Chapter 25 #2
Even as drunk as Gryph is, he shares a look across the table with North. They don’t bother trying to hide it, either. I trained them out of that years ago. The only thing worse than being the little project they’re both diligently working on is any attempts to be subtle about it.
Both options may be pathetic but at least one is honest about it.
“Why are you here, North? I was going to call Black for a ride home, you didn’t need to come.”
Ah.
So it’s someone else here tonight who’s reporting back to my brother. A mark in Gryph’s favor but an executioner’s call for the bar because I refuse to drink somewhere else under my brother’s thumb. Fuck, I might have to leave Draven entirely.
Lost in my own thoughts for a moment, it takes me a second to realize North is staring down at me as he makes an assessment of my state of mind. He hesitates to reply for long enough that my skin begins to crawl.
He spots it instantly, jumping in before I snap, but his measured tone enrages me. “Something has happened, but you need to stay calm.”
That fucking girl.
It has to be her.
I practically snarl at him. “What has she done now?”
North sighs as he shakes his head, rubbing a hand over his face. “Oleander hasn’t done anything, but Atlas Bassinger arrived at Draven this morning.”
Even as sluggish and removed from my own body that I currently feel, there’s no chance I could miss my bond waking up and clawing its way to the surface. My eyes stay clear, but North’s jaw tightens again as though he can sense its presence.
He doesn’t spare Gryph a glance as he continues, still choosing his words with care. “He attended class with her today. He’s made it clear that whether or not he is enrolled, he will continue to do so.”
Any semblance of calm, any scrap of it, is beyond my grasp, and it’s only the whiskey keeping me seated…
and my bond. A thread of clarity pierces through the inebriated and panicked haze that otherwise clouds my mind.
My eyes haven’t voided out, my shadows are still at heel, and though I’m undeniably on a rapid descent to complete insanity, none of my usual defenses have deployed.
Fuck, it only takes the idea of a threat to have my Gift bursting out of me, a warning that can’t be ignored, but my bond keeps everything in check.
Like it’s waiting for something.
Why is my bond interested in the Resistance spawn my brother is bending over for?
I speak through clenched teeth, “And you let him?”
North looks as though he’s hoping a natural disaster hits and we’re all instantly wiped out. “It’s against the law not to.”
Sneering at him, my fingers itch to wrap around his throat for his obsession with fairness and maintaining his image of the good councilman while that insurgent Gifted walks into our home and takes us all out.
“They’re West Coast laws, the East Coast council never adopted them because the Resistance would never care about something like that.
There’s no way he knows a fucking thing about her so-called rights! ”
North’s eyes bore into mine. “Yes, he does. He quoted the exact laws to me, then he also listed every major amendment I’ve broken.
After he hung up on me, he used his time in class to email me a far more detailed and incriminating list with times and date stamps as though he’s some trumped-up non-Gifted lawyer here to intervene on Gifted rights violations. ”
My worst fears are manifesting before us all and he can no longer deny it.
The ties he bound that poisonous Bond of his with are coming loose, only it’s not her escape I’m worried about.
If she’s no longer restrained, how long before she takes the inevitable liberties with the Bonds already trapped in her snare?
How long until she’s chaining them to her side and forcing their submission and their blind obedience as she takes her sickening pleasures?
How long until she’s breaking me open until there’s nothing recognizable left behind?
After drinking enough whiskey to fall asleep without dreaming of that girl, I’m startled awake hours later on my bed with no recollection of my brother getting me back here or his reaction to my drinking.
He is the only person who could corral me back without my shadows killing him though, so it had to be North’s doing.
I also have no idea what’s woken me but I’m furious regardless.
Sleep is almost impossible for me at the best of times and it’s far from that.
Hauling myself into the bathroom takes twice as long as it should, but my legs eventually work well enough to keep me upright.
By the time I’ve cleaned myself up, there’s a fire in my blood that has my skin writhing with unspent energy.
Something is happening, serious enough to wake me, and I need to find North to figure out what the fuck is going on.
The moment I step out into the hallway, I come face to face with the problem.
The girl startles as if she’s not the interloper outside my bedroom, like this isn’t some great plan, but she’s probably sneaking further down the hall to my brother’s room.
Sick of her games, she must be ready to take what she wants from him.
The writhing doubles the second I lay eyes on the girl, standing there with a bag slung over her shoulder and looking homeless. Her hair is glowing white, eyes bright despite the dark circles underneath them, and her lip curls the moment she’s recovered from her shock at my appearance.
I can’t stand to look at the girl, this unbroken Bond of mine.
I need to keep her away from my bond. I’ve done everything in my power to stay away from her as its obsession grows.
There’s nothing pleasant about its desires for her, nothing sweet or gentle.
It’s the only reason I’ve been able to stomach it— for the most part.
It wants to break her open and consume every inch of that girl.
The craving is a dark demand, a possessive and demanding psychosis that proves my brother has been right all along.
There is a monster living inside of me, and god only knows what it’ll do to that wretched girl if given the chance.
My bond won’t let me look away.
In an instant, I lose control of my body.
My bond washes over me, the essence of who I really am and not just my physical self, to direct my eyes at the maid and to dismiss her in my voice. “Leave us.”
Everything I thought I knew of myself, my bond, this unprecedented experience I’ve lived my entire life and kept secret as though that life depended on it, all of it is shattered in an instant.
It’s not unusual for my bond to awaken within me, a common occurrence now thanks to the girl.
It’s also fairly routine for my eyes to void out as it takes control of me.
There’s obvious signs beyond the color of my eyes to discern which of us is in control; the way my body moves, the expression on my face, all the way down to my speech pattern and the tone I use.
I’ve known about the other being within me for long enough to come to a place of agreement with it, to study it, to find out where I end and it begins. When it takes control of my body, it feels as though I’ve simply lost access to the control panel, never that it is controlling me.
Not until now.
Paralyzed by fear, I falter instead of fighting back against my bond.
A rush of satisfaction flows through it and over me until I feel my grip on sanity start to slip.
My bond is ignoring me entirely, but every heartbeat of triumph it feels hits me like a bullet, as though it’s taunting me with the girl and what it plans to do to me.
My mind splinters, the damage to the most visceral parts of me already irreparable.
The cracks bloom in intricate spiderweb patterns in the fragile glass of my psyche, slowly at first with the chiming of bells, but soon the shattering is thunderous in my ears and I lose my senses entirely.
My bond is interacting with her, it’s using me to lure her in; my eyes, my voice, my derision, my utter loathing.
It doesn’t understand the interaction, but it will use it to get her.
It would use anything to get her.
Using every trick I’ve learned to disrupt my bond’s control, I know I can only buy myself a little time and I use it to snarl at the girl. It’s not just blind hatred, it’s a calculated tactic. If I can get her enraged, maybe she’ll leave before everything goes catastrophically, irreparably wrong.
If the thing that lives under my skin forces me to bond with her, I’ll kill myself.
I will never be trapped and forced into submission by a Bonded ever again.
The terror I swore I’d never allow myself to feel again washes over me, sweeping away the haze in my mind as a perfect clarity seeps into my bones.
The strength of that feeling subdues my bond a little, making it easier to hold control of myself for a few extra moments.
“Why are you dressed like a common whore? Did North have to hunt you down at some frat house? You sure know how to piss my brother off, don't you, Poison?"
I’ve called her a whore before but only when North is forcing her into our company.
With any luck, she’ll turn on her heel and run away from me now as she has before.
No matter how many times I try to tell her to leave, to get the fuck away from me, that I’d rather die than stand in this hallway with her, the words die before they can ever take form.
The girl belongs to us.
You, I snap back at it. I don’t want her and I will never belong to a fucking Bond.
It doesn’t respond, but it doesn’t have to; its intentions are clear as it fights to wrest complete control of my body from me. If I don’t get her the fuck away from me, it’s going to Bond with her.
My stomach violently revolts.