Page 285 of Burn of the Everflame

“That will never happen,” he hissed, no trace of hesitation. His voice dropped, low and lethal. “Do you want to be my mate?”

“But what if⁠—”

“Answer me, Diem.” He stepped toward me. “Do you want to be my mate?”

I staggered backward. “What I want doesn’t matter if⁠—”

“It matters to me.” He kept advancing, seeming to grow larger and more fearsome with every step. He’d fought through an inferno to get here, and he wasn’t giving up.

Fear surged—not of him, but of how close I was to flying into the fire to burn and burn and burn with him forever. A strange feeling rose in my chest in response, the same one I’d been struggling to place all day.

An ember. A spark.

“Say you’re not ready,” he challenged. “Say you’re not sure your love is strong enough to form the bond.”

My spine hit the wall of the house, pinning me between my heart and my home. My chest heaved with a sob at the cruel reminder that fate had denied me both.

“Say anything, Diem, but make it honest. Don’t lie to me. Not about this. It’s too sacred.” His eyes narrowed. “And don’t lie to yourself.”

“Yes, I want to be your mate!” I screamed, tears overflowing. “But I can’t. I won’t do it. I love you too much to ruin you.”

He gripped at his collar, ripping the fine fabric of his shirt. A shredded line tore down the center as he pulled it away to bare his chest. The unscarred circle of skin over his heart began to ripple, and the magic of an illusion misted away, giving way to a blinding glow of golden light. At its center, a symbol appeared: two hearts, entwined into a dagger.

Luther’s mating mark.

63

DIEM

“If you are what ruins me, Diem Bellator, then I am ruined already. So fucking ruined.” Luther fell to his knees, slumping like he’d finally set down a long-carried weight. “The second a grey-eyed healer walked through the Lumnos palace doors, my heart was changed forever. This mark happened months ago, but the day we first met . . . that was the moment that ruined me. And I thank the gods for it every day.”

I stared at him, blinking. “Months?”

He nodded bleakly. “In Sophos—in the library, before the island. I taught myself illusions so I could hide it. I didn’t want you to feel pressured to complete the bond. I had to let you make this choice for yourself.”

“You were mated to me all this time?”

He let out a long exhale. “I didn’t realize—when I was carving the apple, I was thinking about our future and how much I loved you, and what I wanted, then I cut myself, and . . .” His brows furrowed. “It wasn’t an accident, but⁠—”

A laugh burst out of me. Despite my reddened eyes and the tears still tumbling in torrents unchecked, I laughed. I couldn’t stop laughing.

The gods had a cruel sense of humor, and this was by far their most insidious work. To leave us both suffering in silence, believing ourselves stranded mates when the bond was complete the whole time, and in the very same way: two hearts, certain of what they wanted, forcibly seizing the reins to fuse themselves together, only for our pointless attempts at self-sacrifice to keep them apart. How poetic. How perverse.

I buried my face in my hands to smother my cackling. The longer I thought about it, the harder I laughed.

“You’re not angry?” he asked.

I had many mixed feelings about his revelation, but anger was not one of them. Not even at the gods. Not for this.

I knelt to join him and stared at his mark. My greatest hope and my deepest fear, wrapped up in a single symbol. I tentatively reached up and set my fingers over its shimmering lines. A pulse of knee-quivering pleasure coursed through me—and him. His joy at my touch, and the desire it provoked, throbbed across the bond.

Our bond.

Our complete bond.

I brushed my thumb across the mark, and Luther’s eyes closed, his head tilting back as he breathed out a slow, quiet “fuck.” His hand clamped over mine, pressing my palm fully to his chest. His other hand fumbled over the coat he’d placed on me, his movements growing increasingly urgent until his palm curled around the back of my neck. At the touch of his skin on mine, he let out another shuddering sigh.

“You cannot imagine how badly I have needed to touch you,” he said, voice rough. “How good it feels when I do.”