38. Chapter 38
Chapter 38
H e burst back into the room nearly an hour later.
“Immmannnni,” he called in a sing-song voice.
The shadows coiled and writhed at the sound of her name, and she turned to find him standing in the doorway. He seemed broader somehow with his chilling demeanor radiating a wild determination.
It was Kiran, but something about him was different. When she met his eyes, a shiver ran down her spine. Gone was the light mocking amusement she’d come to expect. Something far more dangerous had taken its place. The corner of his lips curled, and she shrank back from his face. His features gave nothing away, but both his eyes were nearly black. There was so much darkness swimming in them, and the unpredictability and penchant for cold violence truly scared her the most. This could go extremely wrong for her.
A razor-sharp smile formed on his face. “It’s done. My brother agreed.”
“Does he know about this little binding between us?”
“Yes,” he said instantly. A threat simmered beneath the words.
Dragging his hand over his mouth, he slid his gaze over her, swallowing hard as if he wished to say something else. But he held back from it and, a second later, made his way across the room.
“Before we do this binding,” he continued in the same flat tone, “I need to be absolutely sure you understand the terms. Not only will you be required to accompany me, but you’ll also serve our kingdom like all my witches until we terminate your service or your life ends. You won’t get any special treatment, nor will you speak about our agreement.”
“In other words, you’ll be my master, and I’ll be your slave?”
An uncomfortable silence greeted her question, and she immediately wished to take her words back because Kiran’s expression couldn’t have been more vacant.
“Slaves aren’t paid,” he deadpanned after a minute.
“So, why do I need a binding? Order me to go there with you.” Her fear built in a slow, tense crescendo. Her unglamoured skin must be a sight.
He rolled his eyes. “I already told you we must be magically bound to enter.” Without sparing her a glance, he held his wand in his teeth and rolled up his sleeves.
“What will you make me do once we’re there?” she asked as he bit into the flesh on his arm.
“Nothing. Your role is to help me enter—that’s it.” His blood gushed into a bowl. “Assuming it all goes to plan, the trip will take a few hours for you.”
A sense of trepidation tingled her senses. I can read you better than ever , she thought. She knew he wasn’t being honest, if not entirely.
She sighed, realizing the Niflheim Kingdom’s First Witch needed a sacrifice. Someone willing to agree to a powerful binding with him to go to their death. No wonder he hadn’t found anyone before her. He needed an expendable tool, and not many would agree to bind themselves to Kiran for something like this.
“So, what now? You’re?—”
“No more questions.” His tone left no room for argument. He turned away, humming to himself as he walked across the room, over to the desk in the corner, ignoring her like she was nothing more than a piece of furniture.
Ambling over, sickness swirled in her gut, but she tried to appear uninterested. Murmuring several words in his elvish dialect, he conjured bowls and herbs out of thin air, and various other magical items. Floating flames appeared at his command, bursting with warmth. Her frantic brain only discerned about half of the herbs and tinctures.
A pinch of black powder and dried sage forced the mixture to swirl. It thickened after adding a dash of the tincture and several grains of chalk. Glancing up to see the white smoke rising from the table, wrinkles appeared on his forehead in concentration. He put each item inside a circle made from salt and six floating flames, ready to spell them. Kiran then lifted his hands, infusing his alchemy magic into the substances before the cup lifted itself and poured its contents into a large bowl. In one smooth motion, he cut his other wrist with his fangs and let more blood cover the top layer. Red liquid poured from Kiran’s arm.
Indeed, with all this blood, the flesh magic he planned could only be one type.
“This is a blood burning,” she whispered, picking up a dried leaf. It had a musky scent.
“Very good,” he said, still humming in elvish while preparing the materials.
Highly illegal, she’d only seen it performed once before. Both people in the binding had mixed their blood with the magic then consumed the substance. The person’s essence would latch inside the other, supposedly tied to the signature and the body.
It was also a powerful aphrodisiac.
Nasty, invasive spells like this killed people. There would be unforeseen consequences with this type of deep sacrificial magic.
“These are almost impossible to perform.” She averted her eyes, pretending to study the ingredients.
As his capable hands worked, she had no doubt he’d done this before. Maybe several times. Even while performing several complicated spells at once, he worked with practiced efficiency. She remembered all the binding brands covering his body. How many people controlled him?
Or … how many did he control?
Kiran muttered another incantation, but it was barely even a whisper, and she couldn’t understand the words. He seemed outwardly relaxed, despite the taxing magic he was doing. The rough way he grabbed his collar and unbuttoned his shirt told her how tense he might be, but he didn’t let it slow him down.
A knock sounded at the door, but neither moved to answer it. They needed privacy.
For all the time Kiran had spent observing her in the assessments recently, she hadn’t seen him perform any significant magic since the first day. They had yet to come close to seeing the full extent of his capabilities. He was a mesmerizing witch to watch up close—an artist, really.
“It’s difficult to burn the blood properly,” she continued. “Most of the time, it smokes off or thickens too quickly to be viable, or the blood is incompatible. If you try to drink it, you either die, become sick, or lose too much blood from repeating it.” And this magic needed a lot of blood. “The bond will be strongest if we’re more compatible. Being elves should help, but …” Imani trailed off.
A sudden shadow darkened the door, and Kiran and Imani whipped around to see Jai standing there. His eyes widened at the scene unfolding before him, no doubt recognizing the magic they performed.
Imani remembered Jai’s death scene in her mind. He’d been slumped over in a pool of his own blood.
Kiran and Imani exchanged a glance. “I told you to cast better wards,” Imani muttered.
They could hope he kept his mouth shut but, as if reading her mind, Kiran shook his head. Imani agreed with him. She had lost all faith in everyone—even her so-called friends—keeping secrets to themselves. Unless they were a close family member—the only people Imani would consider trusting these days—they’d use them sooner or later as leverage.
With Kiran elbow-deep in blood and smoke, she glared at him. It would be up to her to kill Jai to remove any witnesses. It had to be done. Even Tanyl was difficult to trust entirely. However, a part of her did think she could learn to trust Esa again … and maybe Kiran, if he let her in more.
She at least trusted Tanyl enough to care for her siblings and Kiran enough to perform this binding.
Months ago, she would have balked at such an act, but this was too important. No one could find out. So, tonight, she snapped her wand out, froze Jai’s body, and slit his throat clean through. Lifting the spell, he fell down the wall, blood covering the front of his shirt, eyes wide.
It only took a minute for him to die. Once he did, she enchanted his body out into the hallway and propped him up against the wall, placing the knife in his hand.
There. Now it was a suicide.
The act left her oddly unfazed. Imani blankly walked back into the room and shut the door. This time, Kiran pointed his wand at it and cast even more defensive spells. She didn’t think anyone would be getting in there tonight uninvited. He’d been sloppy before. How badly did he want her to agree if he forgot simple defensive spells?
“So”—she shuffled to stand beside him—“you better know what you’re doing with this flesh magic binding, or we’re both dead.”
“True. But when used to enhance a binding, it’s unbreakable,” Kiran said eventually, so quiet she almost didn’t hear him. He covered a mix of plants in a bowl with a few drops of a tincture. “It will take several months to cure, but a blood burning like this one will create a powerful bond between the two people.”
It wouldn’t be unbreakable once she had the Drasil. No magic would be unbreakable to something so powerful. But Imani kept it to herself.
Fangs snapping out quickly, he cut another deep cut across his forearm. His face remained impassive, not acknowledging the pain from the wounds. He barely looked at her and said little as he brewed the dried flowers.
“This is a root binding, too.” Imani frowned, the complete understanding of what he was about to do disturbing her even more. “What’s the ramification?” She turned to him, heart hammering. “Death?”
No response.
She crossed her arms and stared at him expectantly, but he still didn’t answer.
“Gods, the ascension assessment binding wasn’t a root. Not even most heartmates choose bindings this extreme,” Imani added.
Again, his silence was all the answer she needed.
The magic in root bindings planted deeper inside someone the longer it remained in place. The blood burning and the death ramifications ratcheted up the intensity of these bindings considerably. Imani pushed her hair off her face, feeling real fear for the first time in a long time.
Actively working to break her promise might cause the magic to tighten around her throat. It might constrict her chest, stop her heart for seconds, or cause blackouts. She would never be able to break or lessen magic like this, even with the Drasil. It would be part of her, like an organ. When complete, the spell would never entirely disappear, like other bindings.
He had lied to her earlier.
“I suppose it’s a perfect choice,” she mused, trying to mask her anxiety. “Blood burnings are highly regulated here. Only the Order is sanctioned to perform them after a strict application process.”
“You know a lot about magic,” he stated. “Most people here lack the curiosity to understand its properties beyond anything but transactional truly.”
“My, my, a compliment.” She preened a bit but managed to keep her face blank. “You don’t know as much about me as you think you do.”
“I know enough,” he said.
Before she could respond, magic filled the room. It was thick and smokey, suffusing the air. The heady effect was immediate.
He closed his cut with his wand then gently pulled her closer while her mind drifted. Imani mentally detached herself as he cut and bled her. The magic seeped into her body.
Kiran pressed a soft kiss to one of her wrists then waved his wand over it, his healing magic sealing the cut. Then he did it again to the cut on her chest and the bruises across her face. After, he swiftly stripped his clothes.
Hugging her arms around her waist, a tremor racked her body. Limbs heavy, she could barely move, transfixed as he stepped out of his pants. Her head might have floated into the clouds from all the magic in the room.
He stood in front of her now, practically naked. Imani started to smile dreamily at him but somehow stopped herself. The magic gripped her, amplifying her attraction to him.
Kiran narrowed his eyes at her. Lifting her hand, he let out a quiet shudder as she moved her fingers lightly up his arms. His skin, a shade more golden than hers, was warm. Trails of sparkling emotions across his skin appeared at her touch.
In a daze, she kept up her movements. He overpowered her senses when he was this close.
Looking up, she was surprised to see his eyes slide closed. Her hands were comically small compared to his, but she ran them down his chest to the trail of hair leading to his undergarments.
Kiran stood perfectly still for a moment. Imani could not read him. She could not understand what was going on in his mind right now.
The striking combination of virile elf and shifter blood gave him a sharp, rugged beauty, incomparable to others. She was glad half-breeds weren’t illegal in Niflheim because there was no contest. He was the most attractive man she’d ever seen.
Why did he hide this perfection from the world? She didn’t understand. In many ways, he hid more than she did.
Something frightening and possessive passed between them.
And she liked it.
With a deep inhale, her nostrils flared, and Kiran bit into his bottom lip. This was more intense than the binding with Tanyl, and it should have terrified her.
Kiran held her face, frantic yet soothing, before dipping his head to nuzzle her neck. A thrill shot through her like she was drowning, and she moved to trace lightly down his abdomen again. But he sucked in a breath before she could finish and snatched her wrists, painfully squeezing.
She yelped, surprised.
Glassy eyes lifted again to meet hers. Any trace of desire was gone, leaving only wickedness and a vacant expression hinting at something swimming beneath Kiran’s mind and body.
How did he switch between personalities so quickly? One second, he was passionate and sarcastically amused. The next, he was cold with malice. She couldn’t keep up. Imani could never get a read on him, and it infuriated her.
In one smooth motion, he removed her robe, tossing it on the floor. “Take the nightgown off.”
She carefully slipped off the straps of her nightgown, letting it pool around her feet. Holding her wand at her side, she took several deep breaths to regain control.
“The magic tonight will draw us together. It requires us to feed from each other, which could also lead to sex. But let me be perfectly clear; I would never touch a dirty whore who’s been with that piece of shit, Tanyl.” Kiran’s tone was befitting a prince, snobbish and cruel, like she was a small-minded little girl and he was far superior in all ways.
In her mind, she’d known this fact: he despised Tanyl. But the slap of his words made her jerk, and for some reason, she didn’t understand.
A deep ache of hurt burst forth in her chest, as if he’d physically struck her. How was he resisting the magic so easily and she wasn’t?
“Well, you might be the biggest hypocrite in the world,” she supplied thickly, masking her pain with barbs. “You’d be lucky to sleep with a whore like me. But you’ll never know since your diseased cock is one fuck away from falling off.”
A swift movement between them startled her. He had her robe in his hands again, and she held her hand out for it. Conjuring, another skill to add to her growing list of his confirmed magic.
He threw it at her, hitting her in the face. “Try not to be a slut for a few hours. We have work to do.” He glared at her as if she were a revolting pest he wanted to forget after killing.
She stood there, frozen. Half in anger, half in embarrassment. Tears from both humiliation and hunger threatened to spill from her eyes. Seething, her hands shook so violently she could barely wrap the garment around her while vaguely thinking this might be the worst night of her life.