Her gaze dropped. Her free hand was on her belly, palm flat over the mark.
The skin under it was warm. It had been warm since last night, a small hearth burning low in a body that had run cold for four centuries, and it would not bank down.
The violet began to swim.
Madness rose in it, the dangerous kind, with nowhere to point itself and no one to kill.
'I am free of time itself now,' she informed the mark, in full decree register. 'The one chain every mortal being wears, and mine is cut. Quinlan will tear the barrier down soon, and the restriction dies with it.'
'The whole world, open, for the first time in my life. I can leave whenever I please. Go wherever I please. Kill whatever I please. I ascended alone once, from nothing, and I require no one for a second ascent.'
She stared down at her own belly the way she stared at enemies she was about to kill.
The mark pulsed warm under her palm, unintimidated.
'...I do not want to?'
The breach was answered at once, with logic.
