Sleep wouldn't come.
I lay in my chamber, staring at the painted ceiling where stars had been mapped in precious lapis. The meeting between Ram and Ptahmose had ended hours ago, but Ram had sent word through a servant that he was retiring early. No explanation. No invitation to discuss what my stepfather had wanted.
The silence felt deliberate. Pointed.
My birthmark pulsed with restless heat, as it had all evening. I pressed my palm against it, willing the sensation to quiet, but it only intensified—a drumbeat beneath my skin that seemed to match some rhythm I couldn't hear.
"You're going to wear a hole in yourself if you keep that up."
I bolted upright, heart slamming against my ribs.
Seth stood by my window, moonlight streaming through his form. Not solid—I could see the latticed screen behind him, the outline of palm fronds in the courtyard beyond. He shimmered like heat off desert sand, edges blurring when he moved, present and absent in the same impossible breath.
"You came back." The words escaped before I could stop them.
"I never left." He moved closer, and I watched the moonlight bend around him rather than through him—as if reality couldn't quite decide how real he was. "I've been here all day. Watching your charming family reunion. Listening to your stepfather's lies."
"You were in the throne room?"
"In the corner of your vision when you weren't looking directly. In the shadows behind the columns. In the reflection of Ram's wine cup when he raised it to drink." Seth's smile held an edge I remembered. "I can be anywhere now, little blessing. Everywhere and nowhere. It's maddening."
I swung my legs over the bed's edge, wrapping a linen sheet around my shoulders. The night air felt cold against my skin, or maybe that was just his presence—divine energy raising goosebumps along my arms.
"Can you hear what they discussed? Ram and Ptahmose?"
"Some of it." He drifted to my cosmetics table, fingers passing through the bronze mirror without touching it. "Your stepfather is careful. He speaks in codes, in implications, in the language of priests who've spent centuries hiding their true meanings."
"But you understood."
"Enough." Seth turned to face me, and even translucent, even incomplete, those crimson eyes held power that made my breath catch. "Your stepfather serves old masters, Enet. Older than the current temples. Older than the worship you were raised in."
"What does that mean?"
"It means he's connected to gods who opposed my freedom. Who wanted me bound forever, passed from vessel to vessel until the sun burned cold." His form flickered, anger disrupting whatever energy held him together. "The same gods who crafted the original binding ritual three centuries ago."
Cold spread through my chest. "Osiris? Horus?"
"Among others. The divine order has long memories and longer grudges." Seth moved toward me, stopping just beyond arm's reach. Close enough. "Ptahmose knows what the ritual did. He knows I'm free but weakened. And he knows about your mark."
My hand flew to my collarbone. "How?"
"Because he's always known." Bitterness threaded through Seth's voice. "Why do you think he sold you to the harem? A half-Greek bastard with no value except her unusual coloring? He knew exactly where you'd end up. Knew your mark would draw me like a moth to flame."
The implications crashed over me. My entire life—the cruelty, the dismissal, the eventual sale to the palace—had it all been calculated? Had Ptahmose been positioning me for this since before I understood what I was?
"He planned this," I breathed. "All of it."
"Not all." Seth's expression shifted to something almost gentle. "He didn't plan for you to survive the ritual. Didn't plan for me to reform with enough strength to manifest. Didn't plan for Ram to actually care about you instead of simply using you as I was meant to."
"What did he plan?"
"For you to be the bait that drew me out. For the ritual to destroy us both—me scattered permanently, you dead from channeling power your body couldn't contain." Seth's form solidified slightly, as if the intensity of his words gave him strength. "When that failed, he needed a new approach. That's what today's meeting was about."
I rose from the bed, frustration overriding caution. "Then tell me what he's planning now. Stop speaking in fragments and riddles."
"I can't tell you what I don't fully know." For the first time, vulnerability crept into his voice. "I caught pieces. References to ancient texts, to binding rituals, to the 'restoration of divine order.' He wants something from Ram—permission, perhaps, or cooperation."
"Ram would never help him bind you again."
"Ram might not have a choice." Seth's eyes met mine, and I saw something I'd rarely witnessed there—fear. "The gods Ptahmose serves have influence your Pharaoh can't ignore. If they demand my re-binding as the price for their continued favor, Ram may be forced to comply."
"Then we stop them. We expose Ptahmose, reveal his schemes—"
"With what evidence? The word of a god no one can see?" Seth laughed bitterly. "I'm a ghost, Enet. A whisper in empty rooms. I can watch and warn, but I can't act. Can't touch. Can't protect you the way I—"
He stopped, the words dying unfinished.
"The way you what?"
Silence stretched between us, thick with things neither of us could say. Seth's form wavered, edges dissolving before reforming with visible effort.
"They'll want me re-bound," he said finally, his voice rough. "Trapped in another vessel, passed down through another bloodline of suffering hosts. That's the best outcome they're hoping for."
"And the worst?"
"Destruction. Complete dissolution. Every particle of my consciousness scattered so thoroughly that even eternity couldn't reassemble me." He moved closer, close enough that I could see the moonlight through his chest where his heart should beat. "But that's not what terrifies me, little blessing."
"What does?"
"They'll use you to do it."
The words landed like physical blows. I stepped back, my shoulders hitting the wall.
"The mark you carry—Nephthys's essence—it's the key to both binding and unbinding me. In the original ritual, you used it to set me free. But the same power that broke my chains can forge new ones." Seth's expression twisted with anguish. "If Ptahmose gets what he wants, if he convinces Ram to cooperate, they'll make you perform another ritual. One that either imprisons me forever or destroys me completely."
"I won't do it."
"You might not have a choice." He reached for my face, and I felt the ghost of warmth where his fingers should have touched my cheek. "They have ways of compelling obedience. Threats, leverage, gods speaking through priests with voices that can't be disobeyed."
"I'll fight them."
"I know." Something that might have been a smile crossed his features. "That's what I love about you. You'll fight anything, even hopeless odds, even divine will itself."
The word hung between us—love—spoken so casually it almost slipped past. But I caught it, held it, felt its weight settle in my chest.
"Seth—"
"Dawn is coming." His form flickered, becoming more shadow than substance. "I can't hold this shape much longer. But I'll be near. Watching."
"Wait." I reached for him, my hand passing through his chest, through emptiness where warmth should exist. "Don't—"
"I'm not leaving." His voice thinned, spreading across the room until it seemed to come from the walls themselves. "I'm just... diffusing. Think of me as the air you breathe. Present, even when you can't see me."
The last traces of crimson faded from the lightening shadows. I stood alone, the sun's first rays warming marble that still felt cold.
I pressed both hands against my birthmark, feeling it pulse steadily.
Seth was right. They would use me. And I had to find a way to stop them before they succeeded.