“Why?” Eli asked.
“To cast a successful protection spell, you need more than power. You need to be whole. Your heart and mind are fractured. Stuck between the world you knew and the world that is. You must make a choice. Accept everything you are—and everything you will one day be—or be doomed to failure forever.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Eli
Cade, Liam, Peter, and Ewan went to work throwing a couple of days’ worth of clothes into suitcases for everyone, while Tierney, Caitlin, and Farren accompanied Eli and Regulus out to the back lawn.
The vampire bared his fangs and sank them deep into his wrist with a quiet snarl. His eyes crinkled around the edges. Pain.
Blood dripped from the wounds onto the grass, and Regulus held out his arm. “Five or six drops will be enough. Do it quickly before the wounds seal. I do not enjoy piercing my own skin.”
What the bloody fuck was he supposed to do? Suck on the vampire’s wrist?
His hesitation must have angered Regulus, because the vampire grabbed Eli’s hair and forced his head back. Holding his arm high, he growled, “Open your fucking mouth or I will force you to comply.”
Eli parted his lips, and the coppery, slightly sweet blood hit his tongue. He counted each impact, reaching seven before the vampire released him.
“Fuck me. That…” He’d been about to tell Regulus how disgusting that experience had been when a power the likes of which he’d never known surged through him. It was like every nerve ending caught fire, but there was no pain. Only an exhilaration he never wanted to end.
Regulus arched a perfectly plucked brow at Eli. “You were saying?”
“Nothing. I was saying nothing.” Eli staggered away a few steps, needing a moment to compose himself before he returned to Farren’s side. Because the way he currently felt? He wanted to rip her clothes off and worship her body until she begged for mercy.
Get yourself under control. If you can’t cast this protection spell, people die.
That single thought sobered him, and Eli took a deep breath. He could senseeverythingnow. Hear the rustle of small animals beyond the tree line to the south. Smell the rotting wood on the other side of the small stream that gurgled peacefully to the west. He could even feel the pull of the moon. Or at least, that’s what he imagined this deep, tugging sensation deep in his soul was.
Turning back to Regulus, he shoved his hands into the pockets of his khakis. “I don’t know how to fix whateverfracturesyou sense in my heart and mind. I’ve accepted my power. If I hadn’t, would I have let it do this to me?” He unbuttoned his shirt to show the vampire the symbols inked into his skin. “Every single one of them felt like it was going to kill me.”
The vampire gestured for Eli to follow him to the edge of the open space, then lowered his voice. “There is a matter left unsettled between you and the female wolf, yes?”
“There is. But now is a completely inappropriate time for us to strip naked and fuck like rabbits until the sun comes up.” He didn’t care that the vampire could likely end him without breaking a sweat. He was bloody tired of riddles and half truths and “searching for himself.”
Regulus’s hand shot out and wrapped around Eli’s throat. “Do not make light of this situation, practitioner.”
“I’m not,” he croaked. “But is there some reason no practitioner on the planet can give me—or anyone—a straight answer?”
The vampire chuckled. Actually chuckled as he released his hold. “The old ways have not left much of the world. Secrecy and deception? They were necessary for survival. Practitioners were hunted and put to death. As were vampires. Werewolves. Fae.”
“Your point?”
“You do not need to ‘fuck like rabbits’ to perform the casting.” The vulgar phrase sounded so out of place coming from the vampire. “You only need to accept your flaws. And hers. And you must be willing to sacrifice all that you have, all that you want in this life, if the casting requires it.”
“I don’t understand. I have to be willing to mate with Farrenandbe willing to die before I get the chance? That is complete rubbish.”
“It is the truth. Now try again.”
* * *
Regulus stoodin front of Farren, Tierney, and Caitlin, ready to whisk them to safety if Eli’s casting went horribly wrong once again.
How the hell was he supposed to succeed when he couldn’t think of a single bloody thing to do differently?
Digging his toes into the dirt, he relished in the small tremors that started under him. Perhaps he didn’t have to pull as much power as he’d done before. If he failed, at least there wouldn’t be as great of a chance he’d destroy Farren’s house.
The Tree of Life on his shoulders started to burn, and he balled his hands into fists. Air was next, along with her matching mark. Then water. Then fire.
