Eli stands alone under the cold glow of the hallway lights, the Fourfold asleep behind the dorm room door. He told himself he just needed air, five minutes, maybe less — but now he's here, feet frozen to the cracked tiles, pulse hammering like it wants to break free.
The hallway feels like a throat that might swallow him whole. The mark under his collar tingles — not burning, not screaming, just alive. Awake. Waiting.
He should turn back. He should crawl back to Celeste's muttered dreams, Jace's half-snores, Liam's steady breath by the window. But something pulls him forward — a tug in his ribs that feels too much like a leash.
At the far end of the hallway, the shadows ripple. At first, Eli thinks it's the flicker of the old overhead light — but then the shadows move, slip, peel away from the wall in the shape of a man too tall, too still.
Khyro steps into the dull wash of the hallway lamp. Frost clings to the hem of his coat, a cold mist curling around his boots. His eyes catch the light like moonlit glass.
"You shouldn't be here," Eli says, but it sounds too thin to matter.
Khyro doesn't smile. He never does when they're alone. "Neither should you."
Eli's mouth goes dry. He hates how his knees feel weak, how the mark throbs in response to Khyro's closeness. He hates that a part of him wants to step closer instead of running back to the Fourfold's warmth.
Khyro watches him for a heartbeat that stretches too long, like he's reading words Eli never wrote. Then he moves — just a step closer, enough for Eli to see the frost ghosting off his breath.
"The mark is weakening the wards," Khyro says, voice so low it scrapes Eli's bones. "Your friends think they can hold back what's coming. They can't."
Eli shakes his head. "We're stronger than you think."
Khyro's eyes soften — barely, a hairline crack in an ancient mask. "You're strong. They're breakable."
A pulse of anger sparks in Eli's chest, small but bright enough to cut through the chill. "Is that a threat?"
"It's a fact," Khyro murmurs. His hand lifts — slow, deliberate, fingertips brushing Eli's collar as if he's memorizing the shape of the mark beneath. "This brand doesn't belong to them. Or you. Or me."
Eli's breath stutters. The cold of Khyro's touch sinks through cloth, straight to the root of his spine. "Then who—"
Before he can finish, a sound slices through the frozen hush — footsteps, heavy, unbothered by the ward lines.
Zyren steps into view like he owns the hallway, a curl of dark smoke trailing after him. His eyes glow faintly red in the flickering light, like embers refusing to die out.
"Well, well. Look at this little midnight rendezvous." Zyren's grin is all sharp edges. "Khyro, you really do have a soft spot for our precious mortal."
Khyro doesn't move, but Eli feels the shift in the air — frost stiffening, shadows coiling tighter. Zyren steps closer anyway, ignoring the frost biting at his boots.
"You shouldn't be here," Khyro says, each word a blade of ice.
Zyren laughs, soft and sweet like poison in tea. "And yet, here I am. Because your leash dog here wandered too far from the kennel."
Eli flinches as Zyren's fingers brush his jaw, warm where Khyro's touch is cold. The mark between them pulses, raw heat crawling under his skin.
"Stop," Eli whispers. But neither of them do.
Zyren leans in, nose brushing Eli's temple, voice curling like smoke in his ear. "The Fourfold can't keep you caged, little star. Not when your blood hums like this."
Khyro's hand snaps out, gripping Zyren's wrist before he can press closer. The temperature drops so fast Eli's breath turns white.
Zyren's grin never falters. "Careful, prince. We wouldn't want to tear him apart before he ripens, would we?"
Eli shoves them both away with what strength he can scrape up. His back hits the wall, the mark blazing so hot he swears he smells singed cloth.
"Enough," he says, voice hoarse but steady. "I'm not yours. I'm not anyone's."
Zyren chuckles. Khyro's eyes flick to him, a silent war that promises ruin in frost and fire.
And Eli? Eli breathes. In. Out. He holds onto that single truth — the only thing that's his.
He's still breathing.
In the distance, he hears the muffled sound of footsteps — Celeste's frantic whisper, Jace's hiss, Liam's soft magic crackling like static in the walls.
Khyro steps back first, snow melting at his boots. His gaze lingers on Eli like a vow.
"Stay alive."
Zyren tilts his head, lips curling in a mock bow. "Try not to burn out too soon, darling."
They slip into the shadows — one a curl of frost, the other a lick of smoke. Gone before Celeste rounds the corner, knife drawn, eyes wide.
"Eli!"
But Eli is already sinking down the wall, breath ragged, palms pressed to the mark that won't stop humming.
He whispers to himself, small and cracked.
"I'm still mine. I'm still mine."
Celeste finds him first. She drops to her knees in front of him, palms pressing to his shoulders, fingers trembling but her voice sharp as broken glass. "Eli, hey—hey! Look at me. Look at me."
He lifts his eyes, fighting to focus through the haze. The mark is still warm, throbbing under his collar like it wants to break his ribs apart and crawl out. He can feel Khyro's frost still clinging to his skin, Zyren's warmth like a ghost on his jaw.
"I'm fine," he lies, voice scraping out like an old hinge. "I'm okay."
"Liar." Celeste's hands slide to his face, thumbs brushing his cheeks like she can wipe away the truth sticking to his bones. "You went out here alone? With them loose?"
Eli tries to answer but Jace barrels up behind her, boots squeaking on the hallway floor. He glares down at Eli like he wants to punch him for existing. "You're an idiot, Serrano. Do you get that? Idiot."
Liam appears behind them, quiet as always. He doesn't speak — just kneels beside Eli, pulling his wrist into his palm, pressing his thumb to Eli's pulse like he needs to feel it, count it, prove it's still beating steady.
"I just needed air," Eli says again, softer this time, because it sounds so stupid now. He tries to laugh but it cracks apart in his throat.
"Air?" Jace spits the word like it's poison. "Air with a vampire prince at your throat and a demon breathing down your neck? That's your idea of air?"
Celeste shoots him a glare. "Jace. Not now."
Jace mutters under his breath but stalks a few paces away, running a hand through his hair like he wants to pull it out by the roots.
Liam's thumb strokes over Eli's wrist, slow and grounding. "They didn't hurt you?"
Eli thinks about the chill that settled in his bones when Khyro touched him. About the way Zyren's voice curled under his skin like a promise. "No," he lies again. "Not really."
Celeste sees through it but doesn't push — not here, not now. She just helps him up, steadying him when his knees protest.
"Back inside," she says, voice iron and gentle all at once. "We're not sleeping alone tonight."
Eli lets them pull him back down the hall, past the half-flickering lights and cracked linoleum, back through the dorm door heavy with iron nails and chalk runes. Jace locks it behind them, clicking it shut like he's sealing a vault.
Inside, the air is warm, thick with the scent of sage they never bothered to air out. Eli sinks onto his bed, shoulders brushing Celeste's, Liam settling beside him like a silent promise. Jace leans against the door, arms crossed tight.
For a long while, no one says a word. The quiet hums around them, restless with things they can't name yet.
Eli closes his eyes, fingers brushing the mark like he can press it deeper into his chest — hide it under bone, under blood, under every lie he has to keep telling to stay whole.
Celeste's hand finds his. Small. Warm. Real.
"The Fourfold doesn't break," she whispers.
Outside, beyond the cracked glass and runed door, frost creeps and shadows curl and the mark hums its secret tune.
But here — here in this circle — Eli breathes.
The lights are off now. Just the faint glow of the desk lamp flickers by Celeste's pile of half-burned ward papers and scraps of salt. Jace paces near the door, boots silent against the thin rug. Liam sits cross-legged by the window, eyes tracing the moon's path like it's spelling out an answer only he can hear.
Eli sits on his bed, knees pulled to his chest, the blanket bunched around him like a too-thin shield. His phone rests beside him, screen dark. He doesn't bother turning it on — there's no message that can fix this, no alarm that can keep the monsters out. No lie that can erase the mark.
Celeste breaks the hush first. She's sitting on the floor, back pressed to the side of Eli's bed, notebook balanced on her knees. The pen taps a steady rhythm against her lip. "I've been thinking."
Jace snorts without looking up. "Dangerous."
She ignores him, flicking him a glare before turning her eyes to Eli. "The runes. The mark. The way they keep showing up where you are — the old library, the chapel, now here. It's not random."
Eli lets out a breath. "I know."
Liam shifts his gaze to them, silent but listening.
Celeste flips to a page in her notebook — half runes, half frantic notes in tiny print. "They're not just marking territory. They're tracking something. Or someone."
Jace stops pacing. He turns, arms crossed. "You mean him." He jerks his chin at Eli like it's obvious.
Celeste nods. "Or whatever's inside him."
Eli's pulse jumps. He curls tighter, fingers pressing over the mark like he can smother the hum beneath his skin. "What do you mean inside me?"
Celeste chews her pen cap. "Something is feeding on you. Or through you. The wards are holding back the obvious threats — claws, teeth — but the mark is inside. It's not just a brand. It's a door."
Jace's jaw clenches. "So we slam it shut."
"It's not that simple," Liam says quietly, voice breaking the hush like a smooth blade. He leans forward, elbows on his knees. "If you slam a door without checking what's halfway through, you don't lock the threat out — you trap it with you."
Eli laughs, a raw, hopeless sound that cracks his throat. "So what do we do? Just sit here? Let them fight over who owns me first?"
"No one owns you," Celeste snaps. Her hand shoots up, grabbing his wrist so tight he can feel the small tremble in her fingers. "You hear me? Not Khyro, not Zyren, not whatever nightmare branded you. You're still you."
Eli swallows the ache in his chest. He wants to believe her. He wants so badly to believe that there's a piece of him that can't be carved out, burned out, claimed.
Jace drags a chair over, drops into it backward, arms folded over the backrest. "So what's the plan, boss?" He tosses the word at Celeste, but his eyes flick to Eli, softer than he wants them to be. "You're the brain. Fix it."
Celeste shakes her head, exhaustion flickering behind her sharp eyes. "We need more. More answers. More pieces. More than just burned salt and half a prayer."
She glances at Eli, voice gentler. "And you need sleep."
Eli almost laughs again. Sleep feels like a joke now — but when Celeste drags herself up and nudges him to lie down, he lets her. Lets her tuck the blanket tighter, even though they both know it's useless against the cold pressing in from the cracks.
Jace turns the lamp down low, his shadow stretching like a silent vow across the floor. Liam stays by the window, still watching the moon. Celeste curls up on the floor beside the bed, notebook still open on her chest, pen slipping from her hand.
Eli watches them — these tired hands holding him together at the seams.
Outside, the frost still creeps. The shadows still breathe. The mark hums like a heartbeat that doesn't belong to him.
But inside this room, for a few stolen hours, Eli is his own.
Sleep doesn't come easy.
Outside, the campus is a coffin of frost and murmurs. Somewhere in the dark, iron nails hum like they're trying to hold the world together with threads too thin to see.
Inside the room, the Fourfold hold their silence like it's the only shield they have left. Jace sits on the floor by the door, his hoodie pulled over his head, headphones on — but Eli can tell the music's not playing. He's listening for footsteps. For claws. For anything that might come scratching at the wards.
Celeste shifts every few minutes, mumbling half-formed plans into the fabric of her sleeve. A new rune. A stronger salt circle. Another half-burned page of scribbles that might be their salvation or their curse.
Liam stays by the window until dawn creeps in, pale and bruised, the glass sweating with cold. He traces something in the fog on the glass — a rune, maybe. Or a promise.
Eli watches all of it from his bed, eyes half-lidded, drifting between dreams and waking. Sometimes the mark flares — a flicker of heat under his ribs that pulls him under into visions of frost and flame. Khyro's eyes. Zyren's grin. Words he doesn't remember learning, echoing in the dark behind his eyelids.
He wakes with a start when Celeste brushes his forehead with the back of her hand. "You're burning up," she whispers. Her eyes flick to the mark she can't see, only feel when his pulse jumps under her palm.
"I'm fine," Eli lies again. He's getting good at it. Maybe too good.
"You're not," Celeste says, voice low but unyielding. She squeezes his wrist. "You don't have to carry this alone."
Jace cracks one eye open from his corner. "Damn right he doesn't." He kicks at the wall for emphasis. "Next time those bloodsuckers or ash-breaths want a piece of you, they'll have to crawl through me first."
Liam doesn't speak, but when Eli shifts his gaze to him, Liam just nods once — the kind of nod that says he'll stand in front of a monster if it means Eli gets one more breath.
Eli wants to say thank you. Wants to tell them he's sorry, that he's terrified, that he's grateful for every stubborn heartbeat they're guarding like it's their own. But his mouth is too dry, the words stuck behind his teeth.
So he just lies there. The mark hums under his collar. Outside, the frost retreats under the weak dawn light. Somewhere deep in the campus, a bell tolls once — a reminder that the world outside still spins, even as theirs threatens to crack wide open.
Jace cracks open the door, peering down the hallway like he's daring it to move. "I'll get coffee. Nobody dies while I'm gone, got it?"
Celeste snorts. "Bring back sugar this time, king."
Liam cracks a small smile that doesn't reach his eyes.
Eli watches them all — these three flawed shields standing between him and the monsters clawing at his ribs.
And when Jace steps into the hallway, Celeste slumps against the bed, Liam's head drops back against the wall, Eli lets himself believe — just for one heartbeat — that the monsters won't win tonight.
The mark under his skin thrums louder. A promise. A threat.
Eli closes his eyes.
They're not broken yet.