Claimed by the scarred Alpha

MARGAUX

The fae was the first to speak. "Who is this Alpha?"

I was too stunned to speak. So Laurent did for me.

"Like she vaguely mentioned, we met him in the library of our pack grounds. He was supposed to be an ancestor of the Valcourt line. We... thought he was trapped in the library. So Margaux offered him a favor to let him out. Turns out that is bullshit too."

"That is scary. The demon presented itself to you as a ghost," Arania said carefully, her small face carrying something serious. "It is not lost on me that you encountered it shortly after your binding broke too. That is not coincidental."

I could not help myself. "What?"

She flew back to my shoulder and stayed there. "The thing is... You whisperers are bridges between the living and the dead, between this realm and what exists beyond the edges of it. Demons have understood that connection for longer than human civilization has existed. It is, in fact, the origin of the witch race. A demon found a whisperer and made an offer at exactly the moment that whisperer needed something most. The pact that followed locked every descendant into the arrangement going forward."

It was a lot. It was too much. I shook my head. "What the heck is going on? I came here to know if I could beat a witch... All... All these new information is too much."

Ophelia reached for my hand. "I am aware."

It felt like she was being honest about that part. But the chill in my body couldn’t be calmed.

I had to ask.

"So this demon," I said, "is trying to do the same thing to me."

"It has probably been watching you since your binding broke," Ophelia said, withdrawing her hand. "Possibly arranging circumstances to ensure you feel isolated and in need of something it can offer. From what my superior spirit has told me about them, demons do not force. They create conditions. They wait for the moment when the offer looks like salvation." She looked at me directly. "How many times over the past week have you been in a situation where you desperately needed help and none was available?"

I thought about the bathtub. The garden attack. The corridor with the invisible hands around my throat.

That was entirely Séverine. But did it know? Was it... I shook those thoughts off.

"Several," I said. "But that was because I was attacked by a witch. The time I met Amine in the Valcourt library... It helped me."

"It’s already attempting to gain your trust," Ophelia said. "This spirit here probably threatened whatever it had planned. Which is why it escalated to attacking this spirit companion of yours. It is running out of option and patience."

Arania too chimed in. "If you didn’t know about it until now, it was obviously still just stalking you. I am not surprised it is seeking you out. Without being connected to any spirit, you have a strong spiritual energy."

"Am I... Am I going to become a witch now?" I stammered.

Arania shook her head. "Not if you beat it at its own game."

Ophelia nodded. "You have to save yourself now. You have to make a pact with a superior spirit like I have."

I swallowed against the dryness in my throat.

"I assume you can help me."

Arania’s expression softened with something that looked almost like sympathy.

"I hope so," she said. "But not all superior spirits happen to be altruistic like me. Many of them are ancient, proud creatures with little interest in mortal affairs. They can simply decide they have no desire to bind themselves to you, and if they do, there is very little anyone can do to change their minds."

A knot settled deeper into my stomach.

"So there’s a chance they just... refuse?"

"There is." She gave a small shrug, elegant even in so simple a movement. "You can certainly try. Sometimes a spirit finds something about a person worth answering."

Her smile turned faintly nostalgic.

"I met Ophelia when she nearly wandered into some fairy ring while being lured there by a sidhe. Had I arrived moments later, she would have belonged to something far less kind."

Ophelia let out an embarrassed little laugh.

"I was very young."

"And very foolish," Arania added lightly.

"I know."

I let out a slow breath.

"Okay."

My gaze drifted to the pale, gelatinous creature resting where Prim was supposed to be.

"What about the witch marks... and her?" I pointed toward the trembling blob. "Can you help with that?"

Without answering immediately, Arania drifted away from us.

She floated through the room with effortless grace until she stood above Prim’s new form. The tiny blob quivered as though sensing her presence.

Arania circled it once, studying it in silence.

"This is not exactly a spiritual deficit," she murmured.

She lowered herself until she hovered only inches above it.

"She split."

The words hung in the room.

I frowned.

"Split?"

Instead of answering, Arania extended a single finger and rested it gently against Prim’s translucent surface.

The blob rippled beneath her touch.

Her eyes slowly closed.

For several long seconds, nothing happened.

Then her brow drew together.

"...I can sense her."

Ophelia straightened.

"You can?"

Arania nodded without opening her eyes.

"Her other self."

A strange current stirred through the room, subtle enough that I questioned whether I had imagined it.

"It isn’t gone," Arania continued quietly. "It is simply... elsewhere."

She withdrew her hand.

"I will try to call it over."

Prim’s blob trembled more violently, as though it had understood every word. While Arania remained focused on it, Ophelia turned back to me.

"As for the witch marks..."

I immediately looked at her.

"...it is possible."

Hope flared so suddenly it almost hurt.

"Really?"

"Yes."

She glanced toward Arania before continuing.

"With spirit light, they can be removed."

Relief rushed into me before she lifted a hand.

"But I do not recommend using your own spiritual energy. The best move for now is to first make a soul pact with a superior spirit."

My shoulders sank.

"Why? I have done it before."