Chapter 11 #2
“Shut up,” he seethes, and begins chanting under his breath.
The words are foreign, ancient, a language I almost recognize but can't quite name. He’s casting.
I catch a glimpse of movement as he raises his other arm.
A massive sword arcs into view, the blade longer than my body.
Red and gold glyphs blaze to life along the steel, pulsing brighter with every word he speaks, until the weapon is glowing.
The air crackles with energy, sharp and electric, lifting the hairs on my arms and rattling my teeth. Then Malachi surges forward, toward the creatures, and my stomach drops.
I squeeze my eyes shut. An inhuman shriek splits the night. Then another. Then silence.
He pivots sharply and marches us off the bridge. When I open my eyes and look around, the creatures are gone. The streetlamps burn steady and warm. The fog has thinned to wisps. I sag against him, trembling.
“Did you kill them?” My voice comes out hoarse, barely a whisper.
“What do you think?”
The sharpness in his tone makes me bristle. “You can put me down now.”
He scoffs. “And risk having to chase you again? Not interested.”
“What?” I frown and try twisting again. “You just saved my life! Why would I run?”
“I don't know, Ada, because you're a fucking menace!”
“I …” I blink, momentarily at a loss for words. “Maybe so, but I'm not an idiot!”
“That's highly debatable,” he mutters.
My spine goes rigid. Menace, I can accept. Reckless, fine. But an idiot? Absolutely not.
“You act like I wanted to be attacked! I just hap—”
He drops me without warning. I stumble, throw my hands out to catch myself, and hiss when my raw palms slam into the wall. I shove off the stone and whirl to face him, fists clenched despite the pain.
“What is wrong with you?”
“What's wrong with me?” He yanks his hood down and glares at me, golden eyes blazing. “What the fuck were you thinking?”
I open my mouth to respond and stop.
The scowling man staring back at me looks nothing like the brute I met earlier.
The thick beard is gone, trimmed to light stubble that reveals a sharp jaw and high cheekbones.
His hair is shorter, no longer wild but swept back from his face.
He wears a navy blue cloak now, gold armor gleaming at his shoulders, a matching tunic molding to the broad planes of his chest. He cleaned up. He cleaned up well.
“Not that I mind you staring, but you'll have plenty of time to ogle me inside.”
My eyes snap back to his face. “Ogle? The last time I saw you, I almost mistook you for a talking yak! I'm just making sure you're the same person.”
He presses his lips together and cocks his head. “Right.”
I ignore his skepticism and step toward the streetlamp, scanning the streets beyond the river.
“Who are you looking for?”
“My friend Naima.” I glance back at him. “And Kage Yoshioka.”
His entire body goes taut. “Kage is here?”
“He said he's here for the Reckoning.” I turn back to the empty streets. “They should be at Siren's by now. Assuming they didn’t encounter any of those creatures.”
“If she's with Kage, she's safe.”
“How do you know?” I look up at him. “Does he have one of those glowing swords?”
His brow arches. “I don’t think Vida would appreciate that description.”
“Who's Vida?”
“My sword.”
“You named your sword Vida?” I almost laugh. “As in life?”
“It seemed fitting.” He shrugs. “What is Siren's Call?”
“A tavern. Brothel. Gambling den. Dance hall.” I point toward the docks. “Past the last bridge, corner of Veneficia Alley.”
“And where will you be while I'm searching for this den of sin?”
“Home.”
I should explain that I just need to change and clean my wounds, but something tells me he'd follow me upstairs, and I need a few minutes alone.
A few minutes without his presence pressing against my senses like a hand around my throat.
But instead of going in the direction I pointed, he turns towards my building.
“Where are you going?”
He stops. Turns. “You said you were going home.”
“I’m going home. Alone.” I cross my arms. “Why don’t you just tell me what my debt is so we can get this over with? Then you can go find your friend and do whatever you came here to do.”
He points at me, the gesture almost accusatory. “We are sticking together from now on.”
“Why would we—”
The words die in my throat as he stalks toward me, his expression dark and furious, and I find myself backing up until my shoulders hit the wall.
“You could have died on that bridge.” His voice is low, rough, barely controlled. “Do you understand that? Do you understand that when I heard you screaming, I felt like I was going to lose my fucking mind?”
My heart lurches. Confusion and something else, something I refuse to name, wage war inside my chest. None of this makes sense. Not his admission. Not the way my pulse quickens to hear it.
A thousand thoughts crash through my mind, but one rises above the rest: the bonding elixir. The one I’ve refused to make for two years. The reason I'm still trapped in my apprenticeship, still under Mother's thumb, still fighting for a freedom that seems further away with every passing day.
Logically, the connection makes no sense.
But it’s the only explanation I can find for the way his emotions slam into me even when I’m not reaching for them.
The way he found me on that bridge. The warmth that flooded my chest when I was drowning in cold.
My knees threaten to buckle. I grab the lamppost to steady myself. No. It can’t be that.
“How did you find me?” The question comes out smaller than I intend.
“Because the goddess bound us together.”
The words hit me like a physical blow. I stare at him. “What … what do you mean?”
“You don't know what bound means? Linked. Tied. Connected—”
“I know what the word means!” My sigil flares, and for once, I'm grateful for the burn. “I just don't understand why you'd think—”
The air crackles, sharp with the same energy I felt on the bridge. My chest flares with anger that isn’t entirely my own. I see it mirrored in his eyes. The lamp above us flickers. I realize, with dawning horror, that I’m not afraid of him.
I should be. Every instinct I have says I should be.
But the fear never comes. I shake my head, sorting through everything I know about bonds.
I’ve been fascinated by them since childhood, since I first read Mystical Bonds in the Veritas library.
Back then, they seemed romantic. Magical.
Now it feels like a trap closing around my throat.
According to Mystical Bonds, the Creators forged bonds after the unicorns were hunted to extinction, a safeguard to protect the remaining avian creatures of the realm.
Before the bonds, the dreki, wyvern, and unicorns were treated as tools.
Weapons. Beasts of burden to be used until they broke and then discarded like rusted blades.
The unicorns were poached for their horns and the healing magic within.
The dreki and wyvern were conscripted into transport and war.
All of them, along with the raffin, were put into a deep slumber by the curse, turned to stone until someone finds a way to lift it.
The alatuses are the only avian creatures that escaped that fate, and no one knows why.
In Lunaris, we don't have natural bonds.
But the Council requires the alatuses to be bound to their legion guards through an alchemized elixir meant to mimic the real thing.
Shame curdles in my stomach as I look down at my fingernails.
Still stained. A permanent reminder of every elixir I made, every bond I helped forge against nature's will.
I stopped making them two years ago, much to Mother’s dismay. But refusing to continue doesn’t erase what I've already done. Maybe this is Mortiana's way of making me pay. Retribution, after all, doesn't expire.
Yet, I refuse to accept that after years of wondering what it might feel like to share a bond with one of the majestic creatures of this realm, to feel that ancient, sacred connection, this is what I’d get. Not an alatus, or a dreki or a wyvern.
Him. Of all the creatures in this realm, I get him.
It's absurd. All of it. But I force myself to breathe and remember one crucial detail: bonds must be accepted by both parties. That’ll be my way out.
“You felt my panic through the bond,” I say slowly, testing the theory aloud. “That's how you found me. Which means if I'm injured, you'd feel it. And vice versa.”
Surely no warrior would want that. To be tethered to an empath, to feel every flash of fear. It's unheard of. Unnatural.
He tilts his head, something unreadable shifting behind his eyes. “It's more nuanced than that.”
“How?”
“What do you know about ravens?”
I frown. “What do ravens have to do with anything?”
“You have ravens here,” he says impatiently. “What do you know about them?”
“I'm an avian healer. I'd like to think I know enough.”
His expression shifts. The anger drains away, the frustration, the barely leashed impatience. What's left is something I haven't seen on his face before. Shock.
Pure, unguarded shock. His eyes roam over my face like he's seeing me for the first time, like I’ve just rearranged myself into something he didn't expect. I’m so busy trying to piece together what ravens have to do with any of this that I almost miss the shift.
The way his shock hardens into something else. Something calculating.
A cold shiver traces down my spine.
“You're a healer?” he asks.
His voice is quiet. Too quiet. The kind of quiet that precedes a trap snapping shut. I bite my tongue and keep my face blank. I was trained for moments like this.
If I can survive Mother’s interrogations, Freida’s cold dissections of every lie I’ve ever told, I can survive this man’s scrutiny. I shove my fear down and reach for something else. Anger isn't ideal, but it’s close to the surface, banked and ready. I let it rise.