The rain didn't just fall that night; it attacked. Sister Mercy's voice carried the weight of seventeen years as she spoke, her arthritic fingers unconsciously tracing the wooden cross hanging from her neck. Each word seemed to cost her something precious.
"Some stories," she began, her eyes fixed on the storm lashing against the window, "are meant to stay buried. But promises made to the dying have a way of resurfacing, no matter how deeply we try to bury them."
Kira shifted in the hard-backed chair, her pulse quickening. This wasn't the gentle bedtime story she had expected. In the lamplight, Sister Mercy appeared older than her seventy-three years, as if the approaching confession were aging her in real time.
"Your seventeenth birthday changes things, child. There are... obligations that come with the mark you bear."
Instinctively, Kira's hand moved to her shoulder, where beneath the cotton of her nightgown, the birthmark pulsed with its mysterious rhythm. The sisters had always dismissed it as ordinary, but Kira knew better. She had sensed it responding to thunderstorms, moments of deep emotion, and the ancient Latin prayers that echoed through the halls of St. Agatha's.
"The night you arrived," Sister Mercy continued, "the storm was different. It was hungry. It didn't just bring rain; it brought something else, something that had been searching for you."
The old nun's hands trembled as she reached into her desk drawer and withdrew a small, wrapped bundle. "Sister Emilia wanted to burn this. She said it was too dangerous to keep. But I couldn't let it go, not when I saw who you were."
Inside the cloth was a pendant, blackened silver twisted into shapes that seemed to shift when Kira wasn't looking directly at them. The moment her fingers touched the metal, she felt a surge of heat emanating from her birthmark.
"This was pinned to your blanket," Sister Mercy whispered. "And this…" She pulled out a piece of parchment with singed edges, the writing faded to an unsettling brown. "…was tucked beneath you."
Kira's hands trembled as she unfolded the parchment. The words were written in a language that should have felt foreign to her, yet she understood every syllable:
"The Marked Child sleeps until her seventeenth year. When shadow touches shadow, the Threshold opens. What was divided shall be made whole. What was banished shall return. The daughter of two worlds awakens."
Suddenly, the temperature in the room dropped significantly. Frost began to form on the inside of the windows, and both women could see their breath misting in the chilling air."Sister Mercy," Kira's voice came out smaller than she had intended. "What am I?"
The old nun's eyes brimmed with tears she had been holding back for seventeen years. She was silent for a long moment, her gaze distant as if she were looking into the past.
"Your mother," Sister Mercy began slowly, "arrived that storm-torn night, clutching you to her chest like you were the most precious thing in existence."
Kira's breath caught in her throat.
"She was dying," Sister Mercy continued, her voice breaking. "I could see it in her eyes, not from illness, but from something far worse. Something that had been hunting her. She pressed you into my arms and begged me to promise her something."
The old nun's hands trembled as she reached for Kira's face, cupping it gently. "She made me swear on everything holy that I would keep you safe at all costs. No matter what came looking for you, no matter who demanded answers, I would protect you until you were old enough to protect yourself."
Tears rolled down Sister Mercy's weathered cheeks. "I promised her, child, and I have kept that promise for seventeen years. But now..." She glanced at the pendant and then at the parchment with its ominous words. "Now I fear that my protection may not be enough anymore."
"I don't know what you are, Kira, but I fear we are about to find out."