“Do you?”
“No. No one ever knows the full extent of the consequences from casting spells. Even with the soulmate bond between lovers, it can create a life-changing love, but when one partner dies, theother is left completely decimated. There’s a cost to all magic, to the twisting of fate, to forcing nature’s hand. It’s not worth it, Charlotte.”
“Is that how you feel about the soulmate bond? It’s not worth it?” I wasn’t sure why that was the one question that came to mind after all he had said.
He fought with his thoughts for a moment. “Any spell tying you to Alaric is not worth it.”
Before I could point out that he didn’t answer my question, the professor returned.
He placed a dagger before me with a black blade and an ornate silver handle. It looked similar to the black tourmaline daggers of the Society. It would fit right in with my other dagger. After being briefly kidnapped by Alaric at the harvest ball, I doubted anyone would question why I wanted more protection. It looked a bit heavier, and it felt different too. A silent hum emanated from it, telling its stories lost to time. Beside it, he placed a piece of wrinkled parchment with hastily scribbled words.
“Though this is a side effect of a greater spell, it could still be broken by the tracking spell reversal. Lucky for you, I just so happen to have a black obsidian dagger, but unlucky for you, we all must hope it works. We’re working with missing pieces here. I’ve copied the reversal spell onto this parchment here, which should be spoken to the blade to incant it before use. This can be done at any time, and I suggest you do it as soon as possible, as I’m sure the opportunity to use the dagger will spring itself upon you without warning.”
I nodded, taking the dagger and parchment.
“And the portal. We were told someone from her world and someone from our world opened it, and only either one of them can close it. Can you tell us anything else?” Sebastian asked.
He glanced around the room growing increasingly more uneasy with each spot his eyes landed on. “I’m afraid not. I don’t even know how this portal was opened in the first place. As with this unknowngreater spell, the portal is also an old magic meant to be forgotten because of how dangerous it is. If the portal can only be closed by the one who opened it, then it could remain open, forever connecting worlds that should have never been connected.”
Something heavy and fragile fell within me. We arrived right back at the same problem. It was foolish to have any bit of hope in getting Alaric back through the portal, and even more monumentally foolish to believe he would willingly close it. And we couldn’t just leave him in my world. Either he needed to quickly develop a change of heart and maybe an entirely new personality, or we had to force him through and imprison him. Or we had to kill him. Which settled uncomfortably in my stomach. He was torturing me, sure, but despite Sebastian’s nickname for me, I did not want to be a killer. I couldn’t even kill in the name of defense when a vampire was a moment from sinking their teeth into me.
And the longer Alaric remained in my world, remained tied to me, the closer I’d get to an inescapable fate. He could turn me at any moment, bond me to him forever. And I’d have to kill him before that happened.
And the very thought made me want to retch.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
After lunch, Sebastian dragged me down the hall and refused to answer any of my questions. We stopped before a door, and he swung it open, finally releasing me from his troll grip. I peeked inside the room. Cool light poured in from the window lined wall, creating a reflective pool on the pale wooden floors. The room was littered with drawing tables, easels with unfinished works upon them, paints of every color imaginable, and brushes of every size. I eyed him suspiciously.
“You only have this moment, Charlotte. You can’t wait for the world to change. You can’t wait for yourself either.” He stared me down as if he was prepared to catch me if I tried to escape.
Aching muscles, gasping breaths, and dead ends flooded my head as I remembered that night. When I ran, and he chased me. A twisted part of me wanted to run right now. But this gesture seemed too intimate to spoil. And a lump formed in my throat as I realized it was one of the nicest things anyone had ever done for me, certainly the most thoughtful. Others rarely ever thought of me.
I stepped into the room, to the easel with the blank canvas right before the windows. Paints and brushes were set up beside it, right next to an empty palette. I sat hesitantly atop the stool. I had never painted before. I’d always just admired Olivia as she painted. I didn’t even really know how.
I glanced back to Sebastian who had sat behind me to my left, his arms crossed over his broad chest, looking awfully close to some guard making sure I completed my work. I wasn’t going to get out of this one.
I looked out to the window, to the lush garden and the heavenly mountains beyond. I squeezed out the thick paint onto the palette, an arrangement of colors before me. I picked up a random brush,dipping it into a sky blue, and I let out a breath as I pushed the color into canvas.
Shadows moved about the room as the sun made its way across the sky. The room grew dim. I wasn’t sure how much time had passed, but it had been a lot since I was losing light. Sebastian had been watching me silently the entire time. His eyes remained on my painting.
At best, it appeared like an impressionistic depiction of a landscape. The vague depiction of a sky, mountains, green blobs that could be hedges, colorful spots that could be flowers. At worst, it was just a bunch of colors stacked on top of each other lost to the canvas and unable to take shape.
I looked to Sebastian who was still staring intently at the painting. He finally met my gaze, his eyes unfocused at first as if he were actually within my blobby world and had to adjust to reality. “Are you finished?”
I glanced over the painting once more. “Yes.”
He stood and picked up the painting, leaving the room without a word. Confused, I trailed after him. Once we were back in his rooms, he hung the painting. The nail had already been placed, in between two windows near what appeared to be a reading nook at the corner of the room.
“You don’t have to keep it,” I murmured.
Without taking his eyes off the painting, he said, “I want to.”
And I looked to the smudges and swirls of colors, something I had made. Something that was a part of me, and it was on display. When everyone, including myself, only wanted to hide me. Or distract others from who I truly was. No one had ever put me on display before. I’d think he was just pitying me, but what turned in his eyes was more believable than any words.
It was a sense of awe. And I knew for damn sure it was not the quality of the painting. He was looking at what only he could see. And I wondered what it was.
* * *
