Page 42 of Binding His Fated Mates

I waited, too. Though I worked to keep my expression as neutral as I could manage, my heart was hammering in my chest. This was it. The question that had plagued us for two years.

“I guess you have a right to know,” Daniel said dully, speaking at last. His gaze was fixed on the table, his dark hair falling into his eyes, as though he couldn’t bring himself to look at either one of us. “And I wanted to tell you. For a long time.”

“Then tell us,” Hunter said. “Make us understand why you kept the single biggest truth about yourself from us. Why every single day we spent together was a lie.”

He didn’t say it cruelly, but it wasn’t gentle, either.

Daniel flinched. Then he sucked in a sharp breath and he nodded. “Yeah, I guess it makes sense that you’d think that.”

“Think that?” Hunter demanded, his eyes narrowing. “It’s the truth!”

Daniel bit his lip and shook his head slightly, his eyes locked onto his plate of food and his hands trembling.

A flicker of doubt chased across my twin’s face.

It was the truth. Wasn’t it? Somehow, seeing Daniel’s reaction, I wasn’t as sure.

“We just want to understand,” I put in.

Daniel’s eyes slid shut and he nodded. “I know.”

Then, with visible effort, Daniel raised his gaze to meet mine. And then Hunter’s. But his expression was all wrong. In the span of only a few moments, all the happiness and peace had drained away from him, and the haunted look had returned to his eyes. The emotion through the bond was impossible to read, a tempest churning beneath Daniel’s calm, unhappy exterior.

“When warlocks and witches are young, our powers aren’t usually very strong, so there’s less risk being friends with mundane kids.” He smiled mirthlessly, shaking his head. “When we first met, I was almost ordinary, like anyone else. When we were kids, it wasn’t really much of a lie. Just for the record.”

Hunter and I traded a glance across the table. We’d befriended him after we’d punched the bully who’d pushed Daniel to the ground at recess and made him scrape up his knee. Afterward, we’d helped Daniel limp to the nurse’s office. We’d gotten in trouble for fighting and the bully hadn’t. But he’d never tried it again, either. Daniel and I had been inseparable ever since.

“But when I was thirteen, my powers started getting stronger and my magical training began. My family takes it very seriously.” He went on, “Once my magic started to really manifest, my family didn’t like the idea of me being so close with a mundane kid. They were worried I’d tell you things that might make life inconvenient for them. They tried to… discourage our friendship.” He swallowed, looking miserable. “But when I kept sneaking out to see you anyway, they realized I wasn’t going to do what they wanted. After they’d caught me for what was probably the tenth time, we had a big fight.”

I frowned, putting things together in my head. Like the way we’d only ever hung out at my place, except when I snuck over and came through the window. My dad, who was almost never home because he worked so much, used to joke that Daniel was his other son because he was always at our place. I’d hardly known Daniel’s family at all, despite living next door. Even though he’d rarely talked about them, I’d always gotten the sense that Daniel didn’t get along well with them.

“They were so angry that I’d disobeyed them,” Daniel said. “And that’s when they put a geas on me.”

“What the hell does this have to do with why you lied to us for twelve years?” Hunter demanded, his voice rising dangerously.

Daniel’s gaze snapped to Hunter’s, his dark eyes flashing with sudden anger. “Your math is wrong.”

“The fuck it is,” Hunter shot back. “You lied for twelve years!”

“No. We’ve known each other twelve years,” Daniel replied evenly, his gaze still locked with Hunter’s. “And for the last two, you’ve known the truth.” He paused and there was no mistaking the way his anger gave way to a simmer of pain in his eyes. “But you never once asked me for what really happened, did you? After everything, you never once gave me the benefit of the doubt. You never let me explain.”

Hunter’s eyes widened and his lips parted. “What could you have possibly said?”

“A geas is a magical compulsion,” Daniel replied harshly. “We—the Henbanes, my family—specialize in binding magic. Making other people do what we want them to.”

Hunter went silent, staring at him, his lips pressed into a tight line.

Daniel’s words became bitter and the corners of his lips turned down clownishly, but his gaze dropped and he didn’t look up at us, as though the only way he could get the next words out was to speak them to his plate. “A geas is one of the most powerful kinds of binding spells there is. It’s the same type of magic that vampires use when they hypnotize people, except stronger. It hijacks your whole body and turns it against you, regardless of what you want.”

I realized, with horrible, sickening clarity, where this conversation was about to go. And from the horror-struck look on his face, Hunter did too.

“My parents, my older brother, and even my sister, Rowan—all four of them cast it together.” He pressed his palms flat against the table, as if steadying himself. “They took away my ability to talk about being a warlock with a mundane person. Or about the supernatural world at all. About any of it. I tried to stop them, but I couldn’t. I’ve never been strong enough to stop them.”

“Wait—” Hunter grimaced, then shook his head as if to clear it. “No. You’re saying that your parents—your whole family—took away your ability to be honest with anyone? Ever?”

Daniel nodded miserably. “You don’t understand. They’re not nice people. They didn’t think anything of it. They knew I wanted to tell you the truth and therefore I was a problem. A liability that they needed to deal with.”

He raised his gaze to ours, his eyes glassy and his expression ghastly, as though he might snap in two at any moment.