Page 214 of The Devil's Thorn
I swallowed. “Yuri didn’t tell me it had anything to do with you,” I said honestly. “He said it was about blood and survival. About choosing the war and not running from it.”
Rafael’s mouth lifted at one corner. Not a smile. Something darker. “He told you the truth. Just not all of it.”
I didn’t ask. Not yet. I let him speak in his own time, and he did.
“For me, as I told you, the thread means the first time you lose something in order to become someone. Your first kill, your first betrayal. The first moment you stop being a person and start becoming what you have to be to survive.”
I felt something sink in my stomach, low and heavy. “That’s what it means to you,” I said softly.
He nodded once. “And now it’s on you.”
There was no accusation in his voice, but it still felt like a chain being locked around my neck. I didn’t regret it. Not for a second. And that scared me more than I wanted to admit.
For a moment, we were just standing there, the space between us charged with something I couldn’t name. Not quite peace. Not quite tension.
Then he moved. Wordless, he reached for his shirt and pulled it back on, buttoning it with slow precision, his eyes not meeting mine until he was done. Then he turned toward the closet.
My breath caught the second he opened it.
The dress hung there like a secret meant only for me. Black. Elegant. Dangerous. The kind of dress that whispered warnings and made promises all at once. And coiled along the bodice—sleek and silent—a serpent was stitched in with a shimmer that caught the light. And around it, winding like blood or fate, was a red thread.
I didn’t speak. I couldn’t.
His voice broke the silence. “You’ll wear it tomorrow.”
I turned to look at him, trying to hide the way my chest tightened. “You bought it for me.”
“I did,” he said simply.
“Why?”
He didn’t hesitate. “Because you’re going to walk into that room beside me, and I want every single person there to understand what you are. Who you are.”
“Which is?”
“My war,” he said. “And my weapon.”
I didn’t know what to say to that. Didn’t know if I wanted to feel what I was feeling. But I didn’t look away from him. Not when the ground beneath me shifted. Not when I realized that whatever tomorrow held… there was no going back now.
The dress didn’t move. It didn’t have to. It just hung there—quiet, deadly, perfect. Like it already knew the power it carried.
Like it already belonged to me.
My fingers twitched slightly at my side, and I blinked as if that might shake the weight settling over my chest. But it didn’t.
I could feel Rafael watching me, but he didn’t say anything yet. He didn’t have to. The silence between us had a shape, a presence. It was a thing that breathed.
I stepped forward slowly, drawn to it like it called something in me I hadn’t known was sleeping. The red thread was so carefully sewn—elegant, deliberate, looping around the snake’s body like it had claimed it. Not constrained. Not caged. Just… entwined. A part of it now.
My voice came out quieter than I meant. “It’s beautiful.”
“It’s yours,” Rafael said simply. “I want everyone to be aware that you are not the prey”.
I stared at him, my heart pushing faster now, uneven and sharp. “You want them to be afraid of me,” I said.
“No,” he said, stepping closer. “I want them to understand that you’re untouchable. That there’s a reason the serpent doesn’t need to strike unless it’s provoked.”
My breath caught. There was something about the way he spoke—calm, but heavy, like each word carried a hidden blade.
