Page 203 of A Vow of Embers

Which would have been wrong.

Very wrong, because he was not himself and he had not made this choice, but my body currently disagreed.

“I might have overdosed him,” Io admitted. “As I’ve told you, he’s a big beast of a man with a thick skull and thicker hide. I wanted to make sure it worked.”

It had worked so well it had nearly killed me.

Earlier, with the life mage, when he had questioned Io’s potion-making skills, I’d had full confidence in her abilities, and I had been right, only she’d now used those skills against me.

“That could explain why he wouldn’t listen to reason. When I was under the influence, he was able to get me to leave.” I hadn’t wanted to, at all, and considered going back several times, but he had ended it.

“Maybe that’s because his feelings are deeper for you now than yours were for him at that time,” Io offered quietly.

Another statement that I couldn’t allow to be true, even if it was. But she understood the potion far better than I did.

Which meant she was probably right.

And I didn’t know what to do with that information.

I shook my head and swallowed. “Will he remember what he said to me?”What we did?

“Did you after you drank it?”

With perfect, excruciating clarity.

“The life mage said they kept vows and had to refrain from ...” How had he put it? “‘Pleasures of the flesh.’ That they had to remain worthy to wield magic.”

“So?” Ahyana said.

Another reminder that I hadn’t told them everything. My plan had been to force or bribe a life mage into wielding the eye to restore Locris, but I feared that I wouldn’t be able to pull that off, considering how bristly and misogynistic the apprentice had been. What if all the life mages were like him?

It would mean that I would have to be the one to use it.

And so I would have to be worthy to wield her magic and stay away from those pleasures of the flesh.

But my adelphia didn’t know any of that.

“It doesn’t matter,” I said neutrally. And perhaps I might have been more inclined to share with them if things hadn’t become so chaotic this night between Xander and me. He and I had been in a relatively peaceful place before this and Io had just upended it, again in pursuit of her doing what she thought was best for me whether I wanted it or not.

“Promise me you won’t drug him again,” I said to Io. Because if she gave him honeyed wine at some point in the future, I suspected that I wouldn’t be strong enough to resist him.

“Fine, I won’t.”

“Or me,” I added.

“Or you!” She didn’t sound happy about it.

“I am going to need a sleeping draught for him,” I said, realizing the irony.

Io gave me a sneaky smile to let me know she understood it, too. “I thought I wasn’t allowed to drug him.”

“This is different,” I said. “And the draught needs to be better than the one last time that didn’t work.”

“I have a more powerful one now. It’s on the table in my room. The dark green one.”

“I had to give that to Zalira. Do you have any others?”

“On the shelf next to my bed,” Io said just as Ahyana asked, “What happened to Zalira?”