Page 195 of Without a Trace
My body wasn’t.
He didn’t answer right away. When he finally spoke, it was quiet—measured. Like he knew he couldn’t put the truth back once it touched air.
I turned around, eyes stinging, throat tight as he said. “Since before you were born.” He went on. “Before you even existed, there were rumors. Whispers in the old lines. That a child born of both bloods would be the undoing of every oath written in ink and ash. A Severance Knot. One soul who could tether bloodlines that were never meant to coexist.”
I turned slowly. “And you believed it?”
“I didn’t want to,” he said. “But then your mother got pregnant. And the moment you opened your eyes, I felt it.”
“What?”
“The magic. The pull. You were quiet, but the air moved differently around you—even the silence knew something ancient had returned.”
“And what about the bond?” I asked, voice sharp. “You said it was prophecy. You said you knew.”
“There were warnings,” he said. “One of the old prophets in the Red Veil saw it in her final vision—three bloodlines tied by fate. One to burn. One to break. One to bind. She said the girl would be born of both legacies. And she’d be drawn to her opposite like flame to air.”
My blood ran cold.
“You mean Trace.”
“I mean all of them,” he said. “You weren’t just bonded to one. You pulled two heirs into a knot they can’t untangle. One from my line. One from theirs.”
I blinked. “Two heirs?”
My voice cracked around it. “What the hell do you mean?”
He stepped closer. “Alden is one too.”
Brielle stepped in. “That’s not possible. Trace is the heir—he’s always been the heir.”
“No,” my father said evenly. “Trace is one heir. The Order hasn’t had a single bloodline in decades. Leadership fractured after I left—Different families rose. Different boys were chosen. You think they sent him in alone?”
My pulse pounded in my ears.
“They sent Alden too,” he said. “Two heirs. Two bloodlines. Bound to the same dying legacy. Raised as brothers. Trained as soldiers.”
I could barely speak. “And they both bonded to me.”
“You were always going to bind the broken,” he said. “That’s what the prophecy meant.”
I wanted to scream. Or laugh. Or fall through the floor and pretend this wasn’t my life. “So what? I was marked before I was even born?”
“Not chosen. Marked.”
My throat burned. “Marked by who?”
“The Codex. The bloodlines. Fate. Take your pick.”
“I didn’t ask for any of this,” I snapped.
“No one ever does,” he said. “But you don’t get to unmake what you are.”
I backed away, rage prickling hot beneath my skin. “You think I care about prophecies and fate? I was living—I was trying to breathe, to survive, and you—you just sat here while they lied to me.”
He tilted his head. “And yet you still found them. Trace. Alden. You didn’t need to be told who they were. You felt it.”
I shook my head. “You don’t understand.”
