Malvor lost track of time somewhere around the fourth day.
The house had no clocks. Arbor moved with mood and presence, not hours. Light faded and returned, but there was no rhythm. Just the heavy, dragging passage of misery.
Malvor sat slouched in the sunroom, legs pulled up, a cold mug clutched in his hands, eyes fixed on the door. Always the door.
Then—a sound.
Faint. Muffled.
He bolted upright so fast the mug shattered on the floor. His heart hammered. He was at her door in an instant, pressed flush to the wood.
Water. Running water.
The shower.
She was in the shower.
He nearly collapsed. The relief hit him like a wave. She was alive. She was moving.
He didn't dare speak, didn't knock. Just pressed his ear to the door, eyes shut tight, and listened to the sound of life on the other side. Water pattered. Pipes groaned. The most beautiful sound he'd ever heard.
He stayed there, silent and reverent, praying to anything that might still listen. Let her be okay. Let her step out. Let her speak. Let her see him.
Time passed. He couldn't say how long. Minutes? Hours? Another eternity folded into the others.
Then, the latch clicked. The door opened.
Malvor stumbled back a step, stunned.
And she emerged.
Wrapped in a towel, hair wet and tangled down her back, drops of water clinging to her skin, steam curling around her like a veil. She didn't look at him. Didn't speak. Just walked past him.
To their room.
His chest cracked with that small act. She was retrieving clothes. That was all. But she was there. Moving. Real.
A sob escaped him. Quiet. Sharp.
She didn't stop.
She returned a minute later, arms full of clothes, face blank.
Then, just before she closed the door, he saw it.
Her leg. The runes. Glowing.
Two of them. One on her thigh, carved from thigh to foot in merciless lines, Aerion's mark. One on the other leg, harsh geometry wrapping her knee, Navir's.
The same glow that Malvor saw on himself when the gods' magic had been activated.
His breath stopped.
No.
Oh gods, no.
His mind screamed, but his body froze.
He staggered forward, hand half-raised, mouth trembling.
"Annie—"
The door shut before he could say another word.
He stood there, heart shattered, stomach twisted.
His knees gave out again, and he collapsed to the floor, fingers gripping the doorframe like it was the only thing holding him up.
The glow. The gods had marked her. Used her.
He had feared, but now, with that confirmation, his body trembled with the weight of it. She had been taken. By them. By Aerion. By Navir.
The scream that left him wasn't loud. It was dark. Low. Like a rift opening in the earth.
His hands sparked with chaos. His teeth ground together until his jaw ached.
He leaned his head against her door and whispered, trembling, "I'm going to kill them."
His magic hissed against the floor like poison.
"I'm going to kill them all."
"My Annie."
The words left his mouth raw.
"They hurt… my Annie."
He stayed there, kneeling at her door, fingers curled tight against the frame. The magic beneath his skin pulsed violently, seething, begging to be let loose. But he didn't move. He couldn't. Not again.
He resumed his post.
Day turned to night—or something close to it. The house shifted around him, silent and slow, as if mourning with him. Arbor didn't dare close a single door. Every hallway bent toward hers. Every window reflected the corridor he guarded. The entire realm bowed to his vigil.
He barely blinked.
He sat on the floor, knees pulled up, back hunched, fingers twitching. The rage had not cooled. It curled inward, sharp and cold, wrapping around his spine like barbed wire.
Every time he closed his eyes, he saw the runes glowing.
Every time he breathed, he tasted ash, filth, and failure.
His Annie.
Not the temple's. Not the gods'. His.
And they had dared to lay their hands on her.
He reached up and touched the door with trembling fingers. Not knocking. Just grounding himself. Just needing to be near her.
Even if she would not speak to him. Even if she never did again.
"I am here," he whispered through the wood, voice barely audible. "I am still here."
She did not answer.
She did not have to.
He would stay.
Because she was alive.
And because until she opened that door again, he wouldn't move. Not even to kill the ones who deserved it. Not yet.
Vengeance could wait.
She could not.
He lost track of how long he had been there. Again.
But sometime during the stretch of endless silence, Malvor began to speak. Softly. Like a prayer whispered through a confessional wall.
"Annie," he said, leaning his head against the door. "You don't have to open it. I just… I need you to hear me."
Silence answered.
"I do not blame you," he whispered. "For anything."
His hand trembled as he traced the grain of the wood.
"Whatever they did… whatever they took, it wasn't yours to protect. It was mine. I should have, I should have…" His voice cracked. "I should have been there."
He sucked in a breath that shook all the way through him.
"I let you go. I let you be alone. I did not stay by your side and I should have known better."
His eyes burned, but the tears wouldn't come anymore. He'd spent them all.
"I do not care what they did. Not about the marks. Not about the glow. I do not care if you never touch me again. If you never say my name. I just…"
His forehead pressed against the door again.
"I just want you to know you are enough. You are still you. You are still my Annie."
The words hung there, fragile, sacred.
And the silence swallowed them whole.
Malvor shut his eyes.
She was probably on the other side of the door, curled into herself, crying into the same sheets she had once felt safe in. And he wasn't allowed to touch her. To hold her. To promise she would never be hurt again.
Because she already had been.
And it was his fault.
You danced while they dragged her away.
You smiled while they tore her open.
He grit his teeth, fists curling so tightly his knuckles split again.
He saw Aerion's smirk. Navir's blank expression. That machine's dying words.
"You are not the first to ask about her."
Someone came before him.
Someone took her.
And he had not stopped it.
"I am going to kill them," he said aloud, voice quiet but jagged. "Not fast. Not clean. I am going to rip them down one cell at a time. I am going to ruin the things they love, salt their realms, break their names until the Pantheon itself forgets they ever existed."
The walls pulsed with his anger. The house held its breath.
"But I will not ever leave you again."
He leaned back, sitting fully on the floor. Shoulders slumped. Eyes on the place where the door met the floor.
"I will not make you watch me rage. I will not bring blood to your feet. I will wait. Until you are ready. Or forever. Whichever comes first."
He laughed, bitter and small.
"That is what you have done to me, Annie. You have turned me into something that waits."
Another pause.
Then, softer:
"I still want you."
His voice was tender now. No threats. No divine fury. Just truth.
"Not because you were untouched. Not because you were perfect. Because you are you. Sharp, and tired, and sarcastic, and alive."
He swallowed thickly.
"I do not care what they took. They did not get you. Not really. Not all of you. Because you are still here."
Another silence.
He stared at the crack under the door like it might breathe.
"Please… come back to me."
And then he waited.
Just like before.
The door stayed closed.
But he stayed too.
Because she was worth the waiting.