Ronan walked through the dark forest, branches scraping overhead, the canopy so thick no moonlight broke through. The forest smelled weird – rot and old smoke – and Ronan knew they were close.

Aura moved beside him, silent except when her foot snapped a twig. A few paces behind, Freya followed, her breathing too loud in the quiet.

"Where are we going?" Freya asked. Again. That made it the tenth time, maybe more.

Ronan kept walking.

"I mean, I know you said we're doing a ritual, but that's not making me feel any better."

"Then stop asking," Aura said, her voice flat. She glared back at Freya.

Ronan noticed the tension there. Aura had been hostile around Freya since the contract. Freya returned the feeling, too. Made sense on Freya's end. Aura had humiliated her, knocked out her assassins, and forced her into submission during that courtyard meeting. Deeply petty people like Freya didn't forgive that kind of thing easily.

Aura's reasoning, though, was less clear. Maybe she sensed Freya was wronging her somehow.

Or maybe she doesn't like manipulative branch family nobles who want to overthrow their main family and seize power for their own.

Hard to tell.

"This is the place," Ronan said.

They stopped in a clearing. Nothing special. Just open ground, dirt beneath their feet, trees surrounding them on all sides. But it would work.

Ronan turned to Freya. His eyes went cold. The warmth he usually performed around others disappeared completely.

"If you tell anyone about what happens here today," he said, his tone flat, uncaring, "whether it fails or not, I promise I will make you suffer for it."

Mostly a threat. Ronan didn't consider himself the revenge type, finding it rather useless. He couldn't recall feeling genuine hatred towards many people in his previous life, save his parents. But he needed her quiet, and threats worked.

Freya nodded. Her voice stayed firm. "I understand that."

But there was a waver behind it. Obvious enough. The dark forest, the talk of rituals, the tense atmosphere – it would make anyone nervous. Freya liked to act in control. But she was just a girl at the end of the day.

Then again, so was he. Just a boy, perhaps in over his head as others would say. However he rarely considered what others thought, only what he wanted.

"The contract would prevent it anyway," Freya said.

"The contract prevents me from harming you," Ronan corrected. "Your sister is not off-limits."

Freya glared. "You will not involve her."

"I won't, unless I have to. And I assure you, I'd rather not. Elara's betrayed expression wouldn't be pleasing to look at."

And he would follow through. He made sure to express that through everything, his tone, body language, his eyes. He stayed around Elara because frankly, he was fond of her. But in terms of actual use, she didn't provide much.

Freya nodded again. "The deal is still on, then."

Ronan nodded back. Freya wanted to get rid of Iris Lockhart. Ronan had promised to help. All she had to do was come and participate in these "attempts" once a week. She'd agreed, thinking the opportunity too great to pass up. But now there was regret in her eyes.

Didn't matter.

Aura turned to him. "Are you sure you remember the rituals correctly?"

"I'm sure."

"They're complicated. My parents would only perform basic ones. Good luck, good health, success. I remember a few from the book, but–"

"We'll perform the good luck ritual first," Ronan said.

Aura handed him the container of mana-imbued ink Vulcan had given him. Ronan knelt, opened it, and began drawing the ritual circle.

Every intricate line, every curve, every rune – all of it remembered from the cult beneath Xyta. He'd only seen it for a few minutes. But that was enough.

Aura stared, shocked.

She'd warned him earlier that these things needed to be taught. That her parents had never taught her. That he wouldn't be able to do it from memory alone. Then he'd drawn one in front of her perfectly. Her expression then had been priceless.

Aura opened her mouth, then closed it. She watched him work, and even though she'd seen him do it once before, the shock hadn't faded.

Drawing the symbols again didn't make her any less impressed.

Ronan finished drawing the last line, stepped back, and let his gaze trace the circle again – every symbol, every curve, every convergence point exactly where it belonged.

Aura circled it once herself, slow, deliberate, checking every mark against what she remembered from the faded pages of her parents' old book. Her eyes moved over the outer ring first, then inward, following the flow pattern.

Finally, she straightened. "It looks right."

Ronan didn't respond immediately. He studied the rune arrangement one more time, confirming the structure matched what he'd seen beneath Xyta. Paula had drawn this exact circle before the ritual collapsed into horror. Now he was recreating it, willingly.

Aura glanced at Freya. "You. Stand outside the circle's edge."

Freya frowned. "Why?"

"Because you will be performing the ritual with us. We brought you here because we need three people," Aura said flatly, annoyance seeping into her tone. "Foolish human. Just do as he says. You are not here for free, remember that. This is a transaction."

Freya's jaw tightened, but she moved without argument.

Ronan knelt at the circle's center. The cold ground bit through his pants, but he ignored it. He channeled mana into the circle the way Aura had instructed earlier, steady, controlled.

The runes along the circle's edge flared weakly. Then flickered. Uneven. Some brighter than others, some barely glowing at all.

Aura's expression shifted immediately from anticipation to concern. "Stop."

Ronan cut off the mana flow mid-channel. It stung slightly – like snapping a muscle mid-motion – but he held still.

"What went wrong?"

Aura didn't answer right away. She crouched at the edge of the circle, tracing a few of the lines with her finger without touching them, murmuring to herself as she cross-referenced what was in front of her against what she remembered from the book. Ronan watched her work and didn't interrupt. Pressing her for an answer before she had one would only slow her down.

After a moment, Aura said, "I think I know the issue."