The hospital waiting room smelled like antiseptic and bad coffee.
Rumi sat in one of the uncomfortable plastic chairs, her arms wrapped around herself, staring at nothing. Beside her, Zoey was curled up asleep, her head on Mira's shoulder. Mira was awake but quiet, her hand resting protectively on Zoey's hair.
Celine was at the nurses' station, arguing in her professional voice about patient information and guardian rights and why she should be allowed to see the boy her daughters had found bleeding in the forest.
It had been three hours since the ambulance had brought them here. Three hours of waiting and worrying and not knowing if Cro was alive or dead or somewhere in between.
Three hours of Rumi staring at her arms, at the marks that had saved their lives, wondering what the hell she was.
"You should wash your hands," Mira said quietly, breaking the silence. "There's still blood under your fingernails."
Rumi looked down. Mira was right—Cro's blood was dried and dark beneath her nails, in the creases of her palms. She should wash it off. Should scrub until her skin was clean and pink and normal.
But she didn't move.
"Rumi," Mira said, more insistent now. "Go wash your hands. Please."
"In a minute," Rumi said.
"Now," Mira said, and there was something in her voice that made Rumi finally look at her. Mira's eyes were red-rimmed, her expression strained. "Please, Rumi. I can't... I can't look at it anymore. I can't look at his blood on your hands and not think about—" She stopped, swallowing hard.
About how close they'd come to dying. About the thing that had attacked them. About the light that had exploded from Rumi's hands.
They hadn't talked about it. Not in front of the paramedics, not in front of Celine, not even between themselves. But it hung in the air between them, unspoken and impossible to ignore.
"Okay," Rumi said softly. "Okay, I'll go wash my hands."
She stood and walked to the bathroom on legs that felt disconnected from her body. The fluorescent lights were too bright, making her squint. She turned on the water and watched it run over her hands, watched Cro's blood swirl down the drain in rusty spirals.
When her hands were clean, she pulled up her sleeves and looked at the marks on her forearms. They looked normal now—just faint patterns on her skin, nothing special, nothing that would make anyone look twice.
But she'd felt them burn. She'd felt power flow through them. She'd killed a demon with light that had come from somewhere inside her, somewhere she hadn't known existed.
What was she?
The question circled endlessly, unanswerable. She was twelve years old. She was a foster kid. She was good at math and bad at sports and she liked reading fantasy novels and listening to music too loud.
She was normal.
Except she wasn't. She'd never been normal. She'd always felt different, other, like she didn't quite fit in her own skin.
Now she knew why.
The bathroom door opened and Celine walked in. She looked exhausted, her professional composure cracking at the edges.
"They're letting me see him," she said. "He's stable. Unconscious, but stable. They're calling it a miracle that he survived at all, given how much blood he lost."
"Can I see him?" Rumi asked immediately.
Celine hesitated. "Rumi, I don't think—"
"Please," Rumi said. "I need to see him. I need to know he's okay."
Something in her voice must have convinced Celine, because after a moment she nodded. "Five minutes. That's all they'll allow."
Cro's room was small and sterile, all white walls and beeping machines. He lay in the bed, pale and still, connected to IVs and monitors. Someone had cleaned the blood off him, bandaged his wounds. He looked younger like this, vulnerable in a way he hadn't in the forest.
But he was alive. His chest rose and fell with steady breaths. The monitors beeped in regular rhythm.
Rumi moved to the side of the bed, her hand hovering over his. She wanted to touch him, to feel his skin warm under her fingers, to confirm that he was real and alive and here.
But she was afraid. Afraid of what might happen if they touched again. Afraid of the marks glowing, of power flowing, of questions she couldn't answer.
"I don't know what you are," she whispered. "I don't know what I am. But I know we're connected. I know these marks mean something. And I know that when you wake up, you're going to explain everything. You're going to tell me the truth. All of it."
Cro didn't respond. Didn't move. But Rumi could have sworn his breathing changed slightly, as if some part of him heard her even in unconsciousness.
She pulled up her sleeve, exposing the marks on her forearm. Then, carefully, she pulled back the blanket covering Cro's arm and pushed up the sleeve of his hospital gown.
His marks were identical to hers. Not similar—identical. The same geometric patterns, the same placement, the same faint glow that was probably just the fluorescent lights but felt like something more.
Two halves of a whole.
"What are we?" Rumi whispered.
The door opened behind her. "Time's up," Celine said gently.
Rumi nodded and started to pull away, but as she did, her hand brushed against Cro's. Just the lightest touch, barely contact at all.
The marks flared.
Both of them—hers and his—blazed with light so bright Celine gasped and took a step back. The monitors went crazy, alarms beeping frantically. And Cro's eyes snapped open, glowing with the same light that covered his marks.
"Rumi," he said, his voice rough but clear. "You need to run. They're coming."
"What—" Rumi started to say.
And then the window exploded inward.
Glass shattered across the room as something massive and dark crashed through. Not a demon this time—something bigger, more solid, more real. It had the shape of a man but moved like an animal, all coiled muscle and predatory grace.
Celine screamed. Alarms shrieked. And Cro was suddenly out of the bed, moving despite his injuries, putting himself between Rumi and the intruder.
"Get her out of here," he said to Celine, his voice layered with that same ancient quality Rumi had heard in her own voice earlier. "Now."
"I'm not leaving you," Rumi said.
"You have to," Cro said. "You're not ready. You don't know how to control it yet."
"Control what?" Rumi demanded.
But she didn't get an answer, because the intruder moved. Fast—faster than anything human should be able to move. It grabbed Cro by the throat and slammed him against the wall hard enough to crack the plaster.
"Found you," it said, and its voice was wrong, layered with harmonics that made Rumi's teeth ache. "Finally found you, little prince. And you've made it so easy, bonding with a human child. So easy to track. So easy to kill."
Cro's hands came up, glowing with power, and he struck the intruder in the chest. The creature staggered back but didn't fall, didn't dissolve like the demons had. It laughed instead, a sound like breaking bones.
"You're weak," it said. "Injured. Dying. You can't protect her. You can't even protect yourself."
"Watch me," Cro said, and power exploded from his body.
The light was blinding. Rumi threw up her hands to shield her eyes, felt Celine grab her and pull her toward the door. Through her fingers she could see Cro's form changing, growing, his body surrounded by an aura of golden light that made the air itself shimmer.
He was transforming. Becoming something more than human, more than the boy she'd met in the clearing.
Becoming what he really was.
The intruder snarled and lunged again, but this time Cro was ready. He moved with impossible speed, his fist connecting with the creature's jaw hard enough to send it flying back through the broken window.
Then Cro turned to look at Rumi, and his eyes were pure gold, glowing with power and something that might have been regret.
"I'm sorry," he said. "I'm so sorry."
And then he was gone, leaping through the window after the intruder, leaving nothing behind but shattered glass and the lingering smell of ozone.
Rumi tried to follow, but Celine held her back. "No," Celine said firmly. "Absolutely not. We're leaving. Now."
"But—"
"Now, Rumi!"
Nurses and security guards were flooding into the room, shouting questions and orders. Celine pulled Rumi into the hallway, back toward the waiting room where Mira and Zoey were standing, wide-eyed and terrified.
"What happened?" Mira asked. "We heard—"
"We're leaving," Celine said. "All of us. Right now."
She herded them toward the exit, moving with the kind of determined efficiency that meant arguing was pointless. But as they reached the hospital doors, Rumi looked back one last time.
Through the broken window of Cro's room, she could see flashes of golden light against the night sky. Could hear sounds that might have been fighting or might have been something else entirely.
He was out there. Fighting. Protecting them even now.
And she'd left him.
"I'm sorry," she whispered, echoing his words. "I'm so sorry."
But sorry didn't change anything. Sorry didn't explain what he was or what she was or why they were connected. Sorry didn't bring him back.
Outside, the night air was cool and clean, free of the hospital's antiseptic smell. Celine loaded them into the car, her hands shaking as she started the engine.
"We're going home," she said. "And then you're going to tell me everything. Every single thing that happened today. No more lies. No more secrets. Understood?"
"Understood," Rumi said quietly.
But even as she said it, she knew she couldn't tell Celine everything. Couldn't explain the marks or the power or the way she'd felt when she'd killed that demon. Couldn't explain the connection she felt to a boy who could transform into something golden and powerful and impossible.
Some truths were too big for words.
Some truths could only be felt.
As they drove away from the hospital, Rumi pressed her hand against the car window, looking back at the building where Cro had been, where he'd fought, where he'd disappeared.
"Come back," she whispered. "Please come back."
But the night gave no answer. The golden light had faded. The sounds of fighting had stopped.
And Rumi was left with nothing but questions and the marks on her arms that still tingled with residual power.
Tomorrow, she'd search for him. Tomorrow, she'd demand answers. Tomorrow, she'd figure out what all of this meant.
Tomorrow couldn't come fast enough.