Page 63 of The Immortal’s Mark

Chapter 11

The First Death

Chapter 644: In which our heroine tells a story she hasn’t told in three hundred years—and doesn’t understand why she’s telling it now.

I’m cross-referencing cult texts with temple records. Tedious work. The kind of work that keeps my hands busy and my brain from wandering into territory I’d rather avoid.

It’s not working.

My fingers stop on a symbol I’d hoped never to see again.

Circle. Eight-pointed star. Serpent choking on its own tail.

Wonderful.

The memory hits before I can brace for it. Smoke and screaming and the particular sound a thatched roof makes when it catches fire. A village in the southern provinces. Three hundred years ago, give or take a decade. I was calling myself something else then—Wei-Lin, I think. Working as the village herbalist. Quiet life. Good dumplings at the shop on the corner.

Then the robed men came.

They asked questions. Old blood. Hidden daughters. Women who don’t age right.

I should have left the moment they arrived. Should have packed my knives and vanished like I’d done a hundred times before. But old Zhou made these pork buns that I’d gotten attached to, and Grandmother Ming was teaching me to cheat at mahjong, and I thought—

I thought maybe this time I could stay.

Stupid thought.

They found me on the third night. I don’t know how. Don’t know what gave me away—maybe I slipped, maybe someone talked, maybe they had methods I’ve never understood.

They burned the village to flush me out.

I died twice in that fire. Woke up in the ashes both times, skin still knitting itself back together, smoke in my lungs and screaming in my ears. Fourteen people dead. Old Zhou. Grandmother Ming. The little girl who used to bring me flowers and ask why I never got sick.

All because I wanted to stay.

I learned something that night, choking on smoke and grief in the ruins of a life I’d let myself want: staying kills people. Not me, unfortunately—but everyone stupid enough to be near me when the past catches up.

Running is safer. Not for me. For them.

I’ve been running ever since.

My fingers have gone still on the scroll. The symbol stares up at me, patient as a grave.

Same cult. Same robes. Same questions about old blood.

Three hundred years later, and they’re still looking for something, apparently. Still leaving ash and guilt in their wake.

I should tell Ren.

Should mention that I’ve seen these people before. That they were hunting even then, that this conspiracy has roots older than his grandfather’s grandfather. That fourteen people died because I stayed too long in a place I should have left, and I’ve been carrying their names ever since.

My ribs go tight. I shift my weight. Count exits—two, one blocked by a shelf.

The thing is, he’s starting to look at me differently. Not like a problem. Not like a weapon. Like maybe I’m someone worth trusting.

I’m not ready to watch that change.

I roll the scroll closed. The symbol disappears.