Chapter 34
My body jolts from the horse’s speed, dusty air kicking into my face.
I look over my shoulder, my insides all twisted up. “Piper.”
His eyes stay stubbornly ahead.
“Piper! Tell me what just happened.”
“Not now.”
Anger cracks in my chest. How dare he try to dismiss me again. I won’t stand for it. Not this time.
My hands twist over the saddle’s horn, not unlike one might wring a neck. “Yes. Right now,” I counter.
He’s silent.
Which enrages me. Possesses me.
I act faster than I can think, snagging the arm he’s using to hold the reins, and without warning, I lash out and bite into his exposed skin.
Hard.
Piper’s shock makes him jerk the reins, causing the horse to rear up, but I keep my teeth clamped. I will bite down to his bone if I have to.
Gladly.
He gets the horse under control in a sudden stop that probably would’ve thrown me off if it weren’t for his hold around my middle.
“What the fuck are you doing?” he snarls.
I snarl back.
With a vicious curse, he grips my jaw and squeezes, forcing me to let go. As soon as I unclamp my teeth, he yanks his arm away from my mouth. I find great satisfaction at the imprint left behind on his skin.
He practically leaps off his horse and drags me down with him. I nearly fall in the dirt from the quick move, but he has a firm grasp on my arms. His face blazes with fury, making my stomach swoop. I’m surprised his glare doesn’t spark a fire.
He looms over me, expression savage. “You just bit me.”
There must be something seriously wrong with me, because his anger causes excitement to spread through me. It travels down each vein, branching out from chest to core, making me want to bite him all over again.
I knock away his hands and lift my chin in defiance, though my insides crackle like lightning. “If you can act like an animal, so can I. Just be glad I didn’t bite hard enough to make you bleed and then lick it off you. In front of everyone!”
His gaze drops to my bared teeth. To my lips pulled back in a snarl. Our anger sprawls as we glare at each other, but then, he moves in close, as if he can’t help himself.
So close I can feel his breath against my face.
My chest heaves, and his expression turns heady.
That crackling charge of lightning that prickled beneath my skin now strikes straight down to my belly. And as if a bolt really did just hit the sand around us, silvery smoke plumes up from his pipe in a winding rivulet.
Madness closes in, letting dark, twisted thoughts rush up. Thoughts about him that I shouldn’t have. Thoughts like what it would be like to clamp my teeth over his bottom lip this time. Or his tongue. What it would feel like if his lips fastened to my mouth instead of my arm . . .
When I realize what I’m thinking, I instantly stiffen. Instantly smother.
I snap my teeth together and then shove my fist into his stomach, though his abdomen is too hard for my strike to do anything except break the loaded stint between us. He blinks, as if remembering himself too, and his head rears back a few inches.
“Stop ignoring my questions,” I bleat. “What just happened back there? What did Frid mean when he said your magic latched?”
He doesn’t offer words right away. Seems to weigh them in his mind instead.
“If you tell me I have no right to questions, I will kick you between the legs again,” I threaten.
Maybe there’s something wrong with him too, because I swear, his expression flares with exhilaration. He stares at me, brown eyes crisp and flaking with firelight.
I swallow hard.
His jaw is tight and shadowed. His mussed light brown hair is dusty from the ride, and tension reigns along the line of his shoulders as he squares off against me. But I’m not going to back down. I don’t care what he threatens; I will not let this sit.
“Well?” I demand.
Finally, he heaves out a breath. “My magic latched . . . on to you,” he says slowly.
I go still. “On to me? What on earth does that mean?”
His jaw grinds together as if he’s chewing up an answer that he’d rather mangle than let out.
But he does, with masticated reluctance.
“It happens to Core fae. It means that for whatever reason, my magic latched on to your life force. That’s why I had the sudden urge to . . . taste your blood,” he grits out. “That can happen sometimes.”
My mind whirls so much I’m not sure I’m seeing straight. “What are you talking about? What do you mean that you latched on to my life force?”
He runs a hand down his face, suddenly weary. That makes me more worried than ever.
“Fae weren’t meant to have magic, Estinya.
When the core power spewed out, some of us survived it, but it’s not like we were born with this power.
It changed us, but that doesn’t mean our bodies ever fully adapted.
We’ve realized that it’s unsustainable .
. . unless our magic latches on to another. ”
My heart pounds in my chest as I stare at him with wide eyes.
“But it’s always been with a fae,” he tells me. “A normal, non-magic fae. Never another Core and never a fiend.” He pauses, eyes boring into mine. “Until now.”
I wish I could read his thoughts. Wish I could decipher that tone of voice and know what it means.
A lump forms in my throat. “Is it . . . going to hurt me? Kill me?”
“No,” he answers with a swift shake of his head. “It’s never hurt any of the fae that a Core latched to, or affected them negatively in any way.”
“But . . . I’m a fiend,” I point out carefully, trying very hard not to panic. “You just said no other Core has ever latched to a fiend. So it could be different for me. Which means you don’t really know for sure.”
His expression empties, but his answer is full. “No,” he admits. “No, I don’t know for sure.”
“Fates.” I shove my hand over my forehead, flattening my hair against my skin like I can hold in my crumbling thoughts.
“Could it weaken me every time you use magic? Does it make you stronger? Does something happen with the latching?” The more questions that come out of my mouth, the more my panic rises. “Explain it to me, Piper.”
He scrubs a hand across his jaw. “Nothing will happen to you. It seems like it’s just a way to balance our magic so it doesn’t overwhelm us. Our power is too much for one body to handle. But you shouldn’t feel anything, even when I do use my magic.”
“But why did it happen with me? What did you do?”
“I didn’t do anything,” he protests with irritation. “The magic chooses. It forms the latch.”
My eyes narrow. “Then unlatch it.”
A tight sigh comes out from between his teeth. “It doesn’t work like that. Once it latches on, it can’t be undone. There’s nothing I can do.”
Outraged disbelief has me shaking my head and looking around at the Drought-riddled landscape without really seeing it. I can’t be magically tied to him.
I just . . . can’t.
“I will not be latched to the man who kidnapped me.”
“You think I wanted my Latch to be a fiend?” he retorts, and it makes my spine stiffen.
“I have no idea the impact you’ll have on my magic or my life force either.
I brought you here to help test our theory on the Plagues, and the last thing I need is another unknown. I’m in a precarious position as it is.”
My breath catches on fire and sprinkles ash onto my ribs. “Sorry to be such a complication for you. Who cares about what you’ve done to me and my life, right?”
He scoffs at my incensed words like I’m some petulant child. “This is bigger than that. There are a lot more people at stake. I’m a Core fae governing over one of the largest territories in Brekon. And I’ve been working tirelessly to figure out if we can fight the Plagues with fiend blood.”
“You can fight the Plagues already!” I hurl. “You and your band of merry Core fae already have the magic to beat them back.”
“Yes, and our magic is fucking killing us!” he shouts, the rebuttal tossed at my face like a slap.
I jolt back, faltering. “What?”
When he said it was unsustainable, I didn’t think he meant it was killing them.
“Try being an ordinary fae just living your life, and then one day, the earth cracks beneath your feet and you get caught in a flow of lava so hot it burns through your veins. Try hearing fae—your friends and family—screaming in agony before the whole world goes silent with their deaths. All while you’re scorched from the inside out as pure power consumes you and gnaws through your very soul. ”
The picture he paints is violent. A terrifying reality.
“And suddenly,” he goes on, “you have magic that you were never meant to have, and you realize that the Fates didn’t bless you by letting you survive.
They cursed you. Because now you’re stuck having to fix their fuckup.
They stuffed our earth too full of power, but when the demonic Banes rose up and the Plagues unleashed, who did everyone expect to fix it? ”
“Core fae,” I murmur, feeling the slimy grip of guilt wrap around me.
I’ve never thought about it like this. I grew up knowing Core had all the power, all the prestige, and all the ways to abuse their influence and control, but I never really considered this side. Never realized the burden of it or what they truly went through—what they’re still going through.
“Core fae,” he agrees with a sharp nod. “While everyone else hid away from the Banes, we were expected to defeat them. And we did—but at great cost. You have no idea what I’ve sacrificed to fight against them and walk away with my life.
And ever since, it has been up to us to beat back the Plagues too, again and again.
But this unnatural magic comes at a price. Our bodies can’t take it on our own.”
Emotion clogs the back of my throat. “So your magic latches on to someone.”