Chapter Fourteen
Aric
I feel rather than see Rey follow me through the rest of my day. Does she seriously have no pride? I spend hours in my room, failing to focus, sensing her mere inches away on the other side of the wall. When I leave, I hear her door open to follow me before I’m in the stairwell.
I lose her on my second run of the day, as dusk begins to settle like a blanket over the forest. Guess her little black shoes weren’t enough to keep up with me. Into hiking, my ass.
But she’s waiting outside the dorms when I return. Shit. She’s not looking at me, though. She’s shaking her head at the students walking toward the path that leads into the woods and down to the lake, through an ancient archway.
This ritual’s ridiculous, yet people swear by it year after year.
I notice Reeve nearby, leaning against a giant redwood and watching all the freshmen light their candles and walk under the arch. Each time someone passes through and the candle doesn’t go out, they all cheer.
Reeve raises a brow as I approach. “It’s sad what people want to be true. There’s no God up there looking down on them, choosing whose candle stays lit.”
I shrug.
“I suppose it’s good to let them have their fun,” he muses. “Plus, most of them are probably hammered anyway.”
“Most of who are hammered?” Rey. I’d know that voice anywhere. I clench my teeth.
Reeve sighs. “All this talk of God, and Satan’s pet rears her ugly head.” He tosses her a smile over his shoulder that softens his words. “Did you need something, princess?”
Rey pauses near us. I take a step back—not out of fear, but necessity.
She’s been here less than a day, and already the tension in my body feels unfamiliar. Coiled too tightly, like I’m not entirely myself.
It’s always been that way when she was near me, though. I can’t help but notice how she walks into a space and people move without knowing why. They soften. Adjust. As if gravity itself has chosen a new center.
I’ve spent my entire life carving out room for myself within my grandfather’s world. For her, the world seems to make that room on instinct.
I don’t resent her for it, but I recognize it for what it is. She was made to draw people in. I was made to push through them.
If she ever turns that gravity toward me with intention, I don’t know what I’ll become in its pull. And I don’t think she does, either.
Even if we both pretend like it didn’t happen, I remember the real reason our families were at the beach that day two years ago.
Both fathers called it a truce, but in reality, it was a transaction.
Her father offered me unimaginable power—and her if I wanted.
Our families would be bound by marriage, and a lifetime of bloodshed would cease.
Our parents had it all figured out. We would wed on her eighteenth birthday, if I had wanted to accept our betrothal that day.
And I did. That’s the truth I’ve never said aloud.
I went to her on the beach to tell her I wouldn’t accept the deal. That I wouldn’t trade her future for mine. That she deserved better than to be used as leverage.
But sitting beside her, I faltered. I remember the salt air and the space between us, close enough to feel like there was something huge hanging there, something I wouldn’t come back from.
And then she reached for my hand.
Her fingers brushed mine—warm and unsteady—and something in me tilted off center. Then she spoke.
“You don’t have to be like him.”
She didn’t say Odin, but she didn’t need to.
I’ve thought about that moment more than I should in the last two years. Lain awake and played it in my head over and over. At the time, I told myself she didn’t know what she was saying. That she didn’t understand what she was accusing me of.
The truth is worse. She wasn’t wrong.
For one unbearable moment, I considered the deal. I imagined what it would be like to take the power her father offered—and take her with it.
I don’t know what horrified me more: the offer itself or the part of me that was tempted.
But when she spoke those soft words, I felt exposed. Judged. As if she’d seen through whatever mask I was wearing and into the man I was becoming.
So I left before I could become him, and I didn’t look back. At least not until my parents died less than a week later.
I remember how my chest felt after hearing the news—tight, raw, like something cracked from the inside out. I didn’t sleep. I didn’t speak. I just stared at the floor until my grandfather pulled the phone from my hand.
Everyone tried to convince me it was just an accident, that I wasn’t to blame. But I knew it wasn’t. He did this—because I rejected his daughter. And she woke something inside me that will never grow warm again.
Glancing over at the half smile lingering on her full lips, I can’t help but wonder what my life would be like if I’d just said yes. At least my parents would be alive.
My fists tighten. My skin aches, like it’s stretching to contain something it wasn’t meant to hold.
A sound—small, brittle—escapes from my palm. I glance down to find a dusting of frost curling across my skin, delicate and shimmering in the light.
I wipe it away quickly, as if that will make it less real.
It’s nothing.
Just her.
Just me.
Sure, now it wants out. Back then, I would have done anything to awaken a monster that could avenge my parents, but it was buried deep.
“Must be another cold snap,” Reeve mutters, rubbing his arms as he looks up at the sky. “Didn’t feel like this ten minutes ago.”
Rey finally speaks again. “What are they doing under the archway?”
“Witchcraft,” Reeve deadpans. “Or in this case, they’ve heard all of the ridiculous stories about the ancient archway that they believe is a gateway to the Gods. In fact, Endir was built around the archway to preserve it historically.”
I roll my eyes, but ever the tour guide, Reeve keeps going.
“Lake Stevens having any sort of Viking influence that old is kind of wild.” He points out the ancient runes inscribed above the arch.
“Norse, not Viking,” Rey says.
Reeve’s eyebrows shoot up. “Norse, not Viking what?”
Rey huffs. “Viking was a job, not a people. So, all Vikings were Norse, but not all Norse were Vikings.”
She says it like it’s something taught in grammar school, but I have to admit I’ve never thought of it that way before. And she’s right. “Like how all sneakers are shoes, but not all shoes are sneakers.”
Her eyes catch mine and twinkle, a slow smile lifting her high cheekbones even higher. Not that I notice. “Exactly.”
I drag my gaze from Rey’s and fix it on the arch.
A short guy with a cloud of black hair sprints through, shielding the flickering of his candle with one hand, like speed alone will keep something ancient from snuffing out the flame.
He reaches the other side, and his friends erupt in cheers, slapping him on the back.
He lifts the candle overhead, his grin as bright as the fire he managed to protect.
A blond girl steps up next. One foot under the arch, then another. She inches forward like every step might collapse the ground beneath her.
Behind her, a taller girl with a long black braid jogs past, offering an encouraging smile over her shoulder as she clears the threshold in a single breath.
More freshmen follow—some cautious, some confident—raising their candles like trophies once they make it to the other side.
I keep my focus there, pretending to track who makes it through and who falters. It’s easier than letting on that I’m hanging on every word of the conversation unfolding just a few feet to my left.
Reeve is giving Rey the full campus tour in lecture form—names, histories, rumors. I could probably recite it in my sleep. But hearing it from his mouth feels different with her standing beside him.
She listens like it matters. Like any of this—our legacy, our fractured past—is something she wants to understand.
Reeve gestures across campus toward the old stone path that disappears into the woods. “There’s a temple out that way. You’ll see it on the expanded tour…”
Rey leans in, curious. Enthralled.
Eventually, he brings the conversation back to the mystery of the arch, and she steps closer to the stone—one foot away, maybe less.
She stays to the side, out of the path of the freshmen still rushing through, and lifts a hand toward the arch like she’s reaching for something precious.
Her hand glides across the runes, moving up and down with the indentations.
She turns to Reeve and gives him a smile I’ve never seen before. It’s easy. Genuine. The kind of smile that warms people, that opens doors.
It pulls the air from my lungs. I don’t know why it hits so hard—only that it does.
“It’s one solid basalt arch,” she says, wonder tucked into the curve of her voice.
Reeve moves to stand beside her without hesitation. Like he belongs there.
I stay where I am. Because I don’t.
“Lots of ancient fishermen claimed it was here before they even settled the land, but who knows. Some say it’s a gateway, others say it’s a shrine to the Gods.
Either way, it’s tradition to pass through with a candle.
” He motions at the arch and tosses her a grin.
“If the candle goes out, it means the Gods have forgotten you and misfortune will follow. If your candle stays lit, it means the Gods still remember and will favor you. It’s why students cheer when they go through. ”
Rey laughs. “Ah, meaning the Gods remember them. Do they even realize who the Gods are?”
She freezes like she said something wrong and bites her lip.
I tilt my head, then catch myself. I do not need to hang on every single thing this woman says. As if to prove my point, I shove my hands in my pockets and grumble, “I’m headed to bed.”
I don’t wait for anyone to answer, just start walking off, and Reeve rushes to catch up to me. He grabs my arm, pulling me to a stop, a mischievous twinkle in his eyes, and says under his breath, “We should make her go through it and blow out her candle to scare her.”
“Yes,” I shake my head and mutter. “Because blowing out a candle will definitely scare the daughter of Satan. Not interested.”
Reeve rolls his eyes. “Bro, you didn’t see her expression.”
I roll my eyes right back. “Why do I have to participate, then?”
“Supervise.” He shrugs. “You’re supervising.”
“I’d rather not.”
“Hey, Rey!” Reeve calls back to where he left her beside the arch. “Aric wants to see you try!”
Great. Killing him later.
He’s wearing his most charming grin, which means she can’t really say no. Not that he gives her any time to do so. He’s already dragged me over and is leading us both to the back of the line of freshmen waiting to cross through.
Rey starts pulling away. “No, I’m good. I’m actually really tired.”
“Afraid?” I scoff, the word sharper than I mean it to be. Something tightens between my shoulders at the sight of her hesitating. “It’s just an old archway. I’ve done it a ton,” I say. Total lie.
I’ve never gone under the damn arch. Not once.
There’s something about it that puts me on edge. Not in some mystical, haunted way—just enough to keep my feet moving in the other direction.
I’ve already experienced enough weird shit in my life. I don’t need to add “creepy magical college architecture” to the list.
“Of course, he’ll go with you,” Reeve volunteers, clapping me on the back. Yup, I’m going to murder him. My own brother. What’s that called again? Fratricide?
By the time we reach the line of freshmen still waiting to go under, many have backed up, some actually silent in awe.
Reeve and I have a reputation in school for rarely talking to lowerclassmen, never mind joining them in their ridiculous games.
Feels like the whole group has been stunned into silence while Reeve grabs two of the plain black candles from the stack on the wooden stump and lights them, handing one to me and one to Rey. “All right, off you go!”
“I hate you,” Rey says to him under her breath. “I told you I didn’t want to do this.”
“Feeling’s mutual.” Reeve winks, then shares a look with me. Right. I’m supposed to blow out her candle. Of all the elementary things, I swear.
“This is stupid,” I say out loud, my breath fogging in front of my face as the temperature continues to drop outside. A chill runs down my spine as Rey and I stand in front of the basalt archway. “Let’s get this shit over with. I’m tired.”
“Same,” Rey mutters next to me.
We both slowly walk under the archway as a mist crawls from the forest and down the pathway toward our feet. Once we’re all the way under the arch and to the other side, I turn to blow out her candle and notice the flame’s already gone.
Extinguished.
The Gods have forgotten her, then?
I slowly look down at mine.
It’s covered in fucking ice. Completely covered, as if I’ve just dipped it into water and frozen it.
I drop the candle immediately and stomp on it, breaking both the candle and the ice wrapped around it. The last thing I need is Odin’s daughter seeing it. “What’d I say? Dumb.”
Rey does the same and rubs her hands against her pants. “Yeah, weird. Mine didn’t even last. Guess I’m forgotten. Too bad.”
If I didn’t know better, I’d think she looks a little sad.
Reeve groans. “The stupid mist rolling in blew both of them out. You should go again.”
I level him with a hard look. “If you’re so obsessed, you go. I’m headed to bed. It’s been a long day.”
My hands shake the entire walk back to the dorm. It was just a stupid cold snap.
I repeat this in my head over and over again as I make my way to my room.
I’m still muttering it as I change and get into bed.
I’m still repeating it when I hear Rey’s door open and close and when she finally rustles herself into bed.
I turn toward the wall and stare at it. She can’t get comfortable, either.
Annoyance hits long and hard when the sounds of her flipping over only to flip again drill directly into my brain.
I’m half tempted to bang on the wall and tell her to lie still before I strap her to her bed.
But then a flurry of visions of actually holding her down in that bed and pressing my mouth against hers fills my brain.
I jerk to a sitting position and smack my face. “No. Nope. None of that. No.”
“Stop talking!” Rey yells from her side of the wall, banging with each word.
I bang right back. “I wasn’t talking to you!”
“Then stop talking to yourself! Some people need sleep!”
I’m going to kill both her and Reeve at this point. “You stop yelling.”
She pounds the wall again. “Sleep.”
She says it like a command, and I find myself lying down in obedience, staring at the stupid wall. Again.
“Ass,” I hear her say under her breath.
That’s it. I raise my middle finger toward the wall.
One whole semester.
Only one of us is going to survive.
I gave her a chance to run years ago.
Now I’ll feel zero guilt over a little blood spilled, because she was foolish enough to stay.