, each form. Where could they have gone? Did something happen? Did someone take them—take Sephy?

Or did Rolfo simply decide this arrangement had run its course?

No. He wouldn't. Not with Sephy.

The thought of my daughter—my miracle, my reason—lost in this crowd, or worse, sends ice through my veins.

"Rolfo!" I call again, louder, not caring who hears, who might recognize me. "ROLFO!"

I spin wildly, my heart hammering against my ribs as I scan the sea of faces. Nothing. No Rolfo. No Sephy. Just strangers pressing in from all sides, their celebrations continuing as my world collapses.

"Please," I beg, grabbing the arm of a passing demon woman. "Have you seen a tall demon with black hair? Carrying a baby?"

She shrugs me off with a scowl, and I stumble backward. My basket slips from my fingers, clattering to the ground. No one notices. No one cares.

The crowd shifts, opening momentarily, and I catch a glimpse of an alleyway to my right. Something pulls me toward it—instinct, desperation, I don't know. I push through bodies, mumbling apologies that fall on deaf ears.

"Rolfo!" I call one last time, voice cracking.

The alley is darker, cooler, the festival noise dulling as I step between buildings. I catch my breath, trying to think clearly, when a shadow detaches from the wall. Something in me recognizes him before my eyes do—like prey sensing a predator.

My blood freezes in my veins.

Kaelith stands before me in simple clothes, not his usual finery—dark trousers and a plain shirt, his ice-blonde hair tucked beneath a cap. But the disguise is meaningless. I'd know him anywhere. Those pale gold eyes with their fiery inner ring. That slight curl at the corner of his mouth. The way he holds himself, like the world belongs to him.

Like I belong to him.

"Aurelie," he says, my name on his lips a violation. "What a happy coincidence."

I back away, my throat closing up. "Stay back," I manage.

He laughs, and it's the same laugh that once echoed through his chambers while I cowered. "Is that any way to greet your master? After all this time?"

"You're not my master." The words come out stronger than I feel. "I don't belong to you."

"Don't you?" His fingers twitch, almost lazy.

Pain explodes in my limbs. It's like being submerged in fire, like every nerve ending is being pulled apart. I try to scream, but my voice dies in my throat. Magic—his magic—coils around my chest, my wrists, invisible but suffocating. My feet leave the ground as the spell tightens.

I struggle against it, muscles straining, but my body won't obey. I'm paralyzed, suspended in his magical grip, helpless.

The world blurs through tears of pain and terror. All I can think is: Sephy. My baby. She needs me.

Kaelith steps closer, his face swimming into focus. He reaches out, brushes a strand of hair from my face with mock tenderness.

"I missed you," he murmurs, his breath hot against my cheek. "Did you think you could hide forever? That I wouldn't reclaim what's mine?"

I try to spit at him, but my body won't respond. The magic constricts tighter, and blackness edges my vision.

"Your little... adventure," he continues, tracing a finger down my arm to where his mark burns beneath my sleeve, "has been inconvenient. But it ends now."

The shadows around us deepen, stretching unnaturally. They crawl up my legs, my torso, cool and slick like oil. Kaelith's chaos magic—the kind demons rarely share with outsiders. The kind he used to punish me when I displeased him.

"Don't worry about the child," he says, and my heart seizes at the mention of Sephy. "I'll find her too. A daughter of my blood belongs with me, not in some gutter with whatever filth has been harboring you."

A strangled sound escapes me—the only protest my body allows.

"Shh," he soothes, as the shadows engulf us both. "It's time to go home."

The alley, the festival, the world—it all disappears as the shadow magic consumes us. I'm aware only of Kaelith's grip on my arm, the pain of his spellbinding me, and the roar of festival-goers just feet away who can't see what's happening in the darkness.

No one sees us vanish. No one hears my silent screams. The celebration continues, oblivious, as I'm swallowed by shadow and the nightmare I thought I'd escaped.