Chapter 253: The Taste Before the Vow
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That left Lily with no answer she wanted to say aloud. It was good. He liked that far too much.
For one suspended moment, they simply stood there with the veil between them, the room still heavy with the aftertaste of confession, agreement, teasing, danger, and the impossible nearness of what they had just chosen.
Then Lily looked down at the Veil of Crimson Silence again.
Her embarrassment did not vanish entirely, but it found something practical to hold onto. That was one of the things Sekhmet liked most about her. She could be flustered and still curious. Still brave. Still unwilling to let a moment of heat push her away from what mattered.
"So," she said, clearing her throat lightly and pretending she had not just been trapped by his last line. "Are we testing it now?"
Sekhmet let the tension in the room loosen by a degree.
"Yes."
He moved back to the table and carefully spread the crimson veil open over the polished wood. Up close, it looked even stranger. The surface was too smooth to be ordinary fabric. Too alive in the way the runes moved beneath it. The artifact held itself in a shape that resembled cloth, but there was something almost liquid about how the folds settled. Like blood remembering elegance.
Lily came to stand beside him again, more careful with her hands now, which amused him privately.
He did not comment on that.
Instead, he focused on the veil.
"The system identified it as a concealment artifact,"
Then he said, "It should suppress bloodline deviation and hide post transformation signatures. The question is how stable the masking is, how it attaches, and whether it reacts better to blood or chaos."
Lily leaned slightly closer, studying the red threaded surface. "It looks expensive."
"It belonged to a true vampire noble," Sekhmet said. "That usually means it is either expensive, dangerous, or both."
"Comforting."
He almost smiled. "You are becoming strangely comfortable around artifacts designed by blood suckers."
Lily looked up at him. "I am adapting to my future."
That line settled in him with quiet force.
He did not let it show too much on his face.
"Do not say things like that so casually," he muttered.
Lily’s mouth curved. "You keep saying that, but I notice you do not actually stop me."
Because he could not, he thought.
Because every time she accepted the shape of what was ahead, some hard, watchful place inside him eased.
He pushed that thought aside and extended one hand over the artifact. Chaos energy moved from his palm in a controlled thread, pale and steady, sinking into the outer layer of the veil. The runes woke at once.
Thin crimson lines spread outward like veins.
The room dimmed by a fraction.
Lily straightened. "Oh."
The artifact lifted off the table by less than an inch and then settled again, now humming faintly. A few of the inner sigils became visible, rotating slowly under the surface.
Sekhmet narrowed his eyes.
"It is reacting well."
"Should I touch it?"
He turned his head toward her. "Maybe not yet."
Lily gave him a look. "That sounds like an invitation to absolutely do it."
"Lily."
"I am not going to ruin your blood cloth."
"It is not blood cloth."
"It is absolutely blood cloth."
Sekhmet let out a quiet breath and returned his attention to the veil. He sent a little more energy through it. The outer runes shifted again, this time gathering toward one edge as if responding to a command he had not consciously given.
Interesting.
He touched one of the runic patterns lightly with two fingers and the artifact changed tension immediately, tightening, thinning, almost becoming denser in his hands.
Then Lily, because she was incapable of leaving well enough alone when mystery was present, leaned in and pressed her fingertip to one of the smaller runes along the side.
"Wait," Sekhmet said.
Too late.
A faint pulse of chaos energy slipped from her touch into the mark.
The veil flashed.
For one startling second the whole thing collapsed inward in a swirl of crimson light, folded in on itself, and then reformed entirely.
Lily jerked her hand back.
Sekhmet’s eyes widened.
Where there had been a veil a heartbeat earlier, there was now a slim bracelet resting on the table. It was dark red, almost black at first glance, with tiny blood silver runes worked into the band and a single almost invisible crimson thread running around its inner edge.
Silence.
Then Lily said, very quietly, "I think I broke it."
Sekhmet reached down and picked up the bracelet.
It was cool.
Solid.
Perfectly formed.
Not broken at all.
Sekhmet thought, "What happened? System, Explain it to me."
Inside his mind, the system spoke.
[Ding! SYSTEM Notification: Artifact adaptation recognized.
Veil of Crimson Silence possesses mutable noble form structure.
The Artifact can transform according to user intent, aura preference, and practical wear requirement.
Current selected form: bracelet.]
Sekhmet stared at the bracelet for one extra second.
Of course it could do that.
Because apparently true vampires not only designed concealment artifacts, they designed them with style.
Lily was still looking at him with that expression she got when she was trying to decide whether something had become wonderful or catastrophic.
"What happened?"
Sekhmet turned the bracelet once between his fingers, watching the tiny runes glimmer along its inner side. "It can transform."
Lily blinked. "Transform?"
"Yes."
"Into a bracelet?"
"For now."
Her eyes widened. "For now?"
Sekhmet looked at the artifact again. "The runes adapted to your intent. Or your instinct. The structure is mutable."
Lily’s face lit up with immediate interest. "You mean it can change shape?"
"Yes."
"That is amazing."
"That is useful," he corrected.
"That too. But mostly amazing."
He handed the bracelet to her carefully.
Lily took it with both hands and examined it with open fascination. "It really did not break."
"No."
The bracelet sat in her palm like it had always been made that way. Elegant. Refined. Easy to hide. Easy to wear. A noble accessory no one would question unless they knew exactly what to question.