Heat seared through the threads of my magic until the ones holding Zaicha disappeared. She rose to stand at Leanora’s side.
“Eiran brought her here,” Zaicha said, her tone dry but amused. “A gift for you, I’m sure.”
Eiran stared at Leanora, unblinking. “You were supposed to stay behind the veil. You—you were bound to the wards. How?”
“I know your magic as well as I know my own,” she said, her smile soft but deliberate.
Eiran’s shadows flicked around him, like a storm trying to decide whether to break. “You’ve been—” His breath caught, his words splintering. He dragged a hand through his hair, the motion rough and desperate, before he faced her again. His eyes darkened. “You’ve been learning my magic.” The words came out low and fast. He stepped closer, too close until they were a breath apart. His shoulders rose and fell with every uneven breath. “That’s what it was to you. Every moment. Every word. You weren’twithme. You were studying me.”
Her smile didn’t fade. “You make it sound so heartless.”
“It was,” he bit out. His hand twitched as if to reach for her or strike her. Maybe both. “I thought you . . .”
Magic pulsed between them. Heavy and electric. His confusion bled into rage. Hers into power. She tilted her head, her features softening.
Alastor took a step forward before he turned those blazing eyes on Eiran. “I told you your prison wouldn’t hold her.”
“Prison.” She scoffed. “I thought you’d be pleased to see me, Alastor.”
“Pleased?” He dragged a hand across his face, squeezing the bridge of his nose. “You killed our brother.”
Something flashed behind her eyes that almost looked like regret. But then she smiled, and the sight of it made me nervous. “I did what I had to do. You of all people should understand.”
“I should understand.” His words came out lethally low. More of a hiss than anything else. “Forget what you did to me. What about Blaise?”
“I freed him of the burden our parents put on our shoulders,” she said, her hands curling into fists.
“You freed him?” His voice rose, brittle and shaking. “His soul hasn’t known rest because of you. He sacrificed himself for you. And you took and took until there was nothing left of him. And even gone, he cannot rest.”
The way Leanora tilted her head looked almost gentle. Caring even. “His sacrifice would’ve meant something if you hadn’t betrayed us.”
Alastor’s hands trembled as his magic burned at his fingertips. His shadows curled into sigils I’d never seen before, and the ground split between them.
“Ibetrayedhim?” Alastor’s eyes transformed to something foreign. Something ancient. The same sigils now shone behind his eyes. “You betrayed us. You imprisoned us. I won’t let you damn him a beat longer.”
Eiran’s eyes narrowed, and just as he wound his shadows around Leanora, magic erupted from Alastor. It was raw and jagged, aimed at anyone in its vicinity.
Brenton moved instinctively, pushing me to the ground as his body covered mine, protecting me from the explosion of magic. He lifted a protective shield, blocking us from the impact.
But Alastor’s grief, his fury, was a living thing, crawling up from the depths of millennia spent as her prisoner. His magic gathered in his palm again, the sigils forming and reshaping until the entirety of his magic burned as a single point that he directed at Leanora’s chest.
Light flared, and the realm itself screamed. But the bolt never reached her.
Eiran moved in front of her, catching it midair. Alastor’s magic shattered around Eiran, scattering in sparks that died on the ground.
“You will not harm my soul-bound mate.” Eiran’s voice thundered, echoing in my chest.
I let out a sound. A whimper, maybe. Even Zaicha’s smirk faltered.
His soul-bound mate.
Alastor stared, horror carving new lines across his face. “This is why you imprisoned her rather than sentencing her to whatever Enfierna awaited her. Why you kept her hidden in some dark corner of this realm.”
Eiran’s expression broke into something that mirrored grief. “Do not speak as if you do not already know the agony you will drown in for the one bound to your soul. You think yourself cursed now? You will die at the hand of the one you still reach for.”
“Leanora cannot exist,” Alastor said. “She will not stop.”
“I know.” Eiran’s shoulders lowered. “I know this now, but . . .”
