Evrin’s question sits like an anvil on my chest. Not human? I mean I knew I was different, that I was somehow other, but I never really questioned my humanity underneath all the extra I could do.

“So what the fuck am I, then?”

“Well, witch is probably the name you’re most familiar with, but we call ourselves casters,” Silva tells me.

I look around to gauge if these assholes are fucking with me, but I’m met with dead serious expressions.

“What makes you so sure I am one?” I whisper, not quite willing to believe what they’re telling me.

“We all saw you use magic when you fought, and then there’s these…” Evrin points to the line of markings that run up the outside of my arm, and dot my ring and middle finger. “I don’t recognize these exact runes, but there’s no doubt in my mind these are caster runes you’ve been tattooed with.”

“Which should be fucking impossible,” Lachlan grumbles, speaking for the first time in a while.

Man, I wish he’d just kept his mouth shut. “What should be fucking impossible?”

“You can’t tattoo runes on a caster. It messes with the caster’s natural branch of magic. You want us to believe you have no idea about casters and magic, but the magic-infused runes tattooed all over you tell a different story.”

“First of all, you fucking tool, why would I lie about the shitty childhood I had. Secondly, my markings, or runes--or whatever the fuck you want to call them--aren’t tattoos. I didn’t do this to myself. I woke up on my sixteenth birthday feeling like I was melting from the inside out and then these showed up.” I pull the neck of my shirt away and point to the runes that run across the top of my shoulder to the base of my neck.

“Lachlan, just stop. You’re not helping.”

To my surprise, Lachlan listens to Aydin and grinds his teeth closed. The car grows quiet again as each of us silently navigate through the smothering tension. Eventually the questions burning holes inside of me win out over my desire to master the silent treatment.

“So, give me the everything I need to know about being a caster cliff notes,” I urge no one in particular.

“Well...we’re a race as old as time, with abilities that fall into one of five categories: Offensive magic, Defensive magic, Elemental magic, Spell magic, and Healing magic. There are casters out there with abilities in more than one branch of magic, but it’s rare,” Keegan tells me, as if he’s reading from a brochure.

“Our abilities first manifest about the age we reach puberty. It’s called a quickening, and we come into our full power around twenty-five, and that’s called an awakening,” Evrin explains.

A massive yawn fights to take over, and it’s like the action reminds the rest of my body just how tired it should feel. I’m muddled with exhaustion, and I lean my head back against the seat and close my eyes as I run through everything they just told me.

“Vinna, could Beth do the things you can?” Evrin pries.

I snort. “No. Thank fuck. She was normal, well, as normal as a sadist can be.”

“Are you sure?” Silva presses.

“Positive. If she had any abilities, she would have used them to hurt me more,” I mumble through another yawn.

“What do you know about your father?” someone murmurs, but I don’t open my gritty eyes to identify who.

“When I could catch Beth drunk enough to ask about him, she always said he was a fling, that she didn’t know who or where he was. But some obvious holes existed in that story. The biggest being that I have a different last name from her. I couldn’t tell you where the hell it comes from though because eventually, I stopped asking questions. It wasn’t worth the beatings," I mumble, semi-conscious and borderline incoherent.

The pain is all I can think about, the burning consumes every cell in my body, and I writhe in a tangle of sheets as I scream into the pillow that’s underneath my head. Death breathes expectantly down the back of my neck, and I almost welcome it.

I can’t do this. I can’t survive this pain, but as much as every fiber of my being believes that it doesn’t release me from this torture. All at once the burning stops, my breaths hitching as relieved sobs tumble out of my mouth.

I’ve been clenching my jaw so hard that I’m surprised my teeth haven’t shattered. I slowly and cautiously unlock the stiff muscles of my body, taking stock of myself. I’m a sweaty, tangled mess. What the hell just happened? I exhale a shuddering sigh and scrub my hands over my face to try and release more of the coiled tension trapped all over me.

What the fuck?

Small, intricate symbols run up one side and down the other of both my middle fingers.

I turn my trembling hand over and find an eight-pointed star mark, sitting under the nail of my ring finger. I scramble to turn on the bedside lamp. Symbols line the outside of my arm, and when I look down more trace the top of my shoulders.

Panicked, I untangle myself from the bedding and dash into the bathroom. I flick on the light and find my reflection in the full-length mirror hanging from the back of the door. I rip my tank top over my head, and I frantically search to see what other parts of my body the intricate symbols have claimed.

Two rows of symbols now run down the back of my neck to my lower back, and my torso is marked on the sides. The symbols start at the bottom of my armpit and stop at my hip bones. I’m marked from my heel, all the way up the back of my leg, until my thigh meets my butt.

The markings on the back of my legs remind me of the black seam that ran up the back of the old-school stockings that women used to wear. On the underside of each of my butt cheeks, symbols follow the natural curve of the bottom of my glutes and stop just shy of the side of my ass.

I spot three symbols on the helix of each of my ears, a line of markings on the outside of each of my feet, and a crescent moon on each of my middle toes. Everywhere I look, from head to foot, I now bear lines of these symbols, one side of my body a mirror image of the other.

I stare at my reflection in the mirror, examining my naked body and the mysterious markings. I don’t know how to even begin to make sense of any of this. I clamp a hand over my mouth in an effort to trap a sob that tries to escape.

What the fuck does any of this mean? I put my back to the wall of the bathroom and slide down until my butt meets the floor. I rest my forehead against my knees, allowing myself to get lost in my thoughts. I run my fingers over the symbols on my arm. They’re not raised at all, which surprises me. The markings feel smooth like they’ve always existed there.

I stroke my now marred skin absentmindedly. Fuck, first Beth kicks me out and now this? I take a deep breath and release it slowly. Just when I think I couldn't feel any more lost, the world has to slap me in the face with something else. I sigh, story of my fucking life.