Rachel drifted in and out of sleep, each return to consciousness thinner and colder than the last.

The room stayed cold no matter how tightly she pulled the blankets around herself. At first, she blamed the old house, the high ceilings, the sealed window and the night air pressing against the glass, yet the chill did not rest on her skin like ordinary weather. It moved beneath her skin, creeping through her hands, settling behind her ribs and gathering around the mark on her arm until the dark coils seemed to burn and freeze at once.

Whenever she closed her eyes, the waterfall returned.

It waited behind the dark of her eyelids, vast and silver beneath a sky she could not see. Water crashed over black stone, then hardened into ice as the roar thinned into a deep groan that made her bones ache. The frozen wall rose before her again, glittering and merciless, and beyond it something moved in the dark.

Rachel tried to turn away inside the dream, though her body would not obey. Her hand lifted toward the ice. Frost crawled over her fingers. The old pain opened inside her wrist where his thumb had touched her, and the mark answered with a heat that stole the breath from her chest.

Then came the cry.

It began somewhere beyond the ice, low enough to be mistaken for wind moving through stone, yet the sound grew until it became a roar that shook the frozen wall. A dark shape struck the barrier from the other side, and cracks burst through the ice in jagged lines, spreading toward Rachel's hand while the figure behind it pressed closer, too large, too hungry, and too aware of her.

"Aphrodite."

His voice moved through the dream like a hand closing around her throat.

Rachel fought to wake, but the ice held her there.

"I will break through," the Abaddon said. "I will find you."

Rachel woke with a strangled breath, her body shaking beneath the blankets, her nightclothes damp against her skin. The room was dark, the bed too soft, the ceiling too high above, and the silence after the waterfall seemed to press against her ears.

She clutched the blanket to her chest and waited for her heart to slow, but it didn't.

The mark tingled beneath her sleeve, and when she rubbed her fingertips over the inside of her wrist, the skin there felt too cold, as if some part of the ice had followed her back. She tried to breathe through it, counting each inhale the way she had done after panic attacks, bad meetings and nights when grief or stress had made sleep impossible.

Then, the cry came again.

Rachel went still because this time the sound had followed her into the waking world. It moved through the dark room, faint at first, then closer, a wounded sound drawn through the walls of the old house. Her skin prickled. The mark pulsed once, hard enough to make her fingers curl.

She sat up slowly, listening.

The cry rose into a low roar.

Rachel threw back the blanket and stumbled from the bed. Her feet hit the floor, cold striking through her soles as she crossed the room and gripped the door handle.

It did not move.

For a second, she only stared at it, her mind refusing the simple fact of the lock. Then the room seemed to close around her. The sealed window, the heavy curtains, the old walls, and the door that would not open pressed in until protection and captivity became one and the same.

She pulled harder, but the handle held.

"Vlad," she called.

No answer came.

The sound moved again, low and mournful, somewhere beyond the door or beneath the floor or inside the mark itself. Rachel hit the door with the side of her fist, then again, panic turning the motion clumsy.

"Vlad."

The house stayed silent.

She struck the door again, and pain split through her hand as the wood bit into her skin. The scent of blood rose at once, sharp and unmistakable in the cold room. Rachel pulled her hand back and stared at the thin red line across her knuckles.

Footsteps sounded in the corridor, coming closer with a calm that made Rachel's panic sharpen.

She stepped back from the door, breath caught in her throat as the footsteps stopped outside her room. She waited for the lock to turn, for the door to open, for some explanation that would make the nightmare, the sound and the locked room feel less like a trap.

Nothing happened.

The footsteps began to move away.

Rachel slammed her palm against the door. "Let me out."

The footsteps stopped.

Silence settled on the other side.

"Let me out," she said again, fighting to keep her voice steady.

Vlad's voice came through the door, calm enough to make her want to hit it again. "You should stop striking the door. The smell of your blood is making this more difficult than it needs to be."

Rachel stared at the wood between them. "Open the door."

"For your safety, you will remain there until sunrise."

Her chest tightened. "For my sanity, open the door now."

"I appreciate the politeness, but my answer remains the same."

Rachel pressed her uninjured hand against the door, trying to ground herself in the grain beneath her palm. "There is something in here."

"There is nothing in that room that can hurt you."

"You do not know that."

"I know this house."

The cry moved through the walls again, distant and raw, and Rachel's breath caught hard enough to hurt. "Then what is that?"

Silence followed.

This time it was different.

Rachel pressed closer to the door. "You heard it."

"No," Vlad said, and the word came slower than before. "I heard you."

Her stomach dropped. "The noises are real."

The lock clicked.

The door opened, and light from the corridor spilled across the floor in a pale strip. Vlad stood on the other side wearing dark trousers and a white shirt, his hair slightly disordered, his face stripped of the polished control he wore so often. His gaze moved over her quickly, taking in her damp clothes, her shaking hands, the blood on her knuckles and the sleeve she had twisted around the burning mark.

"What did you hear?" he asked.

Rachel tried to answer, but the words tangled with the memory of the ice. "A cry. A roar. It sounded like him."

Vlad's expression hardened. "The Abaddon?"

She nodded.

His eyes dropped to her marked arm.

"It came through the walls," she said. "Or through me. I don't know. I woke up, and I could still hear it."

Vlad stepped into the room, and the change was immediate. The air shifted around him, dark and warm, and the cold that had been clinging to Rachel's skin loosened its grip. She hated how quickly her body noticed.

He reached for her injured hand, then paused before touching her. "May I?"

The question unsettled her because she had expected command, not permission.

Rachel gave a small nod.

Vlad took her hand and turned it toward the light. The cut was shallow, though blood had gathered along the broken skin. His gaze lingered on it a little too long, and when his fangs appeared, Rachel felt the old tension between fear and fascination move through her.

He closed his mouth and released her.

"You will live," he said.

"That is your medical opinion?"

"It is one of my kinder ones."

Rachel should have smiled. She almost did. Then another tremor moved through the mark, and the moment collapsed beneath the memory of the voice behind the ice.

"I can't stay in here alone," she said.

"You are safer behind a locked door."

"It does not feel safe when I'm the one locked inside."

His jaw tightened.

Rachel folded her arms across herself, covering the mark with her uninjured hand. "I know why you did it. Or I think I do. The police, the leech, the Abaddon and whatever else is circling this house. But I woke up and could not get out, and for a moment I thought I was back at the ice wall with something on the other side trying to reach me."

The anger in Vlad's face shifted, losing some of its edge.

"I did not lock you in to frighten you," he said.

"You still locked me in."

"Yes."

The admission hung between them.

Rachel looked away first. "Then stay."

Vlad went still.

She hated how exposed the words made her feel, so she kept talking before pride could drag them back. "The cold stops when you are near. The sounds stopped when you came in. I do not know if that is the bond or if I am losing my mind, but I cannot spend the rest of the night listening to him claw at the dark."

Vlad watched her for a long moment.

"You understand what you are asking?"

"I am asking you to stay in the room."

"With you."

Rachel lifted her chin, though her hands were still shaking. "Yes."

His gaze moved over her face, then to the bed, then to the mark half hidden beneath her sleeve. "I will stay until sunrise."

The relief that moved through her was so sharp it almost hurt.

Vlad stepped back and closed the door, though this time he did not lock it. Rachel heard the difference. So did he.

"I am not a complete monster," he said.

"No," she said, looking at the door. "Only a selective one."

A faint curve touched his mouth before it disappeared.

Rachel returned to the bed and pulled back the blankets. The sheets were still cold and damp from her restless sleep, and she hesitated before climbing in, embarrassed by the evidence of her fear. Vlad seemed to notice, but he said nothing. He crossed the room, lifted the spare blanket from the chair near the window, and placed it over the damp side of the bed before sitting on the edge.

"You can sleep," he said.

"Can I?"

"I will wake you if anything changes."

The answer was practical enough to steady her.

Rachel lay on her side, maintaining a careful distance from him. Vlad sat with his back turned, one hand on his knee, his head slightly bowed as if listening to something beyond human senses. The old house creaked around them, wind gently pressed against the window, and somewhere outside, a branch scraped against the stone.

No cry came.

Rachel closed her eyes.

The cold waited for her there.

She opened them again, breath quickening.

Vlad turned. "Rachel."

"I can still feel it."

He looked at the mark. "The stronger our bond is, the weaker his hold on you."

The words settled into the dark room with quiet force.

Rachel stared at him. "How do you know?"

"Because the mark reacts to me."

She looked down at her wrist. Beneath the sleeve, the burn had softened into a low warmth, no longer sharp enough to steal her breath.

Vlad continued, his voice careful. "Whatever he touched in you, he has not claimed all of it. The bond between us interferes with him."

"Then the bond is protecting me?"

"For now."

"For now," she repeated.

"I will not pretend certainty where I have none."

That frightened her more than his usual arrogance.

Rachel shifted, making room beside her before she could convince herself to stop. "Then lie down."

Vlad did not move.

"I thought you were staying."

"I will sleep in the chair."

"I can still feel the cold."

His gaze held hers, searching for reluctance, fear, permission, or perhaps the absence of all three. Rachel hated that he was being careful now, after every careless thing between them, and she hated that the care made her want to trust him.

At last, Vlad stood, pulled his shirt over his head, and placed it over the back of the chair.

Rachel looked away too late.

"You do not need to look so offended," he said. "It is only a shirt."

"I am not offended."

"You are staring at the wall with great conviction."

"I am respecting your privacy."

"How noble."

A small smile tugged at Rachel's mouth before she could stop it.

The mattress dipped as Vlad lay behind her, close enough for warmth to reach her without holding her in place. For a moment, she stayed rigid, every nerve aware of him, of the old strength in his body, of the danger he carried so easily, and of the locked door he had chosen not to lock again.

Then his hand settled lightly over the blanket near her waist, close enough to warm her without touching her skin.

The cold began to recede.

It did not vanish in a rush. It loosened slowly, retreating from her fingers, her chest and the aching place beneath her ribs. The mark warmed beneath her sleeve, and the sound of the waterfall faded until only the room remained, dark and quiet around them.

Rachel let out a breath she had not realised she was holding.

"How do you do that?" she asked.

"I am not sure I do anything."

"That is either modesty or another lie."

"Perhaps both."

She turned her head slightly, enough to see him from the corner of her eye. "The sounds stopped when you came in."

"Then let us hope my presence continues to offend him."

The thought should have been absurd, but Rachel found comfort in it.

For a while, they lay in silence. His warmth gathered against her back through the blanket, steady and impossible to ignore. She hated that the room felt less like a cell with him in it. She hated that his nearness made her body unclench, that the mark quieted under the pressure of a bond she had spent so much energy denying.

"I do not like needing you," she said.

"I am not especially comfortable with it either."

That surprised a quiet laugh from her.

Vlad's voice softened. "Sleep, Rachel."

She wanted to argue. She wanted to ask about the mark, the Abaddon, the cost he had refused to name in the car, and why his presence could push back a creature old enough to make monsters afraid. But the questions had blurred at the edges, and the warmth behind her made the dark less hostile.

The door was closed, but no longer locked.

The window was sealed, but the room no longer felt airless.

Beyond the house, the Abaddon waited somewhere behind ice, rage and shadow, pressing against the places where the world had grown thin. Yet for the first time since the mark had appeared, Rachel could not hear him.

She closed her eyes, her fingers resting over the coils on her wrist, and let herself drift toward sleep with Vlad beside her, guarding her from the dark while remaining one of the dangers she had not yet learned how to survive.