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He really was ours. Mine. Tied to me now with that golden thread of energy.

“Heartstring.” My magic whispered the word with gentle reverence.

I wasn’t alone anymore.

So why did I still feel like so much was missing?

18

RAMI

“Vittu!” I ripped Lucian’s fangs from my forearm and tightened my grip on the back of his neck. He continued to struggle while I wrestled him through the emergency exit of the club. “Find your peace, little brother,” I warned with a growl, “or I will have to find it for you.” I gave him a firm shake before pinning him against the back wall in the alley with an unyielding hand to his chest.

“I will slaughter every one of those fuckers!” he yelled, clawing at my arm in a wild attempt to break free. “I will bring her their heads!”

Snarling, I slapped him across the face with my free hand. I didn’t want to hurt him, but he was in a blood haze and had little control. We didn’t need to get tangled up with human murders any more than Cordelia needed their heads. Striking him was effective, though, and he blinked away some of the darkness clouding his crimson eyes. I took his jaw and forced him to hold my gaze.

“She doesn’t want that,” I told him, keeping the words calm. It pained me to watch him struggle against the demon inside him. “She wants you. You, Lucian.” As the shadows fully faded and his eyes came back to their metallic sheen, the tension bled out of him and he sagged in my grip.

“Fuck.” His voice was ragged. With the storm passed, I pulled my hand back from his chest, and he tipped forward to lean his forehead against my shoulder. “Fuck!”

I palmed the back of his head while he breathed hard, returning to himself. “I know. Olet kunnossa.”

What would my parents think if they saw me now? Comfort was not something I learned as a child. My parents were strict. Stoic. The virtues they chose to impress on me were those of self-control and endurance. When they realized that I could not share their cold indifference, they thought a change in scenery would help sharpen my softer edges. They sent me to America at fifteen, and it worked. I sharpened. I grew angry and aggressive and wanted nothing to do with anything, least of all the prestigious boarding school I was being forced to attend.

Then I met Alaric, and our bond was obvious even before our Legacies were revealed. It was no surprise that Fate had woven us together as driftmates. What had surprised everyone was our being claimed by Kratos. Alaric’s father was the Alpha of the Zelos Legacy, and it was uncommon for an heir to be branded with another warrior-god’s sigil. But Fate was not to be questioned. Even when your drift contained the broken and the damned. Even when being Heartless felt like a death without end.

“You should just let them put me down.” Lucian’s words were splintered.

My hand flexed against his skull, pressing him more tightly to me. “Never. You are veljeni.”

His head rocked against me. “I’m a savage. I fucking bit you!”

“That wasn’t you,” I assured him. I took his shoulders and stood him upright. He was smaller than me—most were—but he was fast and lean. If I hadn’t been able to contain him, the damage could have been much worse. “Besides, your tiny fangs barely pierced the skin.”

He forced a huff of laughter, but it didn’t mask the shame he felt. He hated what he was. What was done to him. But since the monster who infected him with shade and made him a hybrid was long dead, that hatred now turned inward.

“Let’s go home,” I told him, squeezing his shoulder. “We’ll have a lot to talk about when Bellamy gets there.”

It was tense while we waited. Quinn was still up when we got to the house, sitting in the living room with a book in one hand and a tumbler of scotch in the other. Lucian went straight to the kitchen while I sat in an armchair next to the crackling fireplace. He came back with beers for us and began to pace while I filled Quinn in on what had happened at the club.

I had stationed myself on the outskirts of the dance floor when Cordelia went on. Seeing her in that outfit made me hard in an instant, and watching her move was almost painful. She never saw me, her eyes on Bellamy and Lucian, but I was content to admire her from the shadows—until that idiot with a death wish grabbed her. My beast had taken over, and even though Bellamy had warned us of her touch aversion, I couldn’t stop myself.

I was just finishing the debrief when the front door opened. Lucian froze mid-step, and I slowly got to my feet.

“Is she alright?” I asked when Bellamy walked into the room. The look on his face was…elated. There was dried blood around a cut to his brow, and his cheek was starting to bruise, but his smile said everything. “Come.” I waved him over, and he crossed the room to stand in front of me.

“Yeah, she’s fine,” he said while I placed a palm against the side of his neck. He shivered as my gift ran through him, and in moments, the gash was healed and the bruises gone. “Thanks.”

Lucian moved forward with hesitant steps. “What happened?”

I lowered myself back into the armchair, eager to hear the answer. Deep in my chest, the thread of my soul that linked me to Cordelia pulsed with a gentle rhythm, like a second heartbeat. I wondered if she could feel it like I did. Things were so chaotic, I doubted she was even aware that she’d tied me to her with a touch. My beast purred as he wrapped himself around that connection, protecting it.

Protecting her.

Bellamy sat on the couch beside his brother, who had set his book down on the coffee table. “She was so overwhelmed by what happened at the club⁠—”

“And you let her out of your sight anyway.” Quinn’s cold interruption was like a blade between his brother’s ribs.