Page 159 of She Who Devours the Stars

I didn’t say anything.

She looked up, blinking fast, then snapped the spell with a grin. “But you, my darling, you’re family now. Which means you get the full treatment. No shortcuts.”

She let go of my hands, rummaged through the bags, and produced the main event: a leopard print bodysuit, sleeveless, with a high-cut leg that screamed “midnight felony” and aplunging neckline so deep it was basically theoretical. She held it up, radiant. “You’ll wear this. With these.” She brandished the heels.

I drew the line at the heels. “Absolutely not.”

She snorted. “We’ll see.”

I got into the bodysuit with surprising ease. It clung everywhere, refusing to wrinkle or sag. Velline zipped me in, then stood back to admire her work.

“Oh, honey. You’re unstoppable.”

She pushed the heels onto my feet before I could stop her. They were exactly as tall as my dignity was short. I tried to stand, failed, and caught myself on the edge of a rack labeled “Dramatic Entrances Only.”

Velline clapped, delighted. “You’re a natural! No, don’t look at me like that. Come here. You have to see this.”

She led me, teetering, mortified, over to a wall of mirrors. For a second, I didn’t recognize myself. Then I did, and it was so awful it looped back to incredible. I was all angles and ferocity, my mythprint flaring like it wanted to set the outfit on fire, and my face was so perfectly cruel I could have started a minor coup just by raising an eyebrow.

I let out a breath. “I look like a villain’s evil secretary.”

Velline leaned in, lips pressed to my ear. “You look like you could save the world. Or ruin it. Same difference.”

She turned me by the shoulders, studied the profile, then dabbed at my eyes with a soft brush. “You know, Fern would have hated this. But she’d have loved to see you wear it. She always liked a girl who could pull focus.”

I nodded, slowly. “She did.”

Velline was quiet for a long beat. Then, softer: “She’s coming back, you know. She has to.”

I swallowed hard. “If anyone can, it’s Fern.”

Velline smiled, but her eyes were raw. “I’m sorry I didn’t make it easier. She always had to do it her way. Even when it hurt.”

I didn’t know what to say. I stared at the mirror, hating the way my face betrayed nothing, not even the ache in my chest.

“Do you think she’ll like it?” I asked, voice barely above a whisper.

Velline grinned, savage and perfect. “She won’t have a choice. She’ll be too busy staring.”

I managed to laugh, sharp and brittle.

Velline hugged me, quick and hard, then let go. “Now go. Show the universe what a Meldin looks like when she’s ready to win.”

I left the wardrobe, heels clicking like gunshots down the empty corridor.

At the end, I caught my reflection again, alone in the long wall of glass.

I looked ridiculous.

I looked beautiful.

And as I stood there, the mythic pressure in the air doubled. I could feel the storm building, the hunger at its center.

When Fern came back, I was going to make sure she never got away again.

But the moment she did, I was burning this outfit to ash.

Thread Modulation: Dax Meldin