Page 84

What the hell?

I watched in utter astonishment as the gaping wound began to close itself up. Little pieces of Elias’s skin began to weave themselves backtogether – tendons and ligaments reconnecting right before my eyes.

I shuffled backwards, falling onto my hands. “What the…what? How?” I couldn’t form words as I watched the wound completely disappear. Nothing but smooth skin now took the place of where a hole should have been.

“My body can heal itself,” Elias answered, worry lining his features. Worry that I wasn’t taking the news easily, that I couldn’t possibly comprehend what I just saw.

“No, I…I saw you get hurt. You got sliced with my mother’s knife. I…I sutured your wound. It’s still there.” I stumbled over my words, coherent thought nowhere to be found as I sat in shock.

“Was it this knife?” Volund asked, unsheathing my mother’s dagger from his side. I looked up at him, mouth still gaped open, and nodded. “This blade is made of silver. Lycans cannot heal from wounds caused by silver.”

I stared at my mother’s dagger as Volund twisted it between his fingers before sheathing it, an evil grin on his face.

Is that why Elias had seemed so surprised that he was bleeding after he saved me from the bandits? I remembered seeing a look of realization on his face when I told him the blade was made of silver.

So Elias was…not human. An immortal. And he was at least three-hundred years old and had been working for the past Kings of Sprath as an assassin. I turned to him, worry still etched on his face as he looked at me. “You’re immortal? Only…only silver can kill you?” I asked.

Volund laughed, and I was starting to get really tired of him interrupting. “Two things can kill a lycan,” he explained. “Silver weapons, and wolfsbane. The plant is severely poisonous to them. Large doses will kill them. Smaller doses can slow their healing, and make them weak and sickly. How do you think we’ve been able to keep Elias under our control for all these centuries?”

I sucked in a breath. They tortured him. Poisoned him. That’s where all the scars on his body came from.

A deep hatred began to form in my gut, threatening to rise to the surface. It wasn’t a hatred for Elias, although the reality of his deception hurt my soul in ways I wasn’t sure I would ever recover. No, my deep hatred was for Volund. For torturing Elias. For using him as a weapon. Forcing him to kill. But kill who? Why?

My heart completely stopped at a sudden realization. Volund slightly cocked his head to the side as I glared at him with full loathing. “You had my mother killed.”

Volund frowned. “No,” he responded coldly. “I can’t take credit for that one, although it did spark other plans of mine into motion.”

A wave of relief hit me, knowing that Elias didn’t kill my mother.

Volund continued. “Adelaide’s death caused your father to nearly reach a point of insanity, so much so that I was close to manipulating him into giving me control of his armies. If your fucking roach of an uncle hadn’t stepped in, I would have succeeded.

“Then, to my pleasant surprise, your uncle got himself exiled. And after years of planning, I realized thatyourdeath would be the one to put King Callum over the edge at the precise moment I needed it.” He glanced at Elias with a glare. “But this imbecile took things into his own hands and delayed things for me.Why?” His question was filled with icy disdain.

Elias glared back at him, but said nothing.

“After years of torture – centuries of conditioning you to obey – why didn’t you just kill her like you were supposed to?”

Elias clenched his jaw, but refused to answer. Then, I watched as Volund’s eyes widened and his malicious grin returned. Volund broke into maniacal laughter, causing an uncomfortable shiver to run down my spine. “You’ve got to be fucking joking,” he laughed. “Don’t tell me the princess is your fuckingmate.”

Mate? I glanced at Elias, who looked at me for a brief moment before looking away, unable to hold my stare. “What does that mean?” I asked barely above a whisper.

“It means,” Volund interrupted, “that the two of you were destined by the gods to be together. Only lycans have the ability to see and feel a physical mating bond. He probably recognized it the first moment he saw you.”

I cringed. Was that why he didn’t kill me that night when I saw him in my window?

Volund continued. “Once the bond is fully set, if you haven’t done so already, he will feel everything you feel.” He laughed again and wiped a laughter-filled tear from his eye. “This is too good. Now killing you will be ten times the fun.”

Elias’s eyes shot towards Volund. “No,” he growled.

“Oh, yes,” Volund replied condescendingly. “I will torture her slowly to death, and you will feeleverything.”

Elias shot up so quickly, the speed at which he darted towards Volund was definitely not human. But before he could reach the king, several knives went flying in his direction, all from the five Sprathian warriors around us. His unnatural speed let him dodge four of the blades, but the fifth went straight into his shoulder. This didn’t stop him, only slowed him down as he continued lunging towards Volund.

Volund stepped to the side just in time, and grabbed another one of his own knives and stabbed it into Elias’s back. I screamed.

Wait – he could heal, right?

Elias turned and a fist went flying towards Volund, knocking him in the jaw. Volund squealed and stumbled backwards. “Get him with wolfsbane, you fucking idiots,” he screamed at his warriors.