The Mark Is Counting Down
1338 Words
The Mark Is Counting Down
The healer’s room smelled of crushed herbs and blood.
Lina lay on a narrow cot, unconscious, a thin tube in her arm. Her skin was the color of old paper. Wolves in white coats moved around her with the efficiency of people who had seen too many mixed-blood fevers end the same way.
“She’ll live,” the head healer said. Gray braid. Sharp eyes. “For now. The fever only attacks half-breeds. Just like you.”
The words landed like a second branding.
I sat beside the cot and took Lina’s cold hand. Behind me, Darius stood silent in the corner, arms crossed, watching everything and giving nothing away.
“She shouldn’t be here,” he said at last. His voice was low. “You shouldn’t have brought her into this.”
“She was dying.”
“And now Rowan has two leverage instead of one.”
I didn’t answer. There was nothing to say that wouldn’t sound like an excuse.
The door creaked open.
The palace witch shuffled in — bent, milky-eyed, wrapped in layers of black that smelled of smoke and old graves. She went straight to my wrist like she could smell the mark.
“It’s moving,” she cackled. “Hungry little thing.”
I tried to pull my hand away. She held on with fingers like dry twigs.
“The curse feeds on nearness. On touch. On feeling. The closer you get to him, the faster it eats.”
“Then I’ll stay away,” I said.
“Too late for that.” She tapped the black numbers. They burned under her nail. “It’s learning you. In a hundred years he’s had no one. No pack. No touch. No softness. Now he has two. The curse thinks you’re building something. And packs die together.”
Darius’s voice cut through the room. “Can it be stopped?”
The witch held up two crooked fingers. “Two ways only. True love, freely given by both, no force, no bargain. Or one of you dies and the other walks free. Balance. Always balance.”
She left still laughing. The healers followed. Soon it was only me, Lina, and the king who couldn’t sleep.
They put me in a room next to Lina’s. No windows. One bed. One chair. One torch. Orders from the captain of the guard: security risk. The King had decided distance was safer.
I couldn’t sleep. Lina’s coughing came through the wall every few minutes. The mark glowed against my skin.
88.
A soft knock at midnight. Three beats.
I opened the door expecting a guard.
Darius stood there. No crown. No shirt. Just black pants and the full map of his scars. Hair messy. Eyes tired beyond measure.
“Can I come in?”
“You’re the king. You don’t ask.”
He came in anyway and shut the door. He sat on the floor across from me like a man who didn’t deserve the chair.
“I didn’t know,” he said after a long silence. “About the wolf blood. About your sister.”
“Neither did I.”
“I’m sorry, Mira.”
The word sounded foreign in his mouth.
“Don’t be. You gave me a choice.”
“I gave you a death sentence with extra steps.”
“You gave me time with her.” I met his eyes. “That counts for something.”
He looked away. “Why did you take the knife meant for me?”
“Because you would have died.”
“And if I die, you die.” He leaned forward. “Do you understand that?”
“I understand we’re stuck.”
He almost smiled. The corner of his mouth moved and then stopped.
The mark flared without warning.
87.
Darius cursed and stood, pacing the tiny room like a caged thing.
“We can’t even sit in the same space without it taking years.”
“Then what do we do?”
“I don’t know.” He stopped at the door and pressed his forehead to the wood. “Rowan wants me dead. The council wants me weak. And now I have you and your sister and the entire palace watching.”
He turned. “They’re already calling you the King’s pet. The curse-breaker. The death sentence.”
I flinched. “I didn’t ask for any of this.”
“I know.” He crossed the room in two steps and knelt in front of me. Close. Too close. “I’m sorry.”
The words hung between us.
I spoke before I could stop myself. “What if we give it what it wants?”
He went still. “What?”
“Love. The witch said true love breaks it.”
He laughed, short, harsh, empty. “You think I’m capable of that? I haven’t felt anything but rage and hunger for a hundred years.”
“What about when you slept on my shoulder?”
His jaw tightened. “Exhaustion.”
“Liar.”
He was in front of me in one heartbeat. Not touching. Close enough that I felt the heat coming off his skin.
“Don’t.”
“Or what? You’ll send me back to Room 13? The curse will kill me either way.”
I stood. We were toe to toe. I had to tilt my head back to hold his gaze.
“I’m scared, Darius. I’m scared of dying. I’m scared of losing her. And I’m scared that the only way out is to fall in love with the man who branded me.”
He stared at me for a long time. Something cracked behind the gold.
Then he lifted one hand, slow, like I might bolt. His thumb brushed under my eye, catching a tear I hadn’t felt fall.
“Don’t cry,” he said, voice breaking. “Please.”
The mark ignited.
White-hot pain shot up my arm. We both jerked back as if burned.
85.
Two years. Gone in a single touch.
Darius looked sick. He pressed the heel of his hand to his eyes.
“I can’t do this. I can’t take more years from you.”
He walked to the door. His hand shook on the handle.
“I’m moving you and your sister to the north tower. Separate rooms. Guards day and night. No contact.”
“That’s a prison.”
“That’s survival.” He didn’t look back. “If I touch you again, you’ll be dead in a month.”
The door closed. The lock turned.
I sank to the floor.
84.
An hour later the door opened again without a knock.
Not Darius.
Rowan.
He leaned against the frame, rain still dripping from his coat, smiling like a man who had just won a private game.
“Visiting hours are over,” he said pleasantly. “But I make exceptions for family.”
Two guards stood behind him. Lina’s soft coughing still came through the wall.
My blood turned cold. “Get out.”
He stepped inside anyway. “Tell me, Mira. How many years left? Eighty? Seventy?” His eyes dropped to my wrist. “Don’t worry. When it hits zero I’ll be king. And I’ll take very good care of your sister.”
Footsteps thundered in the corridor.
The door slammed open hard enough to crack the frame.
Darius stood there, eyes black, teeth bared, looking like the monster the stories had always claimed he was.
“Touch them,” he said, voice barely human, “and I will end you.”
Rowan raised both hands, still smiling. “Just a friendly visit. Family, after all.”
He backed out. The guards followed.
Darius didn’t enter the room. He stayed in the hallway, breathing hard.
“Pack,” he said. Flat. Final. “Now.”
I looked at my wrist one last time as I helped Lina stand.
83.
We had lost six years since sunset.
And Rowan was only getting started.
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