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“They called it a God Binding. A blessing from the gods themselves. They weren’t real, of course. The most important couples in Yvelian history were said to have had them, but it was all romantic rubbish. Just something storytellers embellished to make their tales more tragic. Plus, they looked impressive in the illuminated books.”
He sat there, his bare, inked chest not moving, his black waves tumbling into his face, so perfect, so handsome, and that cursed fucking thing deep down in the basement of my soul ached and said mine.
“I am not weak, Fisher! I’m not like those butterflies, pathetic, hatching and dying in the cold—”
“Not you! Me!” He thumped himself in his chest, suddenly furious. “My weakness! My vulnerability! I’ve known for centuries that you were coming. That you were just going to show up one day and change everything. You’re the chink in my armor, Saeris. The soft spot where the knife slides in. You are the thing that Malcolm will hurt in order to hurt me, and I couldn’t… couldn’t fucking bear it!”
“It’s the most beautiful thing a person can experience in this lifetime. They glow blue and pink and silver, with an ethereal light.
That’s what Oshellith means in Old Fae, Saeris. Most Sacred.”
“I was told. A long time ago. By my mother. She was an oracle. I didn’t believe her, but then, when I was taken—” He swallowed hard, his eyes watering. Quickly, he scooted to the edge of the bed, planting his bare feet against the floor. He couldn’t breathe.
“She said, when I needed you most, you’d come blazing into my life like a meteorite, riding on a wave of chaos that would turn my whole world upside down.
And that I’d love you with a fierceness despite myself.”
“In all of her drawings of you, your ears were like mine. You were Fae. And when I saw…”
“My mother never said anything about a mating bond. They haven’t existed for so long. The thought never even crossed my mind. But when I found you lying in that pool of blood, I felt it, like a band snapping into place. I smelled it on you, too. And I… I was so fucking angry.”
“I saw them appear while you slept the other night. I watched them growing darker, one after the other, more marks than I’d ever heard of, and it scared the hell out of me, Saeris.”
I ran my free hand gently through his hair, screaming inside, so fucking angry at him, and at myself, and at the gods, and the whole fucking universe for doing this to us. This wasn’t fair. None of it was.
This left only one option: she was helping him somehow with the quicksilver in his head. And if he had to go and see her before he left and when he got back, then it really must be getting bad.
“You really think I’m going to let you sleep out here again?” he asked. “I didn’t know if you’d want me in your bed,” I told him. “If it were up to me, we wouldn’t spend another night without each other again.”
Gods, I wanted him. I wanted all of him.
My soul was on fire, and I didn’t care if I burned for all eternity. So long as I was burning with him, then so be it.
God-bound. We were God-bound. Mates.
could feel it now—a bright thread of energy drawing us together as he wrapped himself around me. If I wanted it, all I needed to do was reach out and claim it.
He would be my end, this male. He would claim my better days and carry me during my worst. He would show me the meaning of ecstasy and drown me in it until I fucking died.
You’ve got me, Little Osha. And I’ve got you.
“Nobody will ever fuck you the way I’m about to fuck you, Saeris Fane. I’m about to introduce you to all seven gods. When you meet them, don’t forget to tell them I’m the one you worship on your knees.”
Out. Fucking. Loud.
“I thought you were hiding these from me,” I said. “Maybe I was. But I’ll be damned all the way to hell and back if you use that sweet mouth on me and I don’t get to watch.”
“My lips to kiss. My mouth to fuck.”
watched, unable to tear my gaze from him, and an array of new tattoos bloomed like black flowers across his skin.
For once, he looked at ease. Content. And… wicked? A slow smile spread across his face.
“Did I imagine it, or did I feel something new slipping into place here earlier?”
“Wings. Really beautiful wings. They have the same metallic sheen as this,” I said, holding up the layered, complicated rune on my right hand.
In the past, one party always got the mating marks first. When the other party accepted the bond, sometimes Marks showed up on their bodies, too. It didn’t happen all of the time. But sometimes…”
“I accepted the bond. Earlier. When I was inside you. When my soul was wrapped around yours.” He was so calm. Not a hint of uncertainty or nerves at all. Meanwhile, I felt like I was about to pass out. “You accepted it,” I said. “I did.”
“I’ll be grateful for every second that I can say that I belong to you, Saeris Fane. Eighty years or eighteen hours. It doesn’t matter to me. It’ll still be the highest honor of my life. But don’t—Are you about to have a heart attack? Your pulse is flying.” The bastard laughed, and I nearly burst into tears. “Don’t freak out. Here. Look.”
He’d accepted me as his mate.
“I’m in love with you, Saeris Fane,” he whispered quietly into my hair. “And I’m already half-mad, anyway. What’s a little complicated thrown into the mix?”
“Please, for the love of the gods, don’t say anything. Just let me have my fantasy. Just for tonight.”
HE WAS the first thing I saw. Always. My heart and my soul knew exactly where to find him.
Holy… Fucking… Hell… The Widow’s Bane was making me hallucinate.
There, sitting in the center of the dais, was Malcolm. His fine features and long, silver hair made him instantly recognizable. It was he who had spoken. It could only have been him, because I had met the other figures who sat on either side of him. They knew perfectly well who I was. To the right of the dais sat Belikon. To the left… Madra.
“I play back,” Fisher spat. “It might not be today, but oh, I am coming to find you, Madra. Fear the shadows, bitch. I’m made of them. One night soon, I’ll climb out of one and slit your fucking throat.”
“You spayed my mate when she was a fucking child,” he seethed. “For that alone, I’ll make your undying existence an unending agony. An eternity of suffering the likes of which even your evil mind cannot comprehend. You’ll know no peace at my hands. I will destroy your empire and erase your name from the annals of time. When I am done with your legacy, Madra the Undying will never have existed. And you’ll live on at my behest, suffering for all of eternity. And no one will know. And no one will care.”
“You really should have let me finish introducing myself earlier. It’s rude to interrupt people.”
“My name is Carrion Swift.
Carrion Daianthus. Firstborn son to Rurik and Amelia Daianthus.”
“You tricked me into drinking Daianthus blood?” “Holy… fucking… gods.” Fisher and Lorreth muttered the curse in unison.
“Yes,” I said. “My mate.”
I suppose it would have been impossible to track all of you down, though. It’s notoriously difficult to detect magic in half-blood Fae. She probably allowed one or two of them to slip through her fingers. They must have hidden in her city and started families and bred.
“Earth. Air. Fire. Water. Salt. Brimstone. Quicksilver. The full gamut. More power than any Alchemist I’ve ever encountered.
This sick piece of shit couldn’t claim any part of my mate. Fisher was mine. “I’m going to kill you,” I groaned. “It’ll be the last thing I do, but it’ll be worth it.”
I was on my feet, hunched and losing blood, standing right beside him. And I had Solace in my hands. “Only the gods are eternal,” I told him. And I cut off Malcolm’s head.
The mountain that weathers all storms,
