He stood there, letting me look at his spirit. I lingered in my spirit vision long enough to grasp all the spirits in the room, minus my bonded mages and some of the surviving guards, and I pushed with everything in me to dislodge spirits from their vessels--monsters included.
My body burned with excruciating pain as spirits were shoved from their vessels, and I dropped to my knees with a loud cry.
All of the monsters in the foyer dropped lifeless, and yet the one mage that I was truly hoping to kill laughed like it was the funniest thing he'd ever seen in his life.
"You're smarter than this, Fawn." Matthieu ran his fingers through his orange hair. "Check it out. Who do you think I am? Look at my spiritclosely."
My spirit gaze narrowed in on his spirit. It was as dark as it always had been, but for the first time, I realized that it was completely obsidian. There was a direct line coming from his spirit, and I knew exactly where it led to.
My spirit vision faded, and I sucked in a painfully sharp gasp. "There's no way."
"Oh, but there is, my sweet beautiful mage. I'm thefirstattempt at making an immortal, but my ties to Hexarium are ratherchaotic." He clapped his hands together and threw out his arms in a dramatic display of himself. "You arenotthe only immortal mage in Hexarium. You never have been. I'm the black cord, and I have even shifted into different mages through the years with my metamorphose powers. I've spoken to you countless times, Fawn. I've gotten to know you countless times. I've been part of your parties before."
"No..." My vision blurred as white noise filled my head, and my hands trembled uncontrollably. I clutched my chest, trying to steady my breathing, but my body convulsed as panic tightened its grip.
"But you weren't supposed to bondthem!" His arm stretched out as he pointed at my bonded mages. "You were supposed to bondme. We were meant to be together. We're the two souls connected to Hexarium, butyoufucked up!"
Everything that he was saying barely soaked into my mind, and I couldn't fathom that I hadn't been the only immortal in Hexarium.
"Youcouldn'thave been there all this time!" Tears welled up in my eyes, clouding my vision as a sob clogged my throat. "I would've noticed..."
"After about a decade of you being immortal, I had my friend take you." His lips twisted into a sinister smirk. "He was a phrenic mage. Perhaps you remember him?"
My heart sank.
"I tested you out then, but you weren't ready for my level of chaos. Even if we did have fun breaking you."
"You're lying..." My body trembled with every passing second. I clung to my chest as my mind raced, replaying past traumas like a broken record. Every single terrible memory with the phrenic mage that I had blocked out seeped in. Terror consumed me, and my body was so tense, I couldn't stop the pain from spreading through my muscles.
"I want to break you again. I almost did, but your powers came back. I forgot to nullify them again," he admitted, shaking his head. "Rookie mistake, but I was so happy to have you again."
I kept shaking my head as flashbacks of my time with the phrenic mage assaulted my memories and brought back all of the devastating scenes that he made me live through in my mind.
"I don't know how to break a bond, but even if I can't break those bonds, I am going to bond my soul with yours, Fawn. We're going to rule Hexarium like we were always supposed to."
"Who thefuckare you?" My teeth chattered as my muscles slumped, drained by the panic that had seized my body and mind. Tears streamed down my face, but my breathing gradually steadied out again.
He chuckled, but I couldn't see him. The guys had blocked my view of him. "You want to know who I am? Well, at first, I was made by Emperor Lloyd's ancestor, but then I became Emperor Lloyd's great grandfather,and I chose youto become my partner for the end of time."
"You're related to Emperor Lloyd?" Silas clarified, shock lacing his tone.
"Don't be stupid." Matthieu scoffed. "I killed his great grandfather and took his place with my metamorphose formafterhe had kids. He wasn't too keen on making a sword of the empire who was immortal," he spat out. "So I did it myself."
I just kept shaking my head in disbelief. There wasno waythat Matthieu was the emperor who treated me so badly, but I knew in my heart that he was telling the truth.
His magical signature had been so familiar that I couldn't even place it, but now that I knew he was immortal, it made sense. I always had a déjà vu moment with certain mages, and it must've been him every time.
Bile crept up my throat, and I held my hand out to conjure a sword of stone, angling the sharp blade between my breasts and shoving it directly through my heart.
My spirit surged into the darkness as death claimed me, and cold settled in my bones in spirit.
I floated in the spirit realm where Hexarium's pool of magic rested, and that dark thread sucking magic from Hexarium remained. It was only then that I noticed it truly was like a parasite.
Matthieu.
Suddenly, a beacon of pale blue luminous light appeared. My thread that connected my spirit to the heart drew from the basin of magic, sucking down as much power as my vessel could physically handle before blinding light wrapped me up in an embrace as it always did.
When the spirits welcomed me like this, I always felt like I was at home. But every time, my spirit was thrown back to consciousness into my vessel.
