Chapter 21
Sidney
I jerked awake with a gasp, my heart pounding against my ribs. Disorientation clung to me like a fog. I pushed upright, rubbing the grit from my eyes. My quarters snapped into focus, the shape of the bedroom anchoring me back to reality.
“Easy.” Zane’s voice cut through the haze. “You slept through the whole day.”
Beside me, Finn stirred too and blinked himself awake. He threw back the blankets and slipped out of bed in his sleep pants, then padded across the room to where Boris paced in impatient circles, his claws clicking on the floor. Finn cocked his head and nodded.
A moment later, he turned and signed, Boris needs to go outside. I will be back. With that, he opened the door, and the honey badger darted out ahead of him. Nibs scurried out after them.
Zane lowered himself onto the edge of the mattress. “I’ve handled all the preparations for the bonding.”
I pulled the blanket over my head. That was tonight, wasn’t it? I wished it didn’t feel so sudden.
“We missed our wedding date, you know?” I asked, muffled.
He slipped beneath the blanket with me, tucking the two of us into a small, secluded world of shared warmth. Without a reflection of light, his eyes were the two dark brown pools I remembered. He waited patiently for me to share what was on my mind.
“We picked the day well in advance. We had friends coming.” Actual friends, folks we could both stand. “It was going to be an event, and I looked forward to it for months until… well, it just never happened.”
“I’m sorry. I looked forward to it too.” He ran his hand down the curve of my back. “Tonight is different. Maybe after all this…we can have a wedding too.”
“Promise?” I murmured.
“Promise, sunshine.” He leaned in and sealed it with a kiss. “Whenever you’re ready, the head priest is waiting out in the gardens for the ceremony.”
Just the mention of Bruvor made my stomach lurch. His cruelty mirrored that of the goddess he served. Zane pressed another kiss to my forehead, steadying me, but it was nowhere near enough to quiet the unease coiling tightly in my chest.
“Can’t we just stay here like this?” I clung to his heat and the fleeting safety it offered.
“I’d be all for it if it weren’t for the blasted Flask’s order,” he sighed. “I prefer you unsmited.”
I traced slow patterns across his chest, letting my gaze slide away from his face as I gathered the courage to voice the questions that had haunted me. “Why did you stay, Zane? Why become her king-in-waiting instead of running?”
His body went rigid beneath my touch. Silence stretched between us, weighted with memories I couldn’t see.
“I didn’t choose to stay. She tortured me.” His voice was flat, scraped clean of emotion. “For months. Broke me down piece by piece, trying to force my submission.”
My breath caught, my fingers curling into the skin of his chest as if I could hold him together.
“When that didn’t work…” With a slow, deliberate finger beneath my chin, he drew my eyes to his, the intensity in his stare enough to turn the air cold. “She threatened to kill you.”
“What?” The word was a breathless exhale, my heart hammering against my ribs. “She knew where I was?”
“She showed me your face in a scrying plate. Said if she could find me, she could find you just as easily. Said you’d scream my name while she drained you dry.
” His jaw ticked. “So, I stopped fighting. Played the role she wanted because the alternative was your grave. Thankfully, before the next half-moon, a beautiful slayer crossed her path.” He shifted, his thumb gliding from my chin to my cheek.
Tears burned behind my eyes. “Zane…”
“I couldn’t let her touch you, Sidney. I would’ve done anything. Become anything.” His hand cupped my face. “Even a monster.”
“You’re not a monster.”
“I was willing to be one. For you.” He pressed a kiss to my forehead. “I still am.”
“And I was willing to raze this place to the ground for you.” I smiled, part bloodthirsty and part playful as I echoed him. “Still am.”
A knock echoed through the room. I wiped my eyes, catching the quick scurry of tiny feet and a sharp little squeak. I shoved the blanket aside and stretched muscles gone stiff from my long rest. Finn slipped through the doorway, signing, Boris is hunting; he may be a while.
The moment had arrived to forge our Devotion, a permanent vow to cherish and protect one another. I longed to reveal my true face for such an important and intimate ritual. Yet I couldn’t, not if I wanted to live.
“I’m not sure what to do for the bonding.” The admission felt foreign. I’d never been one to come unprepared or to neglect research, but I’d never thought I’d participate in a vampiric ritual for multiple mates when I had a betrothed I’d meant to marry.
Finn sat next to me on the bed and shrugged.
“I do,” Zane said. “Go ahead and get changed. I brought you something simple to wear.”
He’d laid out a plain white shift on the bed.
I ducked into the bathroom to ready myself before slipping into the garment.
When I stepped back out, Finn wore a practical, plain white outfit.
Zane’s clothes were similar, but he’d found a sweeping white cape, which he donned with dramatic flair and a wink my way.
“The east gardens have a stone circle,” he continued. “That’s where we’re bonding tonight.”
We left the room and headed that way, descending before heading outside. Colorful vegetation sprawled before us. Zane took us deeper into the area reserved for ceremonies too important for servants’ eyes.
The altar came into view under the half-moon’s glow.
Carved into the rock at its base were Eona’s devotees, kneeling with their arms upraised.
Time had erased their features. Looming over them, Eona’s towering marble likeness posed with her polished stone arms held wide in a welcoming arc.
Purple wisteria hung overhead in cascading clusters swaying in the breeze.
Standing beside the altar like a sentinel was Bruvor. He wore ceremonial robes, deep crimson edged with gold thread. My breath caught as his cold gaze ran over us before settling on me. For a moment, I was a child again, kneeling in the chapel during evening prayers.
“Stay, child. You have sins to confess.”
I remained on my knees on the cold stone floor, hands clasped. In Eona’s house of worship, I tried to be what I wasn’t: a good vampiress.
Bruvor circled me, his robes brushing the ground. “Our goddess demands honesty from her faithful. And she demands blood from the disobedient.”
His hand clamped around the back of my neck, forcing my head down until my forehead pressed against the freezing stone. “You will confess the darkness in your heart before it festers. You will beg Eona’s forgiveness for the treachery you hide behind an innocent facade.”
My throat tightened. “I didn’t do anything wrong. I’ve been good!”
His fingers dug in. “Eona knows what you’ve done. And she is not gentle.”
I stayed there for hours, my knees bruising, my back cramping, while he prayed over me, accusing me of sins I had never committed. I broke down and begged forgiveness for it all, tears blurring everything as sobs shook through me.
He knelt beside me, fingers closing hard around my wrist. “A small offering for your penance is required.”
Before I could pull away, his teeth pierced my skin. Heat flared, then numbness, as he savored my blood. When he released me, he wiped his mouth and smiled. “All is forgiven, half-breed. I’ll see you for your next confession.”
I forced myself back to the present. I wasn’t that helpless child anymore, but my wrists ached in an echo of my many confessions with him.
Bruvor inclined his head. “Good evening, Lady Ilyana.” His gaze slid to Finn and Zane, lingering with thinly veiled superiority, as though their very presence offended the sanctity of the area. “And your devotees. How…fortunate you are in your choices.”
“Good evening, Head Priest.” My tone carried practiced calm, though my pulse thudded hard. Rage simmered beneath my skin at needing him to witness this sacred moment, but I kept my expression an untouchable mask. “We’re ready to begin.”
“Approach the altar of Eona. The Beloved stands here.” He indicated where I should go.
I drew in a sharp breath as I moved closer. The altar thrummed with ancient power, and the air carried a charge. The scent of ozone and old magic mingled with the sweetness of the wisteria.
My stomach knotted, nerves fluttering sharp and restless. My bare feet met the uneven stone. The ground seemed to pulse beneath me, and I shivered.
With Bruvor’s instructions, Zane and Finn stood flanking me. Finn’s red hair caught the moonlight like flames. Zane’s eyes burned with intensity.
Bruvor drew a ceremonial knife from his robes and held it out.
“The bonding of a Devotion is sacred, witnessed by Eona herself. Blood calls to blood, soul to soul.” He moved to stand opposite us across the altar, hands clasped before him.
“A blood exchange creates the connection. The Beloved must cut across both her palms first.”
I took the knife. A tremor ran through my hand—not just nerves, but the sudden, dangerous impulse to stab Bruvor through the heart. He was already on my list for his cruelty, but this wasn’t the right time. I suppressed the impulse, my jaw tightening as I beheld Ilyana’s face in the blade.
This was it—the moment I stopped being just Sidney and became something new, someone tied to two other souls through ancient magic. The knife bit into my right palm, sharp and clean. Blood welled. Before I could overthink it, I drew the blade across my left palm.
Bruvor’s lips curved in approval. “Now, your new devotees will do the same.”
Zane took the knife, cutting his palm before passing it to Finn, who followed suit.
At the priest’s instructions, we pressed our bleeding palms together over the altar.
Finn’s left hand locked against my right, Zane’s right against my left.
Our blood dripped onto the ancient stone, sizzling and steaming as it was absorbed.
Heat sparked where skin met and magic ignited with a crackle I felt in my teeth.
As the wind rose around us my shift fluttered.
“Speak the vows, and let the bond be forged,” Bruvor intoned. He announced the words, and we repeated them.
“I bind myself to you.” Zane stared into my eyes, his voice carried over the gust, strong and certain. “My power, my life, my soul. From this moment until death claims us, I am yours.”
Finn’s mouth formed the same weighty words after he watched Bruvor and Zane speak. “I bind myself to you. My power, my life, my soul. From this moment until death claims us, I am yours.”
Finality closed around my throat, fear rendering me mute.
Inhaling deeply, I loosened its grip. Looking at Zane, then Finn, a bloom of love pushed back against the dread, giving me the strength to speak.
“I bind myself to you both.” I met Zane’s gaze.
“Zane Sevilla.” Then, I let my attention move to Finn.
“And Finnegan O’Connell. My life, my soul.
From this moment until death claims us, you are mine. ”
Magic exploded through me. Lightning crackled within our joined hands. I screamed, unable to help it. The power was too vast, searing through the marrow of my bones and unraveling my very essence, just to knit it back together.
Around us, the air shimmered. Crimson moths materialized from nowhere. Hundreds of them. They swirled around the altar and the wisteria, descending to land on us. I watched them dance in the breeze with a quiet sense of awe.
“Blood moths. They only appear when the bond is true and Lady Eona herself has witnessed and approved,” Bruvor said, though his expression remained unreadable for such a romantic display.
Amid the display, Zane’s power crashed into me like a tsunami of living darkness, vast and hungry.
Then came Finn’s connection, a web of threads stretching to the surrounding life: rustling birds, mice within the walls, and the rhythmic prowl of a stray cat.
The power swelled, then settled bone-deep, integrating until I couldn’t tell where I ended and they began.
The moths lifted as one, vanishing into the night. Breathless, I forced my trembling body to steady.
Bruvor raised his hands to the air. “The Devotion is forged but not complete. You must consummate the union to finish what you have begun.”
Heat flooded my face.
“Beyond the altar, between the ancient oaks, there is a bed of moss.” He gestured toward the trail and stepped back.
“It has been blessed by the goddess herself. Magic grows there, fed by the half-moon. You will complete the bond there, beneath her watchful gaze. No one will disturb you. The space is yours until the moon sets.”
I glanced back as Zane led us down the path. Bruvor remained beside the altar, a dark silhouette against the moonlight. The distance between us grew until wisteria and shadow swallowed him from view.
My breath hitched, and I pressed a hand to my mouth, shoulders curling inward as we walked. After letting out a shaky exhale, the tears I’d been holding back spilled over. “I hated having him there.” My voice trembled. “He watched me bleed again…and he smiled.”
When we reached the sacred space between the oaks, Zane pulled me into his chest, one hand cradling the back of my head. “I know, and I’m here. He doesn’t know it was you.”
A moment later, another set of arms wrapped around me.
Finn pressed against my back, steady and warm.
Zane’s fierce protectiveness grounded me.
Alongside it, Finn’s determination to protect me too promised safety.
Our connection remained just shy of whole, a door ajar, waiting for me to pull it open.