Chapter 8
CHAPTER EIGHT
GENEVIèVE
I’m in awe of the mistletoe as étienne leads me beneath it. Its tendrils glow with green light, the berries pulsing white.
"The Veil thins here," I whisper, feeling its song vibrate through my bones.
“Are you frightened?”
My gaze turns to him, hoping he sees the truth in my eyes. “Of you? Non.”
“We must perform the Lien d’me. Bond of Souls.” étienne produces a small silver blade. “It requires blood and intent. Are you certain, Geneviève? I cannot guarantee what will happen to you once I leave this realm.”
“I’m sure.” I tell the truth, even as fear makes me tremble.
étienne slices his palm, his blood shimmers with shadows. I take the knife from him, doing the same, my blood dripping crimson.
He takes my hand, our blood mixing. The mistletoe pulses and shimmers above us.
He speaks words in the old language. Words of blood, souls, a bond that can’t be broken in this world or the next.
The Veil ripples around us. It wraps around our joined hands, sinking into our skin. étienne's fractured Oathmark begins to glow.
“Do you willingly join your soul to mine?” he asks.
“Yes.” Pain lances through my hand as a mark etches itself there.
"It's accepting us," étienne says with relief. He smiles, his other hand pressing against my cheek. “Tu as mon coeur.” You have my heart.
A wave of emotion fills my chest that has nothing to do with the Veil’s energy blanketing us. It’s love coming from inside me, welling, expanding.
He lifts me into his arms, showing a strength I thought he’d lost. “The final act of the ritual requires us to—”
I press two fingers over his lips and smile. “I understand what happens next.”
He carries me from the atrium, up the grand staircase, to his chambers. The house comes alive around us. Candles igniting, the air warming.
In his room, he lays me on silk sheets. His fingers work the laces of my dress. It falls away with my chemise and drawers.
His silvery eyes alight with desire as he takes me in. “I feel like I’m dreaming, yet I’m not. You’re here, mon ange.”
I nod as I undo the fastenings of his shirt and his breeches until he, too, is bare before me. His skin reveals the marks of the battles he’s fought as an Oathmarked. But he’s beautiful and perfect, and mine. Truly mine. And I’m his. Truly his.
“Come,” he says, taking me into his arms. His touch leaves silver trails of magic shimmering along my skin, making my blood hum. His hands cup my breasts, thumbs circling until I arch beneath him.
étienne's lips follow his fingers. He leaves no part of me untouched. As if he’s imprinting the memory of me into his mind. It’s driving me to madness.
“étienne.” I reach for him, needing him more than I need my next breath.
He rises over me, his slivery gaze glowing with emotion. “Je t’aime.” He presses forward, his body entering mine. Our gazes hold. As do our breaths. It’s as if time has stopped. Even the Veil has stilled, as if marking this moment.
Then he moves gently, then with growing urgency. Each thrust, energy bursts around us in a white, silvery light. Our marks glow brighter as pleasure builds. He takes my hand, pressing my sigil over his heart. The bond pulses, strengthens. Our souls merge, two into one.
I wrap my legs around him, praying for the Veil and the spirits to hear my wish. To save this man. To save our joined souls.
“Now my love,” he says on a strained groan. “I want to feel you.” He thrust in again, and the sweetest sensations flood through my body.
I cry out, arching up into him. He joins me in pleasure, filling my womb with warmth. Even the Veil around us seems to shudder. For one perfect moment, life and love align in perfect harmony.
He remains inside me for a long moment, forehead pressed to mine, as our bond settles into place. The Veil’s glow lingers in the air.
“Geneviève…”
I run my fingers through his hair. “Rest, mon c?ur. The Veil cannot have you tonight.”
The light fades slowly from our marks, leaving only the steady rhythm of his heart beneath my hand. He gathers me to his chest, pressing a final kiss to my brow.
Together, we drift into sleep as the Veil hums a lullaby around us.
A loud noise awakens me.
For a moment, I’m disoriented, unsure of my surroundings.
But then it comes back to me. Returning to étienne’s home. Binding my soul to his. Our bodies joining to complete the bond.
The noise sounds again.
I turn to étienne, pressing on his shoulder to wake him, but my fingers pass partly through. Terror grips me as I see translucent patches across his skin worse than before.
"étienne?" I touch his face. The bond between us pulses, but weakly.
Footsteps echo through the manor. Many sets, moving with purpose.
"They're here." étienne's eyes fly open. "The Council. They probably felt the ritual."
Before I can respond, the bedroom door splinters inward. Four robed figures sweep in. At their head stands an older man with Bastian Favreau's jawline but none of his kindness.
“You of all Oathmarked, étienne …performing a forbidden bond.”
étienne rises, blocking me from the men. “I’m dead, anyway.”
The elder Favreau's eyes narrow. "This binding changes nothing. The Rite of Unmaking begins at once. You will not become an instrument to the Hollow."
Two Council guards appear and seize étienne, their hands passing through his form before anchoring him with magic that makes him cry out.
“Get him dressed. Bring him to the ritual room.”
“And her?”
“Bring her. We’ll decide what to do with her later.”
I struggle against the men, but étienne urges me not to. “Don’t give them a reason to hurt you. They’ll do a spell to erase your memories, and you’ll go back to your life.”
But such a spell won’t work. Not when étienne is seared into my soul.
Once dressed, we’re dragged downstairs into the atrium.
“The Veil knows we’re here,” Favreau says, eyeing the mistletoe. It glows again, but to my mind it’s an angry glow.
"Where are your brothers?" I whisper to étienne as I scan the doorway for any sign of the Oathmarked who promised to help us.
“They cannot save me now, mon amour. Please, stay quiet," he murmurs urgently. "Don't let them know you hear the Veil. They'll take you too."
The two men force étienne to his knees as the Council members begin drawing symbols on the floor with salt and ash.
Favreau begins chanting, and étienne's form wavers like a flame. Pain sears my hand as our bond stretches thin, threatening to rip apart.
"I love you," étienne says, his eyes holding mine as the ritual begins to tear him open. "Whatever happens, remember that."
"By oath you were made," intones Favreau, his voice echoing through the chamber.
I struggle against my captors. "Why?" I scream, not at them but at the Veil itself. "Why bring us together only to allow this?"
The men continue their chants. "By shadow unmade."
étienne's oathmark begins to disappear. His eyes find mine, still full of love even as pain contorts his features. The bond still holds, but barely.
"Let the Veil forget your name."
étienne collapses beneath the mistletoe. The mark on my hand burns cold, spreading numbness.
"No!" I break free and rush to him, gathering his fading form in my arms. "Come back to me. The Veil cannot have you yet."
“He’s not going to the Veil. He’s gone as if he never existed.”
No. It can’t be. I lift my gaze to the mistletoe, not understanding why the Veil would allow this. What was the point of foretelling me of his arrival? Of falling in love with him in life and in dreams? Of bonding us?
“Please. Please don’t let him go. Please let me stay with him.” I press my lips to his forehead and sing the only song I know that might bring him back. A song I shouldn’t know because it was born from the Veil.
"She's a Veilseer," one says, voice thick with disdain.
"Take her," orders Favreau.
As they reach for me, the mistletoe above us trembles. At first, just a quiver, then a violent shaking that rains white berries upon us.
The floor beneath my knees begins to rumble. Cracks race through the marble, spiraling outward from where I clutch étienne's body. Blue light erupts from the cracks, from étienne's breaking Oathmark, from my own hand where our bond burns.
Darkness wells up through the broken floor. It’s not the absence of light but a living shadow.
"What have you done?" Favreau's face contorts with terror.
The spirits surge around me, their voices urgent: Go into the dark, child. Take him with you.
I gather étienne closer and with every bit of strength I have, I lean into the darkness, letting it claim us both.
I fall through the shadow, clinging to étienne's form though I can no longer feel him in my arms.
Spirits, or maybe it’s the Veil, bombard me with messages, but all I hear is noise.
A crackle of energy, the world dissolving into swirling mist, and then—nothing.
I land hard on solid ground, alone in a place I don’t recognize.
It’s a home, but not mine or étienne’s. It’s smaller, less opulent than his.
But it’s warm. Cozy. I want to feel safe here, but I don’t understand where I am.
Have I been taken by the Veil and then spit out?
Am I still lost in it? Is this a dream? A premonition?
"étienne?"
No answer comes. The spirits are silent here, too. For the first time since childhood, I hear nothing but my own breathing.
Fear creeps up my spine. Did I lose him in the crossing? Did I fail? Is his soul gone?
Footsteps sound behind me. I turn, and there he stands. Whole. Solid. The only thing missing is his oathmark.
"étienne!" I run to him, throwing myself into his arms. He catches me, laughing. His body is warm against mine, more substantial than he's been since I found him at my gate.
I pull back, searching his face. "How? The Council…they were unmaking you."
“They mostly did. But you wished for the Veil to save me." He brushes tears from my cheek. "It can’t change what the Council has done, so I can’t return to the living world completely. The Veil has preserved me in this place. A seam between worlds."
“And I am here too. With you.”
"You can cross between, like in our dreams." His arms tighten around me. "The price of my salvation is that I remain here."
I look around at our strange new home, beautiful and eerie. "Why would the Veil go to such lengths only for you to lose everything? Your name, your house..."
étienne smiles, the radiant one. He places his hand gently over my stomach.
"The Veil can’t intervene in the actions of man.
But we succeeded, ma cherie. We heeded the Veil’s calling, and our son shall restore what was broken.
" His eyes glow with certainty. "He will rebuild the Fifth House and heal the breach between worlds. "
“Our son?” Is it possible? I wasn’t blessed with children before, so how can it be possible?
He tilts his head. “The spirits didn’t explain?”
I shake my head. “All I heard was noise…and then nothing.”
He pulls me in, arms wrapping around me. “That information Bastian couldn’t share? House Noctier must survive. It must produce a child born of the world and the Veil.”
A tremor of awe runs through me. “The Veil saved you for a purpose?”
He nods. “It saved us for the future. For the child growing in your womb.”
I press my hand over my stomach where our child grows. “The Fifth House begins again with us?”
The Veil hums in answer.