I had never imagined my life would end like this. For months, danger had been circling me like a shadow, close enough to brush the crown of my head with its cold, damp fingers—but never quite seizing me.
My mother used to say I was born under a lucky star. In the end, that star guttered out. I lay sprawled on the frozen earth of the winter forest, breath misting in the frigid air, my gaze locked on the triumphant smile of my killer. The corners of his mouth were stained with deep, burgundy drops—blood that had only moments ago been my own. He wiped the last of it from his lips with a slow, deliberate stroke of his finger and extended his hand toward me.
"Try it," he murmured.
To give my life for someone I loved—there were worse ways to die. Did I know I might come to regret that choice? Absolutely. But as I stared into the almost luminous blue of his eyes, the thought felt weightless, as if it could never matter in the endless stretch of eternity.
So I obeyed. I let my tongue brush the crimson bead, the metallic tang blooming across my mouth like the taste of cold iron. And then—agony. Searing, all-consuming, ripping through every nerve. In that instant, I knew there was no way back.