“We have a general sense of ashen numbers, but not a full look,” Nerissa answered.
“We have a solution for the ashen, don’t we?” Raek cut in, his sea green eyes shooting toward me and Nerissa.
I signed a quick translation for Drystan, though he probably didn’t need it with his ability to read lips. Astraeus, surprisingly, was the only pirate on board theHydrawho knew the language.
“Have you made a successful transformation?” Drystan responded with quiet shock.
My chin dipped in confirmation, thinking of the ashen I’d changed in Rhashtai during the attack. Had they even survived the battle?
“Once,” I replied. “It took twice the energy as killing thousands of them, though.”
“Either way, we have two weapons. Three, if you count the king,” Kresida interjected, my stomach pitching at the title she used to refer to Bayne. “They can destroy them by the dozens.”
“I don’t think we rule out Lyvia’s ability to save them just yet,” Carina countered.
“What of the king and queen and their elven forces?” Vienah’s tentative question filled the void. Her recently learned hand movements were slow and tentative. “Will the rest of the Rising forces return to Sultira?”
Drystan heaved a sigh before taking a swig of wine. “The queen swore to Bayne she’d send our forces back to Sultira by the end of the year. We were allowed to leave to communicate the message.”
“What about the bone?” Carina asked, eyes wide.
“She’s agreed to send them and the elven forces without it,” Drystan signed, his brows pinched.
“Why would she do that?” I asked, forcing the tremors from my hands.
Drystan’s eyes dropped to his copper hands. “A trade…”
Vulcan paused his dagger above the whetting stone.
“For what?” Nerissa’s words were broken against her whisper.
Drystan scratched at the stubble on his chin as he shot a cautionary glance toward me. “A soulbinding with Bayne,” Drystan answered, his moon-blue eyes heavy with pity as he signed the words.
Silence cleaved the room. My blood stilled in my veins as my heart took a moment to continue its necessary rhythm. Nerissa had gone rigid. Even Astraeus’s arrogant demeanor shifted into something more lethal.
Khato thought that if I saw the soulbinding thread, Bayne would bind himself to me, and it would prevent Antares from getting her claws in him.My inner voice wavered as I spoke to Ti.
But he didn’t believe you, Ti replied, grief and anger weeping down our mental connection.
“I don’t believe it.” Nerissa’s head shook with her reply.
“It’s true,” I breathed, all too aware the eyes in the room hadn’t left my face.
“How would you know that?” Nerissa snapped, turning toward me, but I could no longer speak.
My breath lodged in my throat.
“Khato suspected a soulbinding thread existed between Lyv and Bayne. If it did, she would have felt it break…” Drystan answered, eyes pinching in apology for confirming what I already knew.
Numbness stretched its claws through me, and my vision started to tunnel. But instead of the usual panic that arrived, the slow, freezing burn of fury spread. Bayne was soulbound.
It didn’t matter that we were human and elfkind. Fuck the rules and whatever shitty gods made them up. I’d felt it all along, and whatever magic the twin eclipse released upon the world during the Sending, it unlocked some door between us as Bellatorsandas a pair.
And he didn’t fucking believe me because I was a naïve human. His doubt cost him his soul.
My heart picked up its pace, pushing against the taut skin along the scar on my neck. Powers rose beneath my skin. The Obscura bucked beneath my palms with its usual demand, the darkness writhing in raven swirls along my arms and hands. I blinked slowly, as a warm, golden power twined alongside it, the song of the Transcindiel rising in my mind’s ear in powerful, outraged beats.
Tiberius’s emotions flooded down our connection, a rage dwarfing his own slice of betrayal.You cannot be forced into a soulbinding. Those compatible for it must make the choice, he barked into my mind, fueling my powers and my emotions.
