Treasured (The Binding Chronicles, #3)

by Elayna R. Gallea

None of this was particularly delightful—I preferred libraries over forests, books over people, and reading over hiking.

The harbinger, the Sunwalker, and the Wielder of Shadows. It sounded like the beginning of a bad joke. But instead, it was my life.

Nothing could keep me away from you. Not the queen, the summons, or even death itself.”

“I know I don’t always have the right words, and sometimes I get lost in my head, but you’re my entire world, Sebastian.”

Love was all-encompassing. It could complete you, consume your being, and transcend all rational thoughts and feelings. It was a force with no boundaries, a melody echoing in the hearts of connected souls, and a burning, raging, eternal flame that brought light to the darkest places.

I breathed. “Bite me.” He did. As one, we bit. As one, we drank. And as one, we kept each other alive. Unfettered power ran through my veins, my shadows sang and danced, and strength flourished within me.

My magic thrashed and pulsed, eager to connect with her. She was more than my Tethered partner. She was the missing half of my soul, the light that illuminated my darkness. A lightness brushed up against my mind, as soft as a feather, and I shivered.

“Most of the time, people don’t want to break their bond with their Maker.” Most of the time, Makers weren’t pure evil.

My mouth always got me into trouble. Just once, I’d like to get through a conversation without saying something completely ridiculous and potentially life-endangering.

Vampires, as a whole, were as terrible as they were beautiful. And they were incredibly, awfully, horribly beautiful.

Most of me wanted to gather Luna into my arms and shadow her back to the abbey, breaking the bond be damned. That same part of me wanted to keep her locked up forever for her own safety, so no harm could ever befall her. The other part of me was in complete awe at her courage.

Words could make you, break you, mold you. A word could give someone life or take it away. They were far more powerful than anyone gave them credit for.

cherished. I hadn’t known love could heal like this, that it would scrounge around in your soul, pick up all the broken pieces—even the ones you thought were forever lost—and put them back together. But it did, and it made my life all the sweeter.

“Darling, you are more than just the Sunwalker to me. From the first day I met you, you have been a shining light in my life. You were the

spring coming after a long winter. You infused newness, sunshine, and hope into what had become a very dark, numb existence.”

“I am here simply as the one who has fallen deeply, madly, irrevocably in love with you.” Her eyes searched mine. “Sebastian⁠—” “Don’t be mine for the sake of a treaty,” I implored her. “Be mine because I love you so much

that I cannot stand the thought of being apart from you for even a single moment in time. Be mine because, without you, I am less than nothing. I am a wisp of a shadow, a fleeting existence, barely here at all. Marry me for me, darling. Be mine, forever.”

Your darkness is my darkness. Your shadows are my

“You’re the reason I draw breath, the fire in my heart, the shadows that dance in my soul. Every good thing in my life is because of you. I love you, you ridiculous, sweet vampire. Of course, I’m yours. I never belonged to anyone else.”

Our mouths met in the middle in a clashing, searing, devouring kiss. It was a storm, a quaking of

the earth, a reckoning. This was no gentle peck on the cheek. It was a declaration, a commitment, a vow to spend eternity to be spent together.

“I love you, Sebastian Marcel Jacques François Montquartier, and I will be by your side from now until the rest of our lives.”

“That’s my girl.”

“Darling, you can’t hide anything from me. You study books, but I study you.”