Chapter 30 #2
Imani worked alone. She dismissed her attendants, ensuring nothing would disrupt the exacting precision she demanded.
She gathered each ingredient herself, trusting no other hand to prepare them.
She handled the last piece—a single strand of Meira’s hair, quietly retrieved by a servant—with delicate care.
The chamber she chose sat deep within the palace’s inner bones, entirely removed from the flow of court life.
Its thick stone walls could swallow both sound and magic without a trace.
After sealing the heavy door, she drew a containment circle across the floor with ash and powdered stone, reinforcing the boundary with a thin line of her own blood pressed into measured points of the pattern.
She didn’t have a defensive brand, but she’d never shied away from flesh magic.
A low table stood at the center, bearing only the tools she had arranged: a shallow dish, a narrow blade, a coil of dark thread, and Meira’s hair. Firelight threw dancing shadows against the walls, but the air in the room remained deathly still, waiting for her command.
She tried to take her time.
The first attempt all those months ago had been her working an unfamiliar spell.
Now, she exerted pure control. Standing before the fire, she centered her awareness, channeling her magic inward before releasing it smoothly in a steady flow.
The magic responded effortlessly, with no resistance or unstable edges, flowing cleanly and acknowledging her mastery.
Imani picked up the strand of hair and examined it in the firelight.
It was perfect, but she would only get one shot unless she wanted her plans revealed.
She placed it at the center of the dish and carefully drew her blade across her palm.
Instead of using fire as a medium, as she’d done before, she would use blood.
The shallow cut let a single drop fall onto the hair, darkening and slowly being absorbed, symbolically linking her physical connection to her spell.
Energy in her hands hissed like a serpent, rippling outward briefly before she directed it along the circle’s edge.
It then expanded downward in a smooth and silent bloom.
The spell took hold.
Air in the chamber compressed, forcing a gasp from her throat.
The light bent inward, drawn toward a single focal point, and the ash markings at her feet flared with a steady, pulsing glow.
Imani stood perfectly motionless as the magic built.
When the vision finally formed, it was flawless, drawing her awareness forward without stripping away her sense of self.
Her surroundings blurred, then turned into stone walls—colder and older than the ones she was in, worn down by centuries. A faint, distant light seeped through a high opening, casting elongated shadows on the ground.
A flash of movement caught the edge of her awareness. A figure stepped into the pale light, and Imani sucked in a breath.
Saevel.
Recognition hit her with perfect certainty. Kiran’s brother stood in the space as if he owned it, so grounded that the vision felt less like scrying and more like stepping into the room with him. He existed in the vision, untouched by being watched.
The instant Imani registered him, the connection shifted as the spell deepened.
Magic threads she had spun stretched farther, moving along an unseen but felt trail.
It was no longer fully under her control.
Her consciousness layered and overlapped, blurring the line between the spell’s receiver and its caster.
In a sudden, breathless beat, she realized she wasn’t merely observing a simple Divination vision.
She recognized Meira’s magic signature infiltrating the edges.
The bond was like an unseen current beneath the vision, changing its form. It expanded the scene, giving the vision deeper meaning. Saevel was anchored to the magic, unable to move or run away from it.
He was bound to Meira.
The answers fit together seamlessly. Meira attaching herself to the vision was integral to the spell, firmly embedded within it.
The same ancient laws that regulated Imani’s heartmate bond held true here, intact and unaffected by the surrounding fractures that would normally break another divination spell.
Saevel was Meira’s heartmate.
Imani remained composed as the profound implications of that truth revealed themselves, her mind sharpening like a blade. If Meira was bound, the magic still persisted where it shouldn’t.
The connection shuddered, signaling she had reached the edge of what the spell could sustain. This time, she didn’t push past her limits. She let the vision run its course, holding her iron grip on her consciousness as the space receded. Saevel faded into darkness as the scene fell away.