My breath caught when he said that. Not because of the words themselves, but because of how his voice changed when he spoke them, lower and quieter, stripped of teasing and arrogance, carrying something sharp underneath.
"What do you mean, I'm in danger?" I asked.
Aster didn't answer immediately. He drove in silence for a few seconds, his jaw tight, his fingers gripping the steering wheel harder than before.
"Not the kind of danger you can run from," he said finally. "Not the kind you can lock your doors against."
"That's not reassuring," I muttered.
"You weren't supposed to be seen," he continued, ignoring my comment. "You weren't supposed to be noticed. You were meant to fade into this town, live quietly, and disappear from anything that mattered."
My stomach twisted.
"But you didn't."
He glanced at me.
"You stood where you shouldn't have stood. You listened where you shouldn't have listened. You walked into places that don't exist for humans."
"I didn't do that on purpose," I said.
"That doesn't matter."
The word landed heavier than it should have.
"Then why me?" I asked quietly. "Why does anything like this keep happening to me?"
Aster's gaze softened for the first time.
"Because you're not empty," he said. "And things like us… We notice that."
I didn't like the way he said "us."
"What are you?" I asked.
He smiled faintly.
"Complicated."
"That's not an answer."
"It's the only one you'll survive right now."
The car slowed, stopping near a stretch of road that looked ordinary, too ordinary, like nothing important had ever happened there.
"You don't trust me," he said.
"I don't even know you," I replied.
"That's good," he said. "If you trusted me already, you'd be in real trouble."
I stared at him.
"You're terrible at being comforting."
"I'm not trying to be comforting," he said calmly. "I'm trying to keep you alive."
That sent a cold shiver down my spine.
"What's coming?" I asked.
His jaw clenched again.
"Something older than this town," he said. "Older than Daisy. Older than me. Something that doesn't care whether you're human or not."
I swallowed.
"And you think it cares about me?"
"I know it does."
Silence stretched between us.
"I don't want this," I whispered.
"No one ever does," Aster said gently. "That's how it starts."
I looked out the window at the darkened trees, suddenly feeling very small.
"What happens now?" I asked.
Aster turned toward me fully then.
"Now," he said, "you stop pretending your life is normal. You stop ignoring the things you see. And you start deciding whether you want to survive… or understand."
I met his gaze.
"And if I choose both?"
A slow smile spread across his lips.
"Then you become dangerous."