Chapter 6 Myelas
MYELAS
This is bad.
Like, royally fucked up in the worst way, bad.
The sparks between me and Izzy had been more than just static. I was certain of it, since it had been agony to leave her side. A pull thrummed through me, a heat, a need to be close to her, protect her. I’d only ever heard of it happening to others, but all the signs pointed to one simple fact…
I’d mate-bonded to Izzy.
A woman I barely knew.
A woman who knew nothing of this world but was trapped here, with barely enough anima to survive. If only the orb had stopped at red, then she’d have been free to return to the human realm. Though…
That would have resulted in both of us probably going mad with desire for each other, unable to be together. So… yeah. She was damned either way.
Damned as soon as we’d touched.
Like I’d said. This was bad.
Even worse was the law which forbade my kind from mating with anyone outside of my order, like Izzy.
Damned and double-damned.
Royally fucked-up bad.
As much as every fibre of my being demanded I go back and help Izzy, I couldn’t, not yet. That would be too suspicious. I’d have to find her again later, once she was alone. For now, I needed advice, so I hurried across campus to the shifter barracks.
A fast walk turned to a jog, then an all-out run, sprinting across the river and around Pyric Hall, past the maintenance buildings and up into the sprawling complex where I’d lived since I was twelve.
Luckily, Safir, my mentor, was in his room when I barged in, out of breath.
The old tiger shifter raised a single brow, then beckoned me in.
I closed the door behind me then crossed to sit in the chair on the opposite side of the small square table that served as his desk. As respected as he was, he was granted little in the way of luxuries.
I kept my voice low, knowing it was a death sentence if anyone overheard what I was about to say.
“I just mate-bonded with a nymph they brought back from the human realm!” I didn’t know why I felt compelled to go on, but I did. “Her name is Izzy, and she must be so scared and confused. I need to help her, but—”
“Izzy?” Safir said, voice sharp. “You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
“From where?”
Had Svokol mentioned the city his attendant, Rook had visited? Yes, it was…?
“Providence?”
“Fucking hell!” Safir swore.
Wait… what was going on here? He hadn’t reacted at all to my mention of a mate bond, but her name had certainly gotten him worked up.
“What is it?” I asked.
“Did she have a birthmark on her… no, you wouldn’t have seen…”
I’d gotten a good look at her before she’d awoken.
Remembering her smooth skin and luscious curves made the bond strain, my cock rock hard and ready to be with my mate.
I breathed through it as I focused on what else I’d noticed.
There had been a birthmark on her back, it had almost looked like, “A heart?”
“On her lower back?”
“Yes.”
Safir practically levitated out of his chair, suddenly pacing the room, swearing up a storm.
“She can’t be here!”
This hadn’t been what I’d expected.
“Izzy? Why? Who is she?”
Safir stopped pacing and pinned me down with his gaze. “Wait… did you say you’d mate-bonded her?” He’d finally caught up.
I nodded.
“By Titania and her daughters!” he hissed.
I needed to know what was going on. Now!
I rose and went to him, hands on his shoulders, eyes on his. He was almost a hundred years older than me, but he could still whip my ass across this room. Still, I held him firm.
“Who. Is. She?”
He spoke so softly I barely heard him. “Only the heir to the fucking throne, that’s who!”
I blinked.
There was no heir.
The entire royal family had been assassinated by titan spies a hundred years ago.
Safir sighed. Seeing my confusion, he motioned to his bed, where we both sat. He kept his voice low as he explained.
“When I was a boy, there was a royal scandal. My father served a half-blood nymph name Keomar, who’d been allowed to remain in this world because his mother had been close to the royal family.
Keomar and his family had stayed in the royal compound in El’Anderyn and that’s where he fell in love with princess Ysania. ”
I gasped.
“Exactly. Even as lenient as Queen Leastrine had been, she couldn’t allow such an affair. Yet Princess Ysania had been adamant in her love for Keomar. So, the queen had had no choice but to exile them both to the human realm. That was roughly twenty years before the royal family was assassinated.”
I was starting to understand.
“I went with my father to serve his master in the human realm and took my father’s place when he passed.
But… nineteen years ago. Despite everything we’d done to keep hidden, assassins found the princess and her lover.
I was tasked with getting young Isolde, their daughter, to safety, and I did.
I made sure she was safe… before I went back to help my master and mistress, but I couldn’t save them.
When I returned to where I’d put young Isolde, she was gone.
I’d feared the worst, but… she must have survived! ” He seemed to light up at that.
Isolde.
Izzy.
A half-elf princess.
A royal!
Spirits! How could a lowly shifter like me ever be worthy of someone like her?
Safir’s momentary joy faded. “I’d hoped she’d survived, but…” Safir shook his head. “She was safe in the human realm.”
It was widely suspected, though never proven, that the current Queen Regent, Lady Valnea had orchestrated the assassination of the royals, that she’d let the titan assassins into the palace.
Yet, given how much power Valnea now possessed, it would be exceedingly dangerous to speak out against her, but Safir had always hoped there might be some way to overthrow her.
And Izzy was that way.
But if it became known who she was… her life would be forfeit.
“I need to tell her!” I hissed.
“No!” Safir barked, then hushed himself. “You can’t. She can’t know. Better for her to believe she’s no one special. At least for now. I need time to think on this, what it means, what’s… possible.”
I could see the wheels turning for him, how he’d use Izzy. Then he grimaced and looked at me.
“And you’ve gone and gotten yourself mated to her. Bloody Thorns!” he growled, a rumbling deep in his chest.
“Perhaps… it’s for the best?” I offered. “I can keep an eye on her, protect her… in secret.”
Safir nodded slowly. “Perhaps, but if you miss even a single training session, if anyone suspects…”
It would be my head.
“I know.”
“Fine, do what you can. See her in secret. Protect her, help her, but for Spirits sake, don’t tell her the truth about who she is, not until I have a plan for how to… help her.”
Help her? More like use her, help her ascend to the throne and achieve his goals in ending Valnea’s reign.
I nodded. As messed up as it would be to start a relationship while lying to Izzy and keeping her true identity from her, that was what I must do. For a short while she could be a normal fae, before Safir’s fate found her.
And she’d need my help navigating this serpent’s nest of a world. Given how little anima she seemed to possess, she’d be ridiculed here at Veilblood Academy. Okay, so she may not have a normal life. Her life would be rough: alone and underpowered in a world she didn’t understand.
She’d need a friend, and I vowed to be that for her, even if I was a lowly shifter, unworthy to be anywhere near her…
And even if our bond demanded we be much more than friends.