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Slowly, Elias forced back the fog in his thoughts before meeting Magnus’ scarlet eyes.

Dark mischief twinkled in Arabella’s eyes, but the sorcerer didn’t change his form. Neither did he release Elias’ cock.

“No,” Elias breathed.

The idea of looking upon the face of his matelike this, with a touch that wasn’t hers, had something in him fracturing.

Please, let her touch be just mine.

He wanted to remember Arabella with her sincerity, gentleness, and fierceness. With sudden certainty, he understood why Magnus wore her face—he wanted to warp Elias’ memories of his mate. To remove the safe place his thoughts retreated to during the worst of the sorcerer’s administrations.

To tear him down brick by brick.

There was a flash of teeth as the female before him smiled.

Elias tried desperately to keep his body still. To keep himself from thrusting into Magnus’ hand even as desire alighted in his core.

But when her tongue plunged into his mouth, his body betrayed him.

He thrust once, twice, and then his seed spilled into the female’s hand. As he came, his essence shimmered up his throat and flowed into his mouth. The female’s eyes glowed a brighter scarlet as she pulled it into her. The metallic tang of Elias’ blood mixed with her peppermint taste and the essence’s rich flavor as she fed.

Elias’ fangs pressed against his lower lip as Magnus pulled back, still wearing Arabella’s face. She brought her hand to her mouth, licking Elias’ pleasure clean from her fingers.

A growl ripped from somewhere deep in Elias’ being. He yearned to rip into Magnus’ throat and tear him into shreds even as nausea filled him at the sight.

Once his hand was clean, Magnus smiled and stepped forward until his body pressed against Elias’ skin. Until only Arabella’s leathers were between their bodies.

“You will never be free of me,” Magnus whispered into the space between them with Arabella’s voice, his breath warm onElias’ cheeks. “I see now that, even after feeding on me, even with your compliance, you resist me. You guard your heart from me. So, until you lower those shields around your heart and give me what I seek, I will wear her face, keep you teetering on the edge between desperation and despair.”

As Magnus’ eyes glowed red once more, Elias’ cock became rock hard.

“Please,” Elias managed between kisses as Magnus descended upon him.

Tongue plunging into his mouth, Magnus circled slowly before pulling back and running his teeth over Elias’ lower lip. “Give me what I want, and this stops.”

But Elias couldn’t open his heart—and magic—to Magnus.

Even if he knew how, it was the one place that he could lock away his truest self.

When Elias didn’t respond, Magnus said, “That’s what I thought.”

Then the sorcerer’s hands—Arabella’s hands—were on him again.

Elias pulled at his chains. The motion was violent and filled with every ounce of rage and desperation flowing through him. Blood poured down his wrists. Soon, his arms were slick with red.

But there was nothing he could do to stop the female before him as she fed from him. Each time, she kept him teetering on the edge of humanity, a breath away from succumbing to the demon under his skin.

As day after day passed like this, a haze formed over his mind as his thoughts and realities blurred together.

Each time, he was helpless against her touch and how she used his body. Even the pleasure became painful, and he found himself flinching away at the mere sight of her. The fear bledinto his dreams. Soon, the one place of refuge he had from all of this was no longer safe.

Until slowly, the faintest fissure formed in his heart.

Chapter Eighteen

ARABELLA

Over the next few weeks, Arabella trained nonstop with Arden and his warriors in the large cavern at the mountain’s base.