7. Thyra
SEVEN
THYRA
Iwake to pain.
Not the familiar ache of ritual cuts or the dull throb of blood loss. This is different—a blaze across my collarbone, sharp and insistent, like fire pressed to flesh. I reach for my chest before my eyes fully open, fingers finding bandages where skin should be.
What—
“Don’t touch it.” A voice, old and cracked. One of the Archivist Elders. “The marks are still settling.”
I force my eyes open. The infirmary ceiling swims into focus—grey stone, alchemical lanterns burning low, shadows pooling in corners. I’m lying on one of the narrow beds reserved for keepers who push too far. I’ve been here before. More times than I’d like to admit.
But I’ve never woken with this sensation. This brand, seared raw into my skin.
“What marks?” My voice comes out raw. Dry. How long have I been unconscious? “What happened?”
The Elder moves into my field of vision. The oldest of the three who run the Archive—the one who speaks for the others, whose name I’ve never been permitted to know. Her face is grave. Her luminescent eyes carry an expression I’ve never seen before.
Fear.
“The grimoire marked you.” She settles onto the stool beside my bed, movements careful, deliberate. “While you were unconscious. A claiming sigil.”
The words don’t make sense. I’ve been the grimoire’s keeper for six years. I’ve fed it twice daily, bled for it, killed for it. If it wanted to mark me, it’s had thousands of opportunities.
Why now?
I push myself upright despite the Elder’s protests. The room spins. My hands—wrapped in fresh bandages, cleaner than the makeshift strips the spell-burner used—throb with the memory of wounds. But the pain in my collarbone is worse. Deeper.
A claiming sigil. The grimoire is claiming me.
“Show me.”
The Elder hesitates. Then she reaches forward and carefully peels back the bandages covering my chest.
The sigil burns beneath the linen—literally burns, giving off a faint red-gold glow that pulses in time with my heartbeat. Lines of raised skin trace patterns I recognize from the grimoire’s pages. Script that writhes even when carved into flesh, letters that rearrange themselves as I watch.
The mark covers my collarbone from shoulder to shoulder. A brand. A declaration.
MINE.
The word appears in the center of the sigil, rising from the scarred flesh like an accusation. Then it dissolves, replaced by another.
KEEPER.
Then another.
CLAIMED.
“It’s been writing since you lost consciousness.” The Elder’s voice is carefully neutral. “The words change. The mark doesn’t.”
I press my palm against the sigil. The heat is intense—not painful exactly, but present. Insistent. A reminder that the grimoire’s claim goes deeper than blood payment now. Deeper than the binding that’s kept me tethered.
It’s not just using me as an anchor anymore. It’s declaring ownership.
“Why?” The question comes out sharper than intended. “Why now? What changed?”
The Elder exchanges a glance with her companions—I notice them for the first time, hovering near the doorway, their aged faces tight with concern. No one answers immediately.
Then the youngest Elder steps forward. “The spell-burner. His presence has… accelerated things. The grimoire’s activity has increased tenfold since he arrived.”
Korrath.
His name rises unbidden, and with it comes awareness. A tug I didn’t notice before, a hook lodged deep in my chest. I know where he is—not in the room, but nearby. Close. The mark tells me that much, pulling toward him like a compass needle finding north.
The mark on my collarbone aches with sudden heat.
“Where is he?”
“The corridor.” The eldest Elder’s voice carries warning. “He’s been waiting since he carried you here. Three hours.”
Three hours. The spell-burner has been standing outside my door for three hours while the Elders tended my wounds. Not pacing. Not raging. Just… waiting.
Why?
I swing my legs over the side of the bed. The motion sends vertigo crashing through me—blood loss, exhaustion, the strange new burden of the grimoire’s mark seared into my flesh. I grip the bed frame until the spinning stops.
“You shouldn’t be moving.” The Elder reaches for my arm. “You need rest. The blood you lost—“
“Can wait.” I push myself upright. My legs hold, barely. “If he’s been standing outside for three hours, he has questions. And I have information he needs.”
“Thyra.” The Elder’s hand closes on my wrist—gentle but firm. “The grimoire may be using your connection to the spell-burner to manipulate you both. Be careful what you feel in there.”
I pull my wrist free. The words land somewhere uncomfortable, because I can’t yet tell the difference between what’s mine and what the grimoire put there.
I’m bound to it. I feel what it wants me to feel. How much of my attraction to the spell-burner is real, and how much is manufactured?
I don’t have an answer. And standing here won’t give me one.
“I need to speak with him.”
The corridor outside the infirmary is dim and cold.
Korrath is exactly where I expected him—against the far wall, waiting with the patience of a man who’s learned how to hold still. He’d been there three hours, apparently. He looks like it.
He looks dangerous.
He looks beautiful.
The thought arrives unwanted, unwelcome. I shove it aside and step into the corridor, letting the infirmary door swing shut behind me. The click of the latch echoes in the silence.
“You carried me here.” Not a question.
“You collapsed.” His voice is gravel, rougher than I remember. “Bled out too much playing hero.”
“I was buying us time.”
“You were being reckless.” He pushes off from the wall, and the motion brings him closer. Not threatening—just present. The heat of his body reaches me across the remaining distance, tangible despite the corridor’s chill. “That was my fight. You should have stayed back.”
“If I’d stayed back, the grimoire would have kept feeding on your destruction until it broke containment entirely.” I hold my ground as he approaches. “I know what I’m doing.”
“Do you?” He stops an arm’s length away. Close enough that I have to tilt my head back to hold his gaze. “The Elders told me about the mark. About the claiming sigil.”
My hand moves to my collarbone without conscious thought. Beneath the bandages, the sigil pulses with heat. Responding to his proximity.
“The grimoire is… invested.” I choose the word carefully. “In my survival. And apparently in making sure I don’t leave.”
“You were already bound to it.”
“This is different.” I pull at the collar of my robe, exposing the edge of the bandages.
Beneath them, the sigil’s glow is visible—red-gold light seeping through the linen.
“The original binding was containment. This is possession. The grimoire isn’t just using me as an anchor anymore. It’s claiming me as property.”
Korrath’s jaw tightens. His hand moves toward his chest—a reflexive gesture, fingers pressing against the spot where his mating mark burns. I noticed that mark during the battle, caught a glimpse of it through his torn shirt. Sigils that shouldn’t exist for him. Magic that shouldn’t have chosen me.
“The binding still stands.” The words come out steadier than I feel. “Your mission is complicated.”
“I know.” His voice is flat. “You mentioned that before.”
“My mission hasn’t changed.” He takes another step closer, and suddenly the distance between us has shrunk to almost nothing.
I can smell him—smoke and iron and the char of recent battle.
The scent should repulse me. Instead, it makes my pulse quicken.
“I came here to destroy the grimoire. That’s still the objective. ”
“Even if it kills me?”
The question hangs in the air. His expression doesn’t change, but I see the flicker in his eyes. The hesitation he can’t quite hide.
“The binding breaks when the keeper dies.” The words are deliberate. Measured. “Most of them.”
“Most of them.” I let the emphasis land. “And the exceptions?”
“The magic goes somewhere. Usually into whoever’s closest.” His gaze holds mine, unflinching. “Usually messily.”