“She is touched by a god”—the Bondsmith gestured to herself—“when I put those runes on her body, mixing her blood with my own, I inadvertently made her a target. Blood has unimaginable power and, after Faylinn disappeared from their village, they’ve been without a conduit for decades. They need pure, unAwakened blood for their magic—god-touched blood is that much more . . . potent.”
“What are they doing to her?” Lex asked the question that stuck to my heavy tongue. My skin itched and buzzed as the Bondsmith paused, longing for the answer yet not wanting to know.
“They drain her little by little, keeping her alive to use as a way to bind runes and imbue them with power not unlike what Faylinn and I can achieve.”
“The letter said she would be made into ‘something indestructible,’” Lex quoted the letter with a gesture to the parchment. “Care to explain that?”
The Bondsmith blew out a breath, her eyes seeing something faraway for a moment before continuing.
“There was a prophecy amongst the people of the Far North about a god-touched girl with rune-etched bones who would become a seer capable of living forever. An immortal being beyond the reaches of the gods who would bring their people—my people—out of the Far North and into Elyria once more.” She paused as we all regarded her with mixed expressions of distrust and disbelief. The Bondsmith sighed before continuing. “They called her the Bone Weaver.”
Silence permeated every inch of the room, questions and anger hanging heavy in the air.
“You think that—” I trailed off, bile rising in my throat as I thought about what they could have done to my little girl.
The Bondsmith’s eyes glinted with fierceness as her gaze held mine. “They value blood above all else, and Razia was a rather devout student of the old ways. If they felt she could be the one to fulfill the prophecy—” The Bondsmith shrugged. “I don’t doubt or discredit anything.”
“Then we need to go get her before anything else can happen,” Peytor said quickly with a fire in his eyes that had the cold seeping from my extremities, warmth bubbling at the fierce loyalty and love he showed my daughter—showed me—despite the recent uneasiness in our relationship.
A muscle in Peytor’s jaw ticked rapidly, matching the glinting steel in his gaze. I knew that expression well—demons were eating at his mind, threatening to pull him into memories from his months in the mines. He’d repressed them well, and we’d discussed much of what had happened, but that was the horrible thing about trauma—it never fully disappeared and left the sufferer a slave to its whims, a prisoner to their memories.
I longed to go to him, pull him in my arms and soothe the hurt away. But I was stuck in my seat, unsure of the status of our relationship and frozen by my grief.
As if recognizing the same, Lex’s tanned hand came to cover Peytor’s much paler and broader one, squeezing in reassurance as he nodded curtly in agreement.
“Our quad will go,” he said with a surety I once felt. “Me, Ilyas, Peytor and”—his eyes flicked to me, holding my gaze—“Fo, if she desires.”
“Quad?” Torin asked.
Peytor’s cheeks pinked slightly, though he didn’t pull away from Lex as I expected him to.
“Yes,” Lex responded curtly, effectively closing the conversation and leaving no room for debate.
Talamh’s and Torin’s eyebrows rose, but neither of them made any further comment.
“We can—” Lex began speaking again, his brow furrowed in thought as he pontificated on the logistics of the four of us traveling.
“No.” The Bondsmith held a singular palm in Lex’s direction, silencing my Bonded.
Lightning flashed in Peytor’s eyes as thunder followed in Lex’s.
“No?” Lex hissed. “What do you meanno?”
“This is not your child. It’s Folami’s daughter. My daughter. Lex’s and Ilyas’. You had the opportunity to keep her safe and. You.Failed,”Peytor clipped out, the muscle in his jaw jumping once more.
I followed the whole exchange with a sort of disjointed curiosity. I should care—Ididcare—but it was hard for me to conjure the right emotions, the right amount of outrage. The apathy that shadowed everything else was more rage-inducing than whatever was happening at the table currently.
The Bondsmith flinched as if physically struck by Peytor’s accusation.
“I am . . . aware of my shortcomings?—”
“Are you? Are youtrulyaware of what you’ve done? You’ve subjected a young girl to a life she didn’t ask for, pain she will never be able to forget. You’ve driven a wedge between relationships and sent Folami so far down a path of despair that I’m unsure she’ll ever fully recover,” Peytor said, rising to his feet as he spoke, a myriad of emotions coating every word.
He sat back in his chair with a heavy sigh. Lex shot him a tight-lipped smile before his hand disappeared beneath the table to rub soothing patterns on Peytor’s thigh.
“You were supposed to be on our side,” Torin said lowly, his honeyed eyes searching for hints of deception in the Bondsmith’s crystal-blue eyes.
She shook her curly head.
