Chapter 18The Vessel's Burden

The dust was still settling. Rissa's hands trembled as she pressed them against Dorian's chest, trying to stem the blood that pulsed between her fingers. His eyes were half-open, glassy, his breath a shallow rattle.

"No," she whispered. "No, you don't get to do this."

Elara appeared beside her, tearing strips from her own shirt. "Move your hands." Her voice was hoarse but steady. "I've seen wounds like this before. The Moonstone blight—it thins the blood. Makes it impossible to clot."

Rissa shifted, watching Elara pack the wound with crushed leaves from a pouch at her belt. "Where did you get those?"

"I hid them in my boot." Elara's hands moved with practiced efficiency. "I've been preparing for this night for weeks. The nightmares weren't dreams, Rissa. They were the stone showing me what it wanted. What it feared."

The black veins on Rissa's arms pulsed, spreading toward her shoulders. She could feel the fragment inside her, coiling like a serpent waking from hibernation. It wanted her to panic. To lose control.

*Let me help you*, it whispered. *Let me save him.*

"Don't listen to it." Elara grabbed Rissa's chin, forcing eye contact. "The fragment will try to convince you it's your only option. That's how it survived for centuries in the stone—by making hosts believe they needed it."

Dorian coughed, blood spattering his lips. "Rissa..."

"I'm here." She took his hand, felt how cold it was. "I'm not leaving you."

His grip was weak. "You have to. Vance won't stop. He'll use you until there's nothing left."

Before she could answer, footsteps echoed from the corridor. Heavy. Purposeful. The sound of boots crunching over broken stone.

Vance emerged from the shadows, flanked by six enforcers. His arm hung at an unnatural angle, and blood streaked his face, but his eyes burned with cold triumph.

"Well done, Rissa." His voice was silk over broken glass. "You destroyed the stone. Freed the pack from its madness. Made yourself invaluable."

The enforcers spread out, blocking every exit.

"I don't want to fight anymore," Rissa said, pulling Dorian closer. "Just let us go. Please."

"Let you go?" Vance laughed. "You're carrying the Moonstone's consciousness. Its power. Its hunger. You think I'd let that walk out of here?"

Elara stood, placing herself between Rissa and the enforcers. "She's not a vessel, Vance. She's a person."

"She stopped being a person the moment she swallowed that fragment." Vance took a step forward. "But I'm willing to negotiate. There's a way to transfer the fragment to another host. Willingly given. The stone accepts the transfer, and the original host survives."

Rissa's stomach turned. "Who?"

"Your sister."

Elara went rigid.

"The transfer kills the new host," Vance continued, almost gently. "But it frees you. You can walk away with your journalist, live your human life. Elara dies, but she's already been marked by the stone. Her blood remembers the corruption. She's the perfect vessel."

"No." Rissa's voice cracked. "I won't sacrifice her."

"Then Dorian dies." Vance shrugged. "He's bleeding out as we speak. You can save him by giving me what I want, or you can watch him die and still end up in my chains. Those are your only options."

The fragment surged inside her, hungry for power. For control.

*He's right*, it whispered. *You can't save them both. But you can make him pay. Take what I offer. Let me show you what you can become.*

Rissa looked at Dorian's pale face. At Elara's trembling hands. At the black veins crawling toward her heart.

She made her choice.

The power erupted from her chest like a shockwave—black light, cold and absolute. It threw Vance against the wall, sent the enforcers crashing into each other. The chamber groaned, stones raining from the ceiling.

"Run!" Rissa grabbed Elara's arm. "Get Dorian. Now."

Elara hooked her arms under Dorian's shoulders, dragging him toward a crack in the far wall—a maintenance tunnel, barely wide enough for one person. Rissa followed, the black veins spreading up her neck, into her jaw.

Behind her, Vance was already rising.

"Clever girl," he called after her. "But you can't run forever. The fragment will consume you before dawn. And when it does, I'll find you. I'll carve you open and take what's mine."

The tunnel narrowed, forcing them to crawl. Rissa's vision swam, the black veins pulsing in time with her heartbeat. Dorian was barely conscious now, his breath a thin whistle.

"He's dying," Elara whispered. "I can't stop the bleeding for much longer."

Rissa's hands were shaking. The fragment was screaming at her to give in, to let it take control, to become the monster Vance wanted her to be.

"How do you know about the transfer?" She asked, desperate for anything to focus on.

Elara's face was unreadable. "The nightmares. The stone showed me everything. Every host it ever consumed. Every ritual used to pass it on."

"Then there has to be another way."

"There is." Elara stopped, turning to face Rissa. In the dim light, her eyes were ancient. "But you have to trust me. And you have to be willing to lose everything."

The tunnel ended in a grate, moonlight spilling through. Fresh air. Freedom.

Rissa collapsed the moment they emerged, her legs giving out. The black veins had reached her collarbone, spreading toward her face. She could feel the fragment coiling around her heart, ready to strike.

"Rissa." Elara knelt beside her, pressing a hand to her cheek. "I know how to save you. But you have to let me in. Let me see what the stone showed you. I need to understand the bonds it forged."

"Will it hurt?"

"Yes." Elara's voice broke. "But not as much as watching you die."

Dorian's hand found hers, his fingers cold and trembling. "Do it," he whispered. "I can't lose you."

Rissa looked at him, at the blood pooling beneath his body, at the woman who had been her sister in every way that mattered.

"Okay," she breathed. "I trust you."

Elara placed both hands on Rissa's temples. The moment their skin touched, Rissa felt something ancient and terrible stir inside Elara's mind—the same presence she'd felt in the Moonstone chamber.

The same hunger.

Rissa's consciousness began to fade, Elara's voice growing distant.

*There is a way. But you have to trust me.*

In the distance, Vance howled.

And Rissa fell into darkness.