We repeated the ceremony, and Stellan pledged his fealty, too, to the Circle and to us, to the ends of the world.

   “To the ends of the world,” the rest of the group murmured.

   A few minutes later, Stellan and I were left alone in the room. He shrugged off his shirt and tossed it across the tattoo chair, then turned to me, spreading his arms in the low light. “Where do you want it?”

   I blinked. “You want me to choose?”

   He looked down at himself, holding his blond hair out of his face with one hand, gesturing across his body with the other. His skin glowed golden in the lamplight. “Back’s taken up already, but anywhere else is fair game. Unless you don’t want to decide.”

   “I want to decide.”

   My gaze flitted over him. Maybe I could put the tattoo on his arm. The bicep was classic. Jack’s tattoo was on his forearm—that was always a possibility, too. I looked over the chest I’d woken up on this morning, broad shoulders tapering to a narrow waist, hints of his ribs along his sides when he breathed in. On his rib cage, maybe. I felt a surge of possessiveness at his scars, since I now knew the story behind all of them. I was fairly certain that, as recently as we’d come into each other’s lives, I knew plenty of things about Stellan Korolev that no one else in the world did.

   And yet, we were still in this no-man’s-land between forever and just today. I touched my fingers lightly to his chest. I had to know. He could still get our tattoo if he was leaving—but I couldn’t stand it any longer. I started to open my mouth, but he cut me off.

   “Tokyo,” he said.

   Oh. I felt my shoulders droop.

   I tried to gear up my happy face. The one that said his going to the other side of the world was probably for the best. The one that said of course I was sad he was leaving, but I understood.

   He reached out for my hand. “I want to get you Tokyo. For your birthday.”

   A draft blew through the room and the candles flickered. “What?” I said.

   “I didn’t get you a birthday present last night, and I realized today it’s because I want to get you the whole world. Tokyo is the strangest, most amazing city. They have things called cat cafes—you literally pay a fee to pet cats. And I don’t think you’ll like sake—it’s rice liquor—but I want you to taste it.”

   I shook my head to stop him. “Wait. You’re not saying you’re leaving?”

   “Tokyo’s a long flight. If I left the Circle, I’d have to fly commercial, and who wants that?” he said, with feigned flippancy. When I just stared at him blankly, his face softened. “Avery, I’m saying I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to realize it, but it looks like we’re the official thirteenth family. If you’ll have me.”

   I realized then that as much as I’d hoped for this, I hadn’t expected it. I’d truly thought he’d leave. “But what about your family? Anya?”

   He ran his fingers over my knuckles. They’d healed. I hadn’t been getting up in the middle of the night to punch things lately. “I suppose you’re my family now, too. I never wanted to leave you.”

   “I know that, but—”

   “I don’t think I really even wanted to abandon the Circle. Well,” he continued with a smirk, “that’s not true. When I was a Keeper, I wanted out every day. But now, seeing how things could be . . .”

   “You want it,” I said, surprised. “The Circle. The power. The . . . world.”

   The golden ring around his pupils glowed in the low light. “It used to be that the only thing I wanted was to leave the Circle behind so Anya would be safe. Somewhere along the way, though, I realized I could have left—but instead, I’d been following some girl to the ends of the world. To save people I thought I hated, nonetheless.”

   I grinned up at him, but his face was still serious.

   “I really did almost leave after Jerusalem. But I couldn’t. I finally understood that you weren’t just some girl. And that Jack was right. This is who I am. And it turns out that matters to me.” He took my wrist, ran a finger around the edge of my tattoo. “Kuklachka, yes. I do want this. I want us to be part of the Circle. I want to make things better, and I want—the world, I suppose, yes. We’re being handed this life that could be more than I’ve ever dreamed of. I want to take it. With you.”

   There were voices outside the door, but I ignored them, the reality of what he was saying crashing over me, fizzing and popping in my veins. He wasn’t just agreeing to stay for me. He wanted it. Just like I did.

   “But Anya—”

   He nodded. “Yesterday, when you were talking about your mother, I started to think that if I left, I’d be doing the same thing. Living half a life, and forcing Anya to live half a life, all for the illusion of safety that could shatter at any time. This way, she’ll be with me. She’ll be as safe as she can be. She’ll grow up surrounded by people who care about her, in a way neither of us got to do. And . . .” He twisted his fingers around mine nervously. “She could use a big-sister type. If you’re okay with that. I know asking you to raise a child with me is not the normal topic of conversation on what’s essentially a second date—”

   I laughed past an unexpected tightness in my throat. “I am very much okay with it.” I was almost embarrassed at how quickly I’d said it, and at the catch in my voice that made it mean so much more. I cleared my throat. “You and I will never have the kind of relationship we would have had if we’d met in calculus class and had to make out in your car after school like normal people.”

   A smile ghosted across his face, but more than a smile. Relief. “And I know the Circle does not love that I’m one half of this couple,” he said. “It’ll make it harder, and I’m sure there are many people who would be a better partner for you in this than I will. But I’ll learn, and we’ll have Luc to teach us, and Jack and Elodie to help—”