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Sylvia

R eturning with Jon to the spectral plane two months ago had been a horrible, irrevocable mistake. Every minute we were entwined as equals made me more insatiable. Being here with him again now, in this liminal space where only we existed, only deepened that hunger.

I straddled his hips, ignited by the solid feel of him between my legs. The more I touched him, the more I needed. His large hands slid up from my waist, one knotting in my hair. He pulled, and a moan slipped from me.

“Jon,” I gasped.

I remembered when his name had been so ordinary on my lips. Now, it was sweet like sugar on my tongue: a blessing, a prayer, this monumental thing.

Jon arched up to catch my parted lips, kissing me like he needed me more than air. I readily returned the fervor, my wings giving an involuntary flutter at the brush of his tongue against mine.

These stolen moments were perfect and golden, quickly becoming a post-hunt tradition as lingering adrenaline fueled our passion. Addiction might be a better word, but I didn’t care. Being together like this felt so fucking good with the spectral plane providing a private world for us alone. Our sanctuary.

It was hard to believe that this world once housed the Ancients who tormented and drained me. The transcendent landscape was peaceful now, though vast in a way I still couldn’t comprehend. The changing colors of the sky and ground—though distinguishing the two was difficult—created a mesmerizing backdrop.

As I’d spent more time in this place, I had made an effort to make sense of its secrets. The stolen pages of nomadic journals I'd smuggled out of Elysia provided such meager depth. In hundreds of years, only a handful of fairies had ventured to this place. There was no guidemap, no rules. This time, I alone was the pathfinder; I was the one to document my experiences in the spectral realm for generations to come.

If I ever managed to find a place to call home again, that is. Until then, my scrawled notations on blank parchment and annotations to the map Mother had given me rested solely with me.

At times, the plane teased me with images at the edge of my vision—dreams or memories. Sometimes familiar glimpses of willow fronds or hummingbirds. Other times, unfamiliar human structures and flames, like Jon’s mind was slowly leaving traces here, too. But whenever I tried to get a better look or point Jon’s attention to focus on them, the visions dissolved.

Jon’s hands returned to my waist, plucking at the waistband of my leggings. The gentle pressure grounded me, though it lacked tangible warmth in this place. I sat back, arrested by my own happiness that glowed like a kernel of sunlight in my chest.

“What is it?” Jon asked, a slight crease forming between his eyes.

I took my time in answering. I stroked fingertips through his tangle of dark hair, chewing my lip as the action stirred emotion in his face and slowed the feverish beat of his heart.

“Sometimes it stings,” I said, “knowing I could have been this happy all this time.”

A smile spread on his face—my only warning before Jon’s grip tightened, cementing me in place as he effortlessly sat upright.

“Would you like to see what you’ve been missing?” Jon asked.

My legs were wrapped around his waist, our bodies fused so we were nose to nose. Grinning, I leaned my forehead against his.

“I wish we could have shared revels together,” I whispered. “You would have loved the wine. And the company.”

Jon made a noise in his throat. “Based on what you’ve told me about revels, I wouldn’t care for them.”

“Why?” I blurted, unable to mask the defensive edge to my voice.

His dark gaze devoured me. “If you think I’d want to share you, you’re dead wrong, chula .”

He punctuated this by hoisting me tighter to his front and lowering me onto my back, straddling me, arms caging me in as he leaned down to brush his lips to mine. I forgot to breathe for a few moments, silently delighted by his strength. Even here, he was considerably taller. I felt weightless to him.

The pressure of our friction should have ignited discomfort on my bruises after being throttled during the hunt. The spectral plane masked pain and made even the deepest scars fade. While we were able to explore each other’s unmarred bodies with wonder, the aches were always waiting for us when we opened our eyes in the physical world.

Giggling, I brushed the tip of my nose against his. “No one has to share at a revel,” I said. “There are ways to signal that you’re not available for other partners that night.”

He looked unconvinced. “Like?”

“Special runes.”

His stare darted to my cheek, where a far different rune was etched—the one scar that I could not escape, even here. I dragged my finger over his bare chest, eager for a distraction, and left a cerulean glow in my touch’s wake. My face flushed as the symbol took form. This particular set of interwoven swirls signaled a much deeper connection than the casual relationship Jon and I had tentatively agreed upon.

Don’t get too attached.

We had promised each other—but he couldn’t tell one Fae rune from another.

After peeking down at the mark on his chest, his eyes slid slowly back up to mine and flooded with wicked shadows. “You want me to mark you?” he asked.

The words alone set me aflame. Fucking stars —even forever wasn’t long enough when Jon said things like that. He lowered himself to brush his lips against the side of my neck.

“I’m short on magical runes,” he said, breath tickling my pulse. “I’ll have to mark you my own way. Would you like that?”

Something between a whimper and a laugh escaped me at the thought of being branded by Jon. Yes, yes, yes , I thought, nodding breathlessly. A thousand times yes.

A rare, low chuckle spilled from him at my reaction. His thumb applied pressure over the spot his lips had occupied as though preparing me. When he leaned in again, his teeth teased my skin, digging harder and harder. I opened my senses, allowing myself to feel the delectable pinch.

There would be no visible sign of his passion when we awoke in the motel room, making me all the more determined to sink into the moment. This was the only time he allowed himself to be firm with me, to not treat me like something fragile that would shatter under the slightest pressure.

Jon pressed a final, softer kiss to the spot he marked and then pulled back to admire his work. My heart fluttered at the satisfaction on his face. In an instant, he dropped to leave a trail of kisses down my collarbone, between my breasts, and toward my navel. He paused suddenly, going rigid.

“Jon? ”

His expression became shadowed as he raised himself slightly to look at my ribs—no doubt remembering the ugly bruises he’d glimpsed when I stripped down at the laundromat. He traced the area with chilling precision.

“Nothing hurts me in here,” I purred, pushing myself up on my elbows to kiss him. To my surprise, he jerked back, expression darkening. “Hey. What’s wrong?”

Jon searched my face for an unhurried moment before answering. “If we find another case on the way to Aelthorin,” he said slowly, “I’d like you to consider staying back from the hunt.”

My eyes widened before I could temper my expression. The fact that the request was made out of tenderness softened the blow only slightly.

“We’ve had this conversation before,” I said, determined to keep my voice a sweet murmur despite the outrage flooding me. “I know when to pull back if things get really bad.”

“And that low-level vamp still got the jump on you. Got his hands on you.”

“He threw you across the room just as hard.”

“That’s—it’s different. You know it’s different. I can take it.”

“You don’t get to define how strong I am.” The words came out with more of a bite than I’d intended.

Jon faltered, the urgency on his face softening into untethered affection that made me molten.

“Of course not,” he murmured. “I wouldn’t dare. But I—” After struggling to string together the right words,Jon sighed through his nose, shifting his weight to one arm so he could sweep a lock of my hair off my face. His fingertips were warm, his touch drugging. “I don’t want to lose you. There’s just something about you, Sylv. I couldn’t bear it.”

Focusing on anything was hard with the pleasant weight of his body over mine, my own body demanding to arch into him, to claim him.

“What happened to don’t get too attached ?” I teased—though the shared mantra at the beginning of our time together felt age-old now.

“Guess I fucked up,” Jon said, brushing my jaw.

I let my eyes fall shut, leaning into his hand. It was so gentle, so tender, I almost forgot how dangerous he could truly be. I was glad my days of being prey were long behind me–because that look on Jon's face would surely lure me into letting my guard down.

In the recesses of my mind, his request for my safety stirred uneasily, but the matter could be dealt with another time. He would come to his senses when the veil of lust and adrenaline wore off.

I smiled coyly up at him, eager to distract from a potential argument. “What exactly is it about me? Enlighten me.”

Eyes darkening in the way that made my stomach flip, Jon leaned down.

“You’re brave. And kind. And dangerous.” He punctuated each word with a kiss, trailing over the intricate lace of my bralette.

“And pretty?” I prompted.

“Beautiful.” Jon’s lips brushed the traitor mark on my cheek. “ Eres tan hermosa como las estrellas. ”

A delighted giggle spilled out of me, heart fluttering as his lips stole mine again. “I love when you say nice things to me in Spanish. I’m going to assume that was nice, at least.”

A familiar thrill rushed through me as we entwined. Sometimes, our time together still felt unreal, like Jon would always be this myth just out of reach. This rush rekindled the memory of our first return to the spectral realm—the dizzying, almost unbearable anticipation as we shared our second kiss. That deceptively innocent brush of lips flooded me with something electric and dangerous, making me ravenous. Out of all my partners, none had ever made me feel so reckless, so alive .

I didn’t have to wonder if Jon felt the magnetic pull—the one that tugged us toward something we shouldn’t want but couldn’t resist.I saw it in his eyes. We shared the same wild hunger. We were both twisted in the same way.

I gripped his shoulders, feeling the hard-earned muscle on him. Though reality shifted from blink to blink, the solidity of Jon’s body pressed over mine was constant. I could feel his hunger, his aching care for me in every move he made.

He slipped a hand beneath me and massaged between my wings—a trick he’d learned early on in our time together. His mouth stretched into a smile against my neck when I rewarded him with a pleased moan, the sensitive skin hugging my wings coming alive under his touch. The spectral plane glowed blindingly bright in response to my ecstasy, forcing my eyes to squeeze shut. When I peeked past Jon’s shoulder, the sky and ground shimmered with shooting stars, bright hues of pink and cerulean swirling together. They bled together like watercolors, the air abuzz with silent magic that raised hairs on the back of my neck.

Jon and I broke apart to observe the spectral realm shifting around us. He collapsed beside me, and I cuddled up against him to lay my head on his chest. The miraculous display settled, but brilliant sparks still streaked in and out of sight.

“Sorry,” I said sheepishly. With each visit, this plane seemed to root deeper into the connection with my mind and heart—for better or worse.

He stayed quiet for a few seconds, the warm brown of his eyes mixing with the manifested colors as he drank it all in. “Don’t apologize—it’s you . The most beautiful things about you.” He rubbed my arm up and down.

My throat went tight. I had one job in this arrangement— don’t fall for the lethal hunter you’ll have to leave .

I shifted nervously against him, tucking hair behind my ear. “Jon, do you believe in soul bonds?” My voice was unusually soft and restrained as I absently traced another rune across his chest.

He turned his head, studying me. “I don’t know. I never really thought about it.”

“It’s just another old Elysian story,” I said. “The concept of this invisible golden thread of starlight tied between two souls—unbreakable, always pulling them together, even when it defies all logic. A thread that spans through all time, all distance. Like somehow… the stars intend that they should meet.”

“Sounds like destiny,” he mused. “That can be dangerous if you’re not careful.”

A deflection . Good—that was good. One of us had to be strong enough to keep lines drawn.

I let my tracing fingers drift to his throat, easing my vulnerable query into a purr. “Oh, I see. Still afraid of me?”

Jon put his hand over mine, making me marvel at how his hand encompassed my own. He applied a firm pressure to his throat with my hand, shooting me a soft, sinful smile. I was suddenly grateful he usually saved these grins for me, so that no one else would know how it made him glow like a benevolent god—the corners of his eyes crinkling, the dimples that flashed.

“I’ve always known there was a chance you’d be the death of me, Sylv.”

I kissed him for that, crushing our lips together. The spectral plane colors pulsated with every taste of his skin, glistening corals and golds nearly blinding us. When a bright shape arced particularly close to us, I drew off him to observe it. The display was beautiful—not quite fairy magic, but familiar in a strange sort of way. Like a building storm cloud made of light, it ebbed and flowed in a gentle, snaking pattern above and below us.

“I can barely wrap my head around how much you affect this place. It’s incredible,” Jon said, though I felt him grip me to his side tighter—perhaps the small dizziness he seemed to experience here from time to time, now that I knew heights unsettled him.

“It’s you, too,” I pointed out, thinking of the flashes of his mind I’d seen in the distance. Maybe if he was more intentional about his influence, the images would be less unsettling. “I’d love to see you try.”

He frowned. “Try what?”

I waved my hand at the luminance my passion had conjured. “Taking control.”

“I don’t know the first thing about wielding magic.” There was an edge to his voice. “I doubt I could make it change, anyway.”

I groaned, nuzzling his jaw. “Do you always have to be such a human? Come on—just try. I could get back on top of you, if you think that’d help motivate you.”

He snorted, then fell silent. I glanced up to see a look of concentration shadowing his face.A thrill of surprise ran through me when the soft colors around us were flooded with cool shades of veridian and blue. For a single second, our influence seemed to mingle in perfect harmony. The sight filled me with excitement, but Jon gave a small gasp—one of alarm.

Sudden, vicious clouds roiled on the horizon, fast-approaching. I sat up, glimpsing the house on fire in the distance, much closer than I’d ever seen.

“Jon—” I covered my mouth when I spotted blood trickling out of his nose. That never happened this soon. “Oh, no.”

He sat up halfway with a frown, touching the blood. Without waiting, I chanted the spell to drag us back to reality.

In an instant, we both woke with sharp intakes of breath, lying side by side on Jon’s bed in the motel room in Holly Grove, Arkansas.

I sat up on the pillow, blinking hard to make out the red numbers on the alarm clock: 1:54 a.m . Our time in the spectral plane had felt like half an hour at least, yet only two minutes had passed here. Adjusting back to real-world sensation was still jarring. My ribs ached. My wings were sore. But most painful was the familiar pang of disappointment at losing our equal stature.

I flew up as Jon fumbled for a tissue. Nothing else translated from the spectral plane back with us, but his nosebleeds were real. It happened every time we visited the plane together—Jon left exhausted, a small trickle of blood marking his right nostril. Tissues were always at the ready near his pillow for that reason. He normally bounced back within the hour, but it was hard to shake my guilt that I was left unaffected.

Still, we both agreed that lightheadedness was a small price to pay for the moments we stole together in our secret sanctuary.

“You good?” I asked as Jon sat against the headboard with his head tilted back, the tissue pressed to his nose.

He gave a noncommittal grunt and a thumbs up, but the anxious knot in my gut was not appeased. Having our session cut so abruptly was unusual. I suspected his attempt to alter the spectral landscape must have taxed his human capacity. My flight drooped a little when I recalled that look he’d had on his face—like he’d been afraid of his own ability to control the strange magic there. Unnatural.

Bile rose in me. Two months ago, he might’ve said the very same thing about me.

The bleeding tapered off a few minutes later. Jon tossed the crumpled tissue into the bin between the beds, posture straightening where he leaned against the pillows and headboard. A fragile sense of relief took hold of the room as he caught his breath.

“I think I broke our sanctuary,” he announced with a self-deprecating chuckle.

“You did not,” I huffed, rolling my eyes. I fluttered down to sit on his bent knee—one of my many favorite perches. “It was only your first try, anyway. Don’t be a baby. ”

Eager to keep that hungry look in Jon’s eyes—and take both our minds off the dark turn in the spectral plane—I rubbed the side of my neck and shot him a vixen’s wide smile.

“I swear I can still feel it,” I murmured. I tapped the spot. “Right… here .”

Fuck, it was worth it just to see that sinful sort of pride flash over his face. Jon cupped his hand behind me, his thumb brushing that sensitive spot between my wings.

“Next time, I’ll mark you hard enough it comes back with you,” he said.

I shivered. “I’ll have to hold you to that.”

My gaze fell to the patch of earth that lay on the bedspread beside Jon. My outline of the spectral rune was still there, intact. We were lucky that we didn’t need to lay on the ground outside to activate the spell—a pile of dirt poured from a plastic bag worked perfectly fine to satisfy the spell’s demand for contact with the earth. If Jon wasn’t so sapped from our visits, I would have begged to reactivate the rune immediately.

The neighboring bed was empty. Cliff had departed to the nearest bar shortly after donning freshly laundered clothes. Maybe he found someone else to go home with for the night. Good—he deserved to enjoy himself after a hunt.

I glanced back to Jon, who was tracing the spot on his arm I had healed during tonight’s hunt. It was barely visible now—just smooth skin with a faint hairline shimmer under the lamplight—but he kept staring at it with a faraway look in his eyes and his face carved into an expression I couldn’t quite read. My stomach sank when I remembered his plea for me to sit out from future hunts. Was he still imagining how I’d been injured? Angry with me for refusing his request?

I studied him, feeling the familiar tug between the intimacy of what I knew so well of him and the shadows of what I didn’t—depths I might never reach, no matter how I tried. His five years on me both thrilled me and unsettled me at times, a reminder of everything he had seen, everything he carried. He had already been hunting malevolent spirits for a year when I was first learning how to control my affinity.

“Hey—it’s your turn, isn’t it?” I asked, breaking the silence.

Jon groaned out a laugh. “Not this again.”

“Come on, you love it.”

“I tolerate it.”

“Liar. You wouldn’t keep playing if you didn’t like it,” I countered, breaking into a grin.

He didn’t need to question what I meant. A game of sorts had taken shape between us in past weeks, where we shared memories based on simple prompts to uncover more about each other. The game was for his sake, really. Now that I no longer had to keep secrets from him, I could babble endlessly about my life. Jon, though… He had a harder time opening up.

Nonetheless, his eyes lightened at the change of subject. “Give me a prompt, then.”

“Candy,” I said without hesitation.

He rolled his eyes, settling against the headboard. “Nope. Anything I say is gonna end with you demanding sweets.”

“I do not demand. I ask very politely.” I pouted, hugging one leg close and dropping my chin to my knee in thought. “Fine. Tell me more about your restaurant. You said if you ever gave up hunting, you’d open one.”

“That’s a big if , remember?” Jon said.

“Even still,” I urged. Determined though he was to bury it, I saw the tiny gleam surface in his eyes.

Jon cast his gaze toward the window, where patterned curtains concealed our view of the sleeping city. “It’d be hard. Barely fifty bucks to my name and a high school drop-out to boot.” He puffed out a sigh. “Not to mention, any standard background check will reveal my prolonged visit to the psych ward. Even getting a job washing dishes could be a longshot.”

“Put logic to rest for now,” I said. “Say you get the money somehow, and your restaurant is open. What would it be like?”

Slowly, his expression unknitted. “It wouldn’t need to be a big place. I always picture something cozy. Something that could feel like home. I could give some of my family’s recipes fresh life.”

“Like tostones ?” I asked, hoping I wasn’t butchering the pronunciation.

Jon beamed at me. “Right. And lechón asado —though, you wouldn’t miss that one.”

“Meat?”

He nodded. “But the seasoning… It’s fucking unreal, Sylv. Garlic and citrus and spice. Especially if we had a professional cooking it,” Jon said, clicking his tongue. A pause drew out, his voice taking a softer decibel. “I’d always make sure we had a room curtained off in the back, just for friends and family. They’d never have to pay a dime.”

My gaze lowered, tracing the familiar map of scars on his chest and arms. Some were faint, barely noticeable. Others were still discolored like the skin would never fully heal—and I had tried my hand at it more than once. But only master healers could unwind such deep scars; it was a particularly advanced magic that my secondary affinity simply couldn’t offer.

His body was a story—though, I couldn’t tell if it was a legend or a tragedy yet. A particularly discolored scar was nestled below his collarbone. Victory scarcely came without a cost. Not for the first time, I wondered what Jon might’ve been if life hadn’t turned him into a weapon.

I let myself sink into his happy fantasy, tried to picture his remaining family gathered around a special table at the restaurant. I imagined faces for the members he had mentioned—adding a few extra cousins and uncles he may have omitted. I pictured Jon happy , with that wide smile that made me weak in the knees.

Curiously, I found it difficult to insert myself into the scene, but I was too well-versed in daydreaming to let that barricade me. I muscled through the feeling of being uninvited in my own reverie. And then I was sauntering into the restaurant, as human as any of them, colorful skirts dancing around my heels. His family was thrilled to see me, and Jon swept me into his arms in front of everyone—

“That’s beautiful,” I said.

Jon chuckled, the sound low and callous. “It doesn’t mean anything. It’s just a nice thought.”

“Of course it does!” I blurted.

The heavy look he gave me made me sucked the air from my lungs. “We both know hunters don’t get endings like that. I’ll just be lucky if I get a little peace before one of these bastards does me in someday.”

I blinked, his bluntness slicing through the lingering warmth of my daydream.

“You don't have to believe that,” I offered. “If memory serves, you’ve been wrong before.”

I lifted a brow, attempting to goad another laugh out of him. Instead, I watched walls go up behind his eyes. Jon looked back down at his healed forearm, rubbing it.

“I can’t just walk away. If I stop, people will die,” he said. “Innocent people. Families. How could I live with myself for that? There’s too much out there.”

I let the heaviness settle for a moment, refolding my wings at my back. “People will always need someone. Why does it have to be you ?”

“Sylv, you know why.”

I recoiled slightly because I knew those shadows in his eyes, how his grief so often curdled into anger. I knew about the countless nights he had tossed through nightmares, trying to forget his father’s voice when he knew it wasn’t really his father anymore.

Staring at him, it hit me like a blow; nothing else would ever be enough. Jon would never be satisfied—no tally of victories enough to sate his conscience.

I was raised to believe that bad things happened sometimes to make room for something new, something better . But sitting here with him, both of us adrift without our families, I couldn’t bring myself to voice any sage optimism. It would feel hollow and insincere. We had each other, but I hesitate to assume he felt the same comfort in that fact. We were temporary. I was a lost cause.

“I just wish you could have a beautiful end,” I murmured. “You deserve that.”

“Yeah, me too,” Jon conceded.

As his gaze softened on me, growing pensive, I couldn’t help but feel a seed of hope despite it all. Maybe he could still defy his fate—with or without me by his side. The thought stirred something raw in me, an ache that made my chest tight.

Aching to hold onto him .

The reality stung more than I liked to admit, knowing that my place in Jon’s future was as much of a fantasy as any far-fetched dream. If he did build another life for himself someday, I would certainly not be a part of it. I never minded rotating partners with Damian, moving person to person between revels. But suddenly, the image of another woman at Jon’s side made me heat—stealing my daydream.

“Would you remember me if you did ever make it out of hunting?” I asked.

“I’ll try to keep you straight out of the dozens of fairies that have saved my life,” Jon answered, deadpan.

He was trying to get a laugh out of me, but that possessive beast in my chest was restless, had me reaching for my sheathed dagger at my hip. I gave it a little flip, the way Cliff had taught me, and I was proud when my fingers caught the handle instead of the blade. “Would it help if I left something behind?”

Jon’s breath stilled, his brows pulled together as I slowly twirled the blade in my hand. “Like what?”

“A symbol,” I said, studying his bare torso to pick my place. “So anyone who comes next will know you were mine once.” The idea possessed me. I’d never once considered it before, but now I could hardly breathe for my anticipation.

Jon’s answering smile was caught between surprise and heat. “You want to mark me ,” he breathed.

I hovered by his right shoulder, meeting his gaze as I set the tip of my blade to his sun-kissed skin. “Yes,” I all but growled.

I could feel his pulse quicken, but he didn’t pull away. He stayed still, waiting .

I held my breath, hesitating for a moment before plunging my dagger into his skin. There was more resistance than I expected, and I heard Jon suck in a sharp breath. I glanced at his face—his eyes shut like this was a delicious kind of pain, a kind to be savored. And it was mine to give.

His blood ran over my knuckles in thin streams. Jon didn’t breathe a word of protest as I carved the Fae rune over the strong slope of his shoulder—interlocking circles and delicate swirls, a brutal approximation of the one I had given him in the spectral plane. Teenagers playfully designated this marking for their beloved , but the sentiment seemed to take a more potent translation as it seeped blood.

It went against every instinct not to immediately conjure spellwork to heal Jon. No— not this time. When it did heal, slowly and painstakingly, the symbol would scar over, and my mark would join the story of scars on his body. With him always. My heart leapt to my throat. It was more beautiful than I’d imagined.

I heard a soft breath escape Jon, and I nearly flinched—pulled out of my reverie to gauge his expression.

“You know,” he said, gingerly brushing a finger over the fresh cuts. “You’re just as twisted as I am.”

The shadowed half-smile on his face nearly undid me.

I studied the dagger in my hand, a soft chuckle drawn out of me. “I don’t mind being a freak if it’s with you,” I said.