Chapter 38 Meryn #2
I wrap an arm around Saela’s shoulders, pulling her in close. “Speaking of uncomfortable connections with Killian and Alistair, there’s something you need to know. My sister has a sire bond with Killian. He’s the one who turned her.”
Lucien’s upper lip curls, and his fingers tighten around the manuscript. “And you chose to keep this information from me?” There’s thinly veiled wrath in his voice. Venna moves closer to me and Saela, hovering protectively.
Lucien’s sharp blue gaze darts toward my sister. “Can you hear him?”
Saela shakes her head as I pull the Tear from the shelter of her top. “This necklace seems to have some sort of protective power,” she explains. “It blocks the connection.”
Lucien and Venna both study the necklace. A spark of recognition lights Lucien’s eyes.
“Interesting,” he murmurs. “I wouldn’t have thought… but then, how can you know for sure?”
“We do,” I interrupt. Saela doesn’t look nervous when I glance at her. “She was without its protection briefly. It’s been tested.” I can tell he’s trying to determine whether he should believe me, but I don’t have the patience. “What do you know about the Tears, Lucien?”
Lucien shuts his eyes and runs a fingertip along his brow as if smoothing away a thread of pain. Then he reaches down beneath his own clothes and lifts the chain around his neck with that same finger.
At the end of it dangles another Tear pendant, glittering with power. It’s a reflection of Saela’s, just as our crowns mirror each other.
A disbelieving noise escapes me. “I guess I wasn’t the only one withholding information. You didn’t feel like revealing this at dinner last night, when you were crowing about how the jewels have power?”
His smile turns sharp, and I know I’m going to hate what comes out of his mouth next. “I only like to show you mine when you show me yours.”
Venna rolls her eyes.
Childish prick. How did he make it a thousand years without someone getting irritated enough to cut off his head?
Ignoring his teasing, I ask, “Are you more powerful when you wear it? Does it enhance your Siphon magic?”
He rubs his thumb over it and bows his head in a nod. Then he speaks under his breath. “I wonder…”
Unexpectedly, he grips the stone, lifts it over his head, and holds it out to me.
Hesitantly, I take it.
The moment the jewel settles against my palm, my power rises in a writhing answer to the stone’s silent call, just as it did when I tried on the other necklace at the war camp.
“Your intoxicated expression tells me it works for you,” Lucien says. His head is tilted to one side like he’s trying to find the right angle to see into me.
Saela, wide-eyed, is too busy digesting this new information to notice the interested gleam in Lucien’s eye. Venna clocks it, though. I make a mental note to discuss that with her later.
“So your crowns help you control your respective powers, the necklaces give you protection, and both of the Tears make your magic stronger,” Saela recites. “I wonder how strong a person would be if they had all the Tears on them at once.”
There’s another Goddess Tear, though. The one the Mother Priestess wears. Probably worth keeping that a secret from Lucien—for now, at least.
I hold Lucien’s necklace back out to him reluctantly. “I’m going to need Saela’s Tear if… if we’re going to face off against Killian and Alistair.”
We haven’t discussed his proposed ceasefire yet. He doesn’t know I’m going to accept it, although surely he must assume I will, given how favorable the terms are for me. Either way, when we meet Killian on a battlefield, I know we’re going to need all the strength we can get.
Lucien smiles as he slips his Tear back on. “If only you had a millennium of experience at your disposal to solve this little problem for you.”
Venna rolls her eyes again, and Lucien sees it this time, looking at her in curiosity. I get the distinct feeling he’s not used to people being unimpressed by him.
“Siphons tend to be particular about consent,” Lucien continues eventually. “Over the years, we developed items capable of blocking a sire’s power. Most commonly fashioned as jewelry, actually. Saela can simply trade what’s around her neck.”
“Another necklace?” Venna looks doubtful. “What proof do we have that this will do what you say?”
“Not to mention, I don’t know if I’m comfortable handing my sister enchanted Siphon jewelry she might never be able to take off,” I add, lifting my bound wrist for demonstration.
Lucien shrugs. “Consult your father if you require reassurance. They’re quite commonplace.” He leans his hip against the table, and the smirk comes back out. “It seems to me this is the only way for you to get your Tear back.”
“Is that what your ten centuries are telling you?” Venna says dryly.
“Loudly and clearly,” he confirms, and turns away from us, reaching for another manuscript.
But nothing about Lucien’s motivations is clear at all.
In the same breath I have that thought, pain gathers at my temples.
It’s a normal headache, at first.
Then Lucien says something, and I can’t hear him even though he’s just across the table from me.
Saela says my name, I think, and Venna dashes toward me. But they both seem far away.
It’s coming from the mental bonds—a scream that’s growing progressively louder by the second until my vision whites out and the noise and pain disconnect me from my body entirely.
Suddenly, I’m looking at the world through Siegrid’s eyes. I’m in her head somehow. There’s a swirl of fury and confusion. Despair. Hate. Such burning hate. She’s atop her massive wolf. And she’s in severe pain.
A lance pierces her side, the shaft of it deep in her body. She’s struggling to stay astride Genicos. He’s attempting to heal her, but the wound can’t heal while the weapon is still lodged in her body.
Siegrid gives another scream of anguish and rage. All around us, Nocturnan forces are engaged in a desperate fight. Nobody can stop to help her.
She hates the pain clouding her mind.
She hates her own weakness, letting herself fall into so much danger.
But more than anything, she hates herself for failing to anticipate this. Him.
This is not a Siphon attack. In the sea of churning, struggling, and dying bodies, I see that our forces are fighting against… Phylax. They have plenty of commoner soldiers on their side as well.
Siegrid grits her teeth through the agony and orders her troops to regroup. If the defensive line falls…
Well, they’ll lose the whole front.
They’ll lose the kingdom to him.
Wind picks up, blowing smoke into Siegrid’s face. She stares through it, watching a figure emerge as the smoke clears with the wind.
Tormun, the Alpha of Phylax. He’s massive on his wolf, rippling, hefting an enormous mace that shouldn’t be possible to wield on wolfback. His arm strains under the weapon’s weight as he lifts it, his oddly dulled gaze set on Siegrid.
His wolf crushes a Strategos wolf under its weight. That mace comes down on his opponent’s skull, killing them instantly, the wolf’s rider screaming under their own mount’s corpse. Tormun is going to break through, and Siegrid will not allow that to happen.
With a shriek, she rips the lance from her side, the pain rushing in like wildfire. Genicos howls at the shared pain, even as he strains to heal his rider.
He’s trained for this. He’s healed her a thousand times, and he will again, she knows it.
Tormun is almost upon them. And there’s a pest at his side.
Fucking Jonah.
Everything sinks into the blur of mounted battle. Siegrid’s wolf collides with Tormun’s, snapping and lashing out. Her blade deflects his first strike, and the shock wave vibrates up her arm, jarring the wound in her side and making her cry out.
She may not be physically stronger than Tormun, but she’s far more skilled. And now, Genicos’s magic is working on her; her flesh knits together, her strength returning.
Siegrid strikes out savagely, scoring a long wound across Tormun’s massive thigh. He falls back with a shout. His wolf is panting and bleeding.
Pressing her advantage, she gathers her Daemos magic and pushes it out toward Tormun with a shout. But the corruption in the pack magic hits her then—I can feel her pain and confusion as the impelling blast doubles back on her, rebounding and sending even powerful Genicos reeling.
Siegrid struggles to right herself on Genicos’s back, keeping her eyes locked on Tormun, who is closing in once more.
But then. Jonah. She wasn’t paying attention to him; she dismissed him as inconsequential.
He follows the powerful motion of his wolf’s body and brings his sword with him. It slots beneath Siegrid’s armor, and white-hot agony explodes as the steel pierces through vital organs.
I feel it all.
Siegrid’s blood floods her mouth. She wonders, in a moment of bizarre silence when all the shrieks and howls around her fall away, whether her son taught the boy how to angle his blade just like this.
Genicos attempts to heal her, but his strength is depleted from healing her previous injury, and the blade is still deep inside her.
The wound is mortal. She’s going to die.
She knows it, too. In her final moments, she wonders if she taught Stark enough about everything that comes next for him. If he’s prepared to become the Sovereign Alpha and for what—who—comes along with that role.
Siegrid looks down at the blade. She grips the hilt weakly like she means to draw it and use it. But she can’t find any more strength. She’s spent it all.
She regrets it, their relationship.
She thought if she kept him at a distance, she could shield him from it somehow.
She hopes she made him strong enough.
Siegrid slides from her wolf’s back and lands in the bloody muck on her side, the sword still stuck in her. Her wolf howls in anguish. The sound echoes over the battlefield, and devastation echoes back over the bonds. Her fading consciousness registers one final, ruinous sight.
The central command post is up in flames, cinders disappearing into the sky.
Everything goes black.
I’ve never been so close to death before. Never.
I gasp. Air pummels my lungs painfully. My hand whips up, searching for the blade I so clearly felt enter my body, but there’s nothing there. There’s nothing.
My eyes dart around. I’m looking for Siegrid’s wolf, Genicos, where he fell next to her, his life snuffing out.
All I see are the scattered documents spread across the library table. A sob tears out of me, and then I’m on the floor. My entire body shakes with the aftershocks of Siegrid’s death, like I’m experiencing her death rattle for her.
Saela drops onto her knees next to me, grabbing my hand, her face pale with fear.
“Meryn, talk to us,” comes Venna’s voice, as if from far away.
“What happened?” Lucien says, tone urgent. “What happened?”
Through my tears, I struggle to form words. My voice breaks pathetically as I finally manage to force it out.
“Nocturna has fallen.”