By dinnertime, my hand hurt more than my stomach.

  The dining hall hummed with the usual Saturday chaos—clatter of trays, the industrial whine of the drink machine, somebody at the far table laughing way too loud about something that probably involves bodily fluids. Our Saturday club corner was mostly full: twins arguing over whose turn it is to fetch dessert, Vinh dissecting his chicken like it contains state secrets, Luis building a mashed?potato fort. Lillibet sat straight?backed, eating with that same precise efficiency she brought to everything else.

  Only Artem and Rebecca were missing.

  Theo sat across from me, a faint purpling bruise just visible along his jaw. Every time I accidentally flexed my right hand around my fork, pain zinged through my knuckles. We were both very carefully not talking about it.

  The doors swung open again. Jamal’s head snapped up like it was on a string.

  Ronni sashayed into the room in a fresh pair of heels, hips swaying, makeup fixed, her pink skirt so ruffled it could probably qualify as a small ecosystem, dark hair in braids now, tied with matching bows. She spotted us, beamed, and started picking her way between the tables.

  By the time she reached us, Jamal was already half out of his seat. He hooked an arm around her shoulders and tucked her in against his side like claimed territory. She slotted in without thinking about it, head briefly bumping his cheek, tray landing on the table with a soft clack.

  Seeing her—the girl the Reaper hugged like a favorite—kicked something in my chest hard enough to sting.

  “How can she do that?” The words were out before I could wrestle them down. Heat flared under my skin. “Treat him that way?”

  The nearby chatter didn’t stop, but it…tilted. Our table went quiet in that concentrated way that says everyone’s suddenly, intensely interested in not seeming like they’re eavesdropping while absolutely doing it.

  The sparkle in Ronni’s eyes dimed. The look that crossed her face was the same one I saw on the lawn when Artem whispered “Grandmother”—sorrow dropping over her like a veil.

  “It’s not her fault,” she said.

  Her voice is so soft it almost got swallowed by the scrape of a chair behind us. I still heard it.

  “How could that not be her fault?” I asked. It came out sharper than I intended. My fork clinked too hard against my plate; my knuckles throbbed in protest.

  Ronni let out a slow breath, shoulders rising and falling under Jamal’s arm.

  “What do you know about blood magic?” she asked.

  I shook my head; I’d never heard of it. Across from me, Hana nods, bright and eager. Theo actually bounces in his seat.

  “It’s a Bone Smith technique, right?” he blurts, already leaning in. Everyone else shifts with him: Lillibet’s eyes flickered up from her plate, Vinh’s fork paused mid?air, the twins stopped arguing. Even Luis forgot about his carb architecture.

  Ronni glanced around at the sudden semicircle of attention and huffed a quiet, helpless little laugh.

  “Okay,” she says. “To start with, I hate that name.” She wrinkled her nose. “It’s not magic. It’s science.”

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  She settled her tray, freed her hands, and her voice slipped into the precise, patient cadence of someone used to explaining complicated things to people who might blow themselves up with partial information.

  “Blood ‘magic’ is extremely rare,” she said. “It requires a top?level Alchemist and a master Bone Smith working in conjunction. Alchemical solutions—expensive ones, made with compounds that are difficult and dangerous to source—are applied to the material.”

  “What material?” I ask.

  “It’s always a Gorgon bone,” Ronni says. “That’s the most powerful.”

  Theo’s hand went to his hip. We’re slated to patrol later, and he’d already grabbed it from his room, even though he’s not technically allowed to carry it on campus. His fingers tapped the hilt, and a grin slipped out before he could stop it.

  Ronni’s sentence cut off. She zeroed in on his hand. “You have a Gorgon sword?” Her eyebrows jumped. “There are only—what is its name?”

  “Moon Shadow,” Theo says, just this side of reverence.

  “Um.” Ronni narrows her eyes, riffling through some internal index. “No. I don’t know it.”

  “My father commissioned it to keep my mom safe,” he said.

  For a heartbeat, something bitter twists his mouth, sharp and gone so fast I’m not sure I didn’t imagine it.

  “Oh. Yes.” Ronni blinks, shakes herself, and gives me—gives all of us—a small apologetic smile. Jamal’s fingers tightened on her shoulder.

  “Back to the crafting,” she says. “The Bone Smith shapes the weapon and carves the runes to focus its power. More solutions are applied, mixed with the Kindred’s blood. It binds their line to the Darkling power in the weapon, making both it and the wielder stronger.”

  Vinh let out a low whistle through his teeth. One of the twins mutters, “That is so unfair,” under her breath. Hana looks like Christmas came early.

  “Blood magic swords are the most powerful weapons that exist in the world,” Ronni goes on. “They’re also cursed.”

  That word drops like a stone. Even the noise of the cafeteria seems to fade for a second.

  “I only know of five,” she says. “Though I expect there are more in the East. Sickle is one of them.”

  You could feel the name even if you didn’t know it. A kind of weight in the air.

  “The curses are unique,” she said, voice quieter now. “And not always obvious. Grandmother’s is subtle, but I’ve figured out what it is. She doesn’t believe me.”

  Her gaze dropped to her hands. When she looked back up, her eyes shone with unshed tears.

  “She thinks her family is incompetent, useless, and weak,” Ronni says.

  I shake my head before my brain catches up. “She clearly doesn’t see you that way.”

  “I’m adopted,” Ronni says.

  There’s no wobble in it. No shame, no sting. Just a flat, simple fact.

  “There is no shared blood or ties of marriage,” she continues. “Vows have power, you know. I think that’s the difference.”

  She rested her fingertips lightly on the table, nails painted a glittery pink that suddenly looked like armor.

  “She’s not able to love those who are tied to her,” Ronni said softly, “and can only see their failures. All the love she can’t give anyone else is poured into me.”

  For a moment, nobody said anything. Somewhere behind us a tray dropped, the crash making half the room jump and then laugh. At our table, the sound barely registered.

  Artem’s empty chair sat at my elbow like an accusation.

  Hana recovered first. She bumped Lillibet’s shoulder with her own and murmured something about a lab mishap that involved exploding beakers and singed eyebrows. Lillibet’s mouth twitched, the smallest ghost of a smile.

  Luis demands to know which twin has the better sword grip, sparking a new argument. Theo, still rubbing his thumb along Moon Shadow’s hilt, starts to ask Ronni about the cost of those “expensive components.”

  She cut him off. “It takes a fresh bone. Existing swords can’t be modified. And didn’t you hear what I said about curses?”

  He just shrugged.

  Jamal barrels over the awkwardness with an overly dramatic retelling of rescuing her shoes from the carnivorous lawn, complete with sound effects and hand gestures.

  The conversation tilts back toward normal: homework, sparring bruises, a rumor about Wraith sightings three towns over.

  But the shape of the world has shifted a little in my head. The Reaper isn’t less terrifying. Artem isn’t less hurt. My hand still aches where bone met Theo’s jaw.

  I just…understand a different piece of the why.