“The ember is magic we know far too little about,” I mutter, raking a hand through my hair.
Ian lets out a shuddering breath. “If they’ve truly removed her mating bite, and mated her over and over, removing each bite with an ember, saints… it’s a miracle she’s still alive. If she is.”
“She is,” I mutter, guilt plunging deep in my belly. “Because Rad hasn’t finished tormenting me with her yet.”
“Knock knock,” Mai says from the cracked door to Ian’s office. “I hear some utter madwoman wants to be hexed into a nasty, thorny omega trap. Whoa! What on earth are those?”
Ian frowns in resignation and passes the photos over to Mai. “I’m surprised Langford hasn’t shown these to you already. Juniper received these from Andrew Radcliffe, stuck to her cottage door with Trinity’s scribe.”
Mai shakes, but not with fear. No, the diminutive omega healer isfurious.“Those fuckingmonsters! Oh, dear Trinity, what have they done to you…”
“We think they burned away her mating bite from Jaime with the ember, if that’s even possible. It’s our best guess at this point.” Ian slams his fist down on the desk, making me and Mai jump. “I hate not havinganswers.” He looks at us both, suddenly sheepish, black hair sweeping in front of his downcast blue eyes. “Sorry.”
“I have to bring him down,” I realize, all hope sinking like a stone in my gut. “The disappearing omegas, the acts of terror by the Soldiers, saints, maybe even my father’s business, he’s involved in all of it.”
“Why does it have to be you?” Mai demands, scorn in her voice.
“Because all other channels have failed. He can’t be expelled, and he can’t be prosecuted. For whatever reason, he’s taken an interest in me.” A dark thought steals my breath. “My-my affinity. Could he know about it?”
A muscle in Ian’s jaw ticks. “We can’t rule that out. His reach is great, and so is that of the Soldiers. There has to be a bigger plan here, more than just terrorizing academies…”
“There is,” I murmur. “I don’t know what it is yet, but I intend to find out. Whatever’s going on, Andrew Radcliffe is the first domino, and I intend to topple him.”
CHAPTER30
Ian hesitates, golden scribe held before him. “I hate this,” he mutters. “I hate even casting a hex so wretched, and to cast it on you…”
“I have to learn,” I say, clenching my hands into fists, bracing myself for the ripping thorns. I’ve worn leggings and an old sweatshirt to his office for this express purpose—clothes I don’t mind seeing shredded by the dark purple-black thorns of the hex’s trap.
He meets my eyes, apology in his, and speaks the words of power associated with the hex, flicking his scribe through the seven sigils that make up the trap. He slashes the slim metal wand toward, me and I flinch, squeezing my eyes shut.
Magical vines whip up from the floor, lashing around my wrists and thighs, dragging me down to the floor. My knees crack against stone, and I belatedly grunt out, “Kneepads. Next time, fucking kneepads.”
I fight the thorns, struggling against the vines, but the briars only dig deeper, dark magic slicing through my skin. Blood trails down my wrist into the hand gripped tightly around my scribe, and when I try to move my scribe through the first sigil of a nullification spell, I drop it. It rolls away, slick with my blood, and I flounder for it, but it’s too distant.
“Release me, please,” I murmur. “I can’t do this without my scribe.”
Ian performs the nullification spell, and the thorns burn away, sloughing off and vanishing.
Mai rushes forward, dabbing at my cuts with gauze damp with antiseptic, but I brush her off.
“There’s no point cleaning my wounds until we’re finished or I’m bleeding out.” I turn to Ian. “Again?”
He flicks two cushioning spells toward my knees, and I nod my gratitude, my eyes meeting his.
Saints, it’s written plainly on his face, in the way his eyes track the rivulets of blood tracing down my wrists, that he hates every minute of this.
He graces me with a sad smile. “Don’t flinch this time. And don’t struggle. Your first impulse will always be to flinch and then fight, but the harder you fight, the tighter the trap closes around you.”
I nod and brace myself, but the moment the sigils fly from his scribe, I do just as he told me not to: I flinch. And when the vines close around me and drag me to my knees, I thrash and I fight, every struggling motion driving the wicked thorns deeper into my skin, the vines coiling around me tighter and tighter. Sharp pain sears through me, but I hold onto my scribe, even as blood flows into my fist, as the thorns carve into my skin. I try to trace through the arcs and angles of the nullification spell, but thorns creep down my fingers until I can’t move my scribe at all.
I shake my head and Ian releases me.
I wipe the blood off on my leggings. “Again.”
We practice until I’ve finally cast the nullification spell correctly. The trap doesn’t release me. When Ian does, I let Mai tend to my wounds.
“They’re not meant to be escaped,” Ian says quietly, coming to stand beside us. His scent is too sharp, the citrus notes too bright, and tense energy radiates off of him.
