A S H R I E L

The hum finds me before the frost does. A sharp vibration beneath my skin, a reminder that the Rift never sleeps. It ripples out from the town, carried on the night air, pulling like a hook set deep into bone.

I felt it at the café, an echo breaking the quiet, spirals threading into the mortal world where they do not belong. I shouldn’t have lingered in the shadows outside, watching her laugh with him, pretending for a heartbeat that she was only a girl and I only a man. The Rift doesn’t care for such illusions.

By the time I return to the academy grounds, the air is colder. Colder than it should be. The lamps lining the paths burn dim, their glass fogged with frost that creeps from the iron posts. The wards whisper their unease, faint cracks in the veil.

And then I hear it: the muffled cries spilling from the girls’ dormitory.

The Oath stirs, pulling me forward. Whether I will or not, my steps carry me to her door.

The hum of the Rift grows louder as I reach the threshold.

It thrums low beneath my skin, a vibration I can’t shake, as if frost is crawling through my veins. By the time I step into the courtyard shadows, the air is already sharp with it, wrong and unnatural. The girls’ dormitory windows are misted white from the inside.

I shouldn’t be here. Guardians aren’t meant to linger outside mortal thresholds. But rules mean nothing against the Oath. When her breath stutters in the dark, when the Rift stirs too close, my body moves whether I command it or not.

So I stand in the frost-heavy silence, watching.

A muffled cry cuts through the hall beyond the door. Another, sharper this time. Then the hurried pound of footsteps. Light spills across the threshold as the door flies open, and two girls tumble into the corridor, clutching their blankets tight around their shoulders. Their feet skid on a sheen of ice spreading along the floorboards.

Frost spirals. Already blooming, curling like veins across the dormitory corridor.

My hand closes around the hilt of the blade that isn’t there until I will it to be. Frostlight flares along its edge, quiet, patient, ready.

And yet, I don’t step inside. Not yet. Because she’s in there. And if the Rift has reached her bed, I’ll have to choose between the oath that binds me to protect her, and the truth that protecting her means keeping my distance.

A door creaks somewhere above. Footsteps pad hesitantly down the stairs. Then another cry, a girl’s voice, higher, sharp with fear.

I shifted my weight, blade angled low at my side. The Oath claws at me to move, to step inside and end the spiral before it spreads. But I still force myself. The wards in the dormitory are meant to keep creatures like me out, even if I am no longer fully one of them. I should not break that boundary.

The frost does it for me.

It creeps along the corridor boards, spilling into view through the open door. Thin lines first, then spiral markings I know too well. They pulse faintly, feeding on the fear inside.

Then I hear her.

Elle’s voice cuts through the noise, not loud, not even certain, just a breath, the sound of her waking into the wrong kind of night. The frost stills as if listening. My grip on the blade tightens until frostlight sparks along its edge.

She steps into the hall seconds later, scarf clutched tight around her throat, eyes wide in the torchlight. Her bare feet skid on the ice. The other girls crowd behind her, shivering, whispering.

And then her gaze finds me through the doorway.

She stops dead.

I see it, the flicker of relief that softens her shoulders, the fear that lingers anyway. Safe and afraid, all at once. She should turn away, shut the door, retreat to her bed like the rest of them. But she doesn’t. She lingers, breath clouding white, caught in the space between us.

I should look away. I don’t.

The Oath sings under my skin, binding me tighter to her with every breath she takes.

The frost shifts.

At first it only curls harmlessly along the walls, a pattern etched in silence. Then the hum spikes, sharp enough that I feel it in my teeth. The spirals flare brighter, feeding, reaching.

One of the girls behind Elle stumbles forward. Her name, Juniper, I think, catches in the whispers that thread through the dorm halls at night. She stretches out a hand to steady herself against the wall.

Her palm meets ice.

The frost answers.

She screams as her skin sears white, patches blooming like dead flowers across her fingers. The sound splits the corridor, panic scattering the others back toward their rooms.

I curse under my breath, stepping forward without thought. The blade flares in my hand, aching to sever the spiral at its root, but the wards hum their warning as I near the door. A barrier I cannot cross without shattering something older than this academy.

Still, the Oath drags at me. Her voice, the one that binds me, rings sharp above the panic. “Help her!” Elle cries, darting forward.

She drops to her knees beside Juniper, trying to pry her hand free from the wall. Her scarf flutters loose as she pulls, frost glittering against her hair. She doesn’t see the danger coiling toward her, how the spiral bends to her presence, eager, hungry.

I feel it, like the Rift itself is reaching for her.

My jaw locks. If I break the wards, I risk unraveling protections meant to keep them all safe. But if I don’t..

Another cry tears through the night, this one from Elle herself as frost snakes close around her wrists.

The Oath leaves me no choice.

The wards flare as I step forward, light sparking like fire against my skin. The barrier sears, warning me back, but I don’t stop. Not when she’s on her knees, not when the spiral is bending toward her like it recognizes its master.

I raise the blade. Frostlight sears down its edge, humming with the same hunger as the spiral. One strike will sever it, though it will cost me.

“Elle!” Luke’s voice isn’t here, yet I hear it echo in my head, protective and desperate. The thought makes me falter for a fraction of a second.

In that breath, the spiral lashes outward.

Juniper shrieks, collapsing against the wall as her hand rips free, skin marked with blackened frostbite that crawls across her knuckles. The smell of burning cold fills the air, sharp as iron. The other girls cry out, retreating into their rooms, slamming doors.

And then Maribel Crane’s voice pierces through the chaos, high and triumphant.

“She did it!” She points straight at Elle, eyes blazing with vicious satisfaction. “She caused it, she cursed Juniper!”

The words slam harder than the frost ever could.

Every gaze left in the corridor whips to Elle. Her scarf dangles loose around her shoulders, breath misting, hands trembling as if the spiral answered her alone. Fear carves her pale face, but beneath it, something more dangerous, recognition.

“No,” Elle whispers, shaking her head, but her voice is too thin against Maribel’s scream.

“She’s the reason it’s happening! Look at her!” Maribel’s voice cracks with hysteria, yet it feeds the panic instead of breaking it. “She’s the witch!”

The word hangs heavy, ancient, sharp enough to cut.

Elle stumbles back against the wall, wide eyes locking on me through the threshold. For a heartbeat, the world narrows to that single thread between us, the silent plea she doesn’t dare speak.

The Oath surges, burning through my veins. I could end this now, cut the spiral and silence their fear. But the wards hold me back, forcing me to watch as the whispers rise and the girls retreat from her as though she’s already damned.

And all I can think as I meet her gaze is that prophecy’s noose just pulled tighter.