Chapter Eighteen #2
“We were wrong; the dragons were never on Exile to keep the exiles from escaping,” he admits. His eyes flick toward the image, then back to me. “They were there because you were. Protecting you until it was time.”
“Time for what?”
“For fate to call you home.”
Home.
This time, the word doesn’t draw flashes of the island.
Instead, I see the endless, open sky stretched over the sharp towers of Rathe, wings cutting shadows across the stone of the castle with a quiet certainty that makes something deep in my chest settle instead of burn.
Calm instead of combat, an idea I never dared to wish for, but suddenly, desperately crave.
And at the center of it is a burning chaos that’s welcome instead of hated. It’s like the world finally clicks into place around me instead of trying to shove me somewhere I never fit.
A purpose that isn’t to kill or be killed.
It’s reason.
I am more than nothing.
My breath catches as the feeling spreads, steady and grounding. Before I even understand what I’m seeing, blue eyes flash through the vision.
Standing in the center of it all, is Legend.
His hand reaches for mine like the distance between us was never supposed to exist in the first place. Dark hair falls across his forehead, those impossible eyes locked on me with something fierce and certain burning behind them.
My gaze drops to his throat. To the teeth marks pressed deep into the column of muscle, dark and undeniably mine.
Because he is mine and none of this is his fucking fault.
It isn’t mine, either.
My breath leaves me in a sharp gasp and the vision shatters.
I shove back from the table so fast the chair topples over.
“Yes, my little mate.” The beast stirs for the first time since I stepped into this room.
“You knew?” I say aloud, and Creed snaps to me.
Creed. I hold his gaze as something else settles.
Trust.
Call me daft, but I trust Creed Deveraux. The barrier in my mind falls, and I feel the moment he slips inside. Listening, watching.
The beast hums low in my mind and Creed’s eyes go white.
“Yes, Hellpet. As I told you before, I don’t call you Hellpet for no reason.”
“So, I have been controlling the dragons,” I muse aloud. “They do what they do because I wish them to.” It’s not just because they’re familiar with me.
It’s because they are a part of me.
Holy shit.
Creed swipes his hand in the air, and a hologram pops up between us. The center shifts into a mirror that shows my reflection.
The red jewel at the edge of my temple glows.
“It’s where your power manifests from,” Creed says. “It’s been sealed inside out this whole time, Haide. A direct link to the soul stones.”
“It is a soul stone of its own, and it was fueled when I pressed the other into your chest. Like the royal said, it is now a direct link to the power of every fallen dragon, power and soul.”
I tilt my head to the left a little, staring at the other. “And the blue one?”
“Your link to Legend, the same color as your fated mate’s eyes.”
“It’s not glowing.” I don’t expect the hint of heartache that slips over me as I say it.
I didn’t even know I knew what heartache felt like, but that’s the only way to describe it.
“No, it’s not.” Creed’s guilt bleeds through his tone and I glare at him.
Did he destroy my link to my mate when he took him from me? Because if he did—I’ll kill him.
Creed’s lips twitch.
“There is something that this king has not yet told you that you need to know.”
My eyes narrow on Creed and he licks his lips, nodding.
“Arabella.”
A rumble works its way up my throat. I don’t know if it’s me, the Nightkin, or both. “I’m getting sick of hearing that name.”
“As am I.”
“Tell her,” the beast demands.
Creed nods. “I made the final decision to create the fake bond between her and Legend.”
“Doesn’t take much to figure that out, dickhead, but I know the Nightkin, and there is no way that’s what he meant. Keep talking.”
“We knew her to be Argent, but she’s not supposed to be able to harness the kind of power she is and be able to do what she is doing.”
“What is she doing?”
He hesitates and I fling my hand up, flame dancing at my fingertips.
“Don’t bitch out now,” I snap. “You’re responsible for all this, as you said. Own it, Creed. Say it with your full fucking chest.”
“She is deepening the bond.”
The words are like a blade sliding between my ribs, a feeling I am all too familiar with. But this time it’s worse.
“You mean the fake bond. It’s not real.” Say it’s not real…
“Yes,” Creed confirms quickly but my mind doesn’t ease. “But that’s part of the problem. It was supposed to be a temporary situation while we figured out how to fix him. I didn’t know his ethos had been torn from his being on the island when he went after you. I thought you were siphoning him.”
“I know all that,” I bite out. “Get to the fucking point before I fucking fry you out of spite.”
His jaw tightens.
“She’s controlling him,” he says quietly. “Controlling the bond itself. And I think she knows how to complete it.”
The room suddenly feels smaller.
Hotter.
Complete it? How do you complete it if it’s not real?
“If she does,” he continues, voice dropping even lower, “your bond will be ripped from within you.”
The Nightkin goes still.
“And when that happens,” Creed finishes, “Legend’s Ethos, the Nightkin as he calls himself, dies with it.”
Cold panic surges through me so violently my hands curl into fists, the flame there dancing up my arms. “I will die before I allow him to.”
The rumble in my chest echoes down my spine.
Creed’s expression hardens. “Then you better hurry, Haide.”
Shivers snap down my spine.
“Knight linked me the moment we stepped into this room,” he says. “Her manipulation is working, and the effect on him is stronger now that they’re in her homeland.”
A pulse of rage rolls through me. “How so?”
He grimaces, like the next words are too painful to speak. “He’s agreed to a bonding ceremony.”
My heart slams against my ribs. “When?”
“Now.”