He scooped me up in a bridal carry, my limbs weak and falling limply to my sides as my head lolled against his chest. “Council members, it appears my mate and I will need to retire for the day. But please, there is no need to rush. Stay as long as you like. Enjoy yourselves.”
It felt like I was levitating as Victor brought me back to my room, and while I couldn’t see him, I could sense that Vorthain was behind us, following our every step like a shadow that was heavier than the object that cast it.
The sconces went by in blurs as I hummed to myself, a Sirena Murphy song I’d listened to on repeat when it’d been released six years ago. But for some reason only the melody came to me now, the words melting like snowflakes as soon as they hit my tongue.
“I may have gone a little overboard,” Victor said, concern tugging at his brow.
“You had reason to celebrate,” Vorthain replied. “It’s not everyday one ushers in the dawn of a new age.”
Victor’s chuckle reverberated through me, and he lifted me closer to his face, running the tip of his nose along my cheek. “Yes, I suppose not.”
We entered his rooms and then mine, and he laid me on the bed.
My shoes had long since been abandoned, and he tucked me in gently, giving me a chaste kiss on the forehead. “Rest now, darling. Vorthain will watch you while I get your supplements.”
The dark priest bowed his head slightly as Victor left, then took up his vigil once more in the corner of the room.
With great effort, I turned my head towards him, blinking slowly. “Why are you doing this?” I asked, my voice sounding separate from the rest of me as it floated across the room.
My eyes drifted towards the window, where the sky was just beginning to lighten over the wall and treetops outside of the mansion. Vorthain stood, gliding over to close the curtains before coming to my side.
He then sat beside me, and his fingers—gray, cold, and weathered—traced the visible scars, the physical memories of my attack. As his touch moved, so did a feeling of foreboding, as though each contact were an injection of dread shot straight into my bloodstream.
“I’m simply fixing a broken system. Don’t you want to be happy? I can make you happy.”
Of course I wanted to be happy, I just didn’t think I’d ever find that with Victor. We were just so different. He hated my hobbies and interests, and he never laughed at my jokes, the few times I’d tried to make them. He thought my life before we’d met was small and insignificant, my dreams pitiful.
And while the sex had been good—great, even—it hadn’t ever been something I actually wanted. It was proof I was alive, a link to a living, breathing Magik to remind myself I existed. Feelings and sensations to fill the emptiness left from everything else he’d taken from me.
To make me feel happiness with Victor would mean not only erasing the memories of five years of torture, it meant changing who I was on a fundamental level.
And the worst part of it all was that I had had a taste of what a mate bond was supposed to be. Ronan, even though he was the reason I was back here, had been like a glass of ice cold water after drinking sludge in the desert. A breath of fresh air after living under a cloud of smog.
A glimpse into a future we could never have.
That kind of connection, somehow both effortlessly earthly and cosmic, both magic and mundane, couldn’t be duplicated, no matter what Vorthain said. And Victor’s treatment of mecould never be rewritten into something that even hoped to resemble it.
“It won’t be real,” I said turning away from him and blinking away the tears.
He scoffed, his nails scratching me a little deeper as he continued outlining the echoes of pain on my arms. “What makes a mate bond ‘real,’ hm? Your scientists have tried and failed to find the code, to discover the spell that will unlock the secrets the gods have kept to themselves, hidden in the darkness. But for all their research, they have uncovered nothing.”
His breath was hot on my ear as he leaned down to whisper. “My goddess thrives in the darkness, witch. She’s observed the suffering of us mortals, as some are blessed with power and companionship, and the rest wallow in weakness and mediocrity.”
There were seven gods who had created the Magiks of Lundaria in their images: Hecara for witches and familiars, Sanguiel for vampires, Cethelyne for merfolk, Vorrak for werewolves, Orithiel for elves, Solasia for seraphim, and Ravaric for demons. As far as I knew, they all had worked together to create mate bonds between the races, to ensure we didn’t tear the world apart out of hatred and confusion in our differences.
But Vorthain spoke of his goddess like she was different, and I’d never heard of any gods aside from the seven of our world.
“Who do you serve?” I asked, my voice so small I was surprised the words even formed sound.
What are you?
“My master’s name was stolen by time, buried in oblivion, and hidden by fear. You need only know that she’s finally awakened, and is disgusted by what the gods have done to their children. In her mercy, rather than destroy this world and start anew, she’s instead going to repair it. She’s giving us a choice, sowe can create the bonds ourselves. To help you see the gods for who they truly are, and unshackle us from the chains of fate.”
Victor came back in, a bottle of pills in one hand, the other holding a glass of the thick, viscous blood replacement drink. Even in my altered state, my empty stomach revolted at the sight of it.
“That would probably go down easier after a proper meal,” Vorthain said to no one in particular, but he tilted his head towards Victor, his hand still on my skin as he forced the Premier to acknowledge me as a person.
I wanted to hate the man… whatever he was. But I couldn’t deny it was nice to have someone remind my “mate” that I had basic needs.
