Page 112 of Crave Me

For whatever reason, my medallion had linked our fates. Perhaps because it had wanted me to fix her broken spirit. Or maybe it had seen something here that I couldn’t.

Regardless, we were in this moment together now.

And I needed her to release me from this curse before the dead army around us rose.

Which seemed to be intermittent because the ground had stopped trembling, telling me whatever spell Klas had cast was settling into the graves around us.

Assuming it’s him and not her,I thought. But no. I… I believed her. There was just something about the way she’d spoken and her demeanor that told me it was all true.

Another inherited gift from Vesperus, perhaps?I wondered, searching my link to him. He was still silent. But my soul could sense him, which brought me peace.

However, I suspected that peace would not last for long.

“Where is it?” Fallon demanded, her actions manic once more. “I need you. Please. You’re the only thing that helps. I… I think clearly… with… with you…” She started to growl, her fury a palpable wave that struck my senses and had me widening my eyes.

Then she turned on me and hit me with a blast of power that had me gasping as the invisible net lifted from my spirit, freeing me from its deadly hold.

She stumbled back several paces and tripped into her grave. “Oh, no,” she breathed. “Oh, no. Oh, no. Oh, no. Sh-shouldn’t have done that,” she told herself. “He’ll be mad. We … I… I support… I… Mated. We’re mated. Mates support one another. Mates cherish one another. Mateshelpone another. Yes…”

Her voice had shifted from a scared tone to a chant of some kind, the words uttered aloud not sounding like her own.

But a spell, I realized.

She started to rise from her grave, her power licking over my being and filling me with a sense of dread.

I did not want to fight this woman. She had clearly been beaten down by her mate, and potentially even bespelled by him.

Or someone else, I thought as my body eagerly absorbed all the lingering stardust in the air.

“We must help him,” she said, her voice still sounding distant and not her own. “That is my duty. That is my place. That is who I am in this world—Klas’s mate.”

Definitely a spell, I decided.One I’m going to need a lot of power to break.

Because I needed this witch on my side, not against me.

I could battle her deathly magic and try to take her down, but renewing her life would be a far easier task. Because I was one of creation. And mending a soul was well within my power to do.

The stardust pooled in my palm, preparing for my command, as her lips began to move in an ancient chant filled with dark tendrils of power.

“You don’t want to hurt me,” I told her softly. “This isn’t you.” Which I knew because I’d seen the real her in that fiery gaze, and in the blast of power that had released me from my ropes.

“This is my duty. This is my place. This is who I am in this world as Klas’s mate,” she said, uttering a different variation of her earlier chant.

“There is so much more in life than being someone’s mate,” I promised her. “It’s a mate’s duty to be a partner, not to bury you in the ground and abuse your powers. Your place isn’t with him, Fallon Doyle. Your place is withyou.”

I blew the stardust in her direction, my wish for her to be whole, to be her own woman, to behealed, warming the golden crystals and showering her with renewed life.

She didn’t react at first, her eyes rounding in confusion.

And then she screamed as a pulse of energy rippled out from her to the earth below.

It knocked me off my feet, but I phased to the other side of her, observing as her fragmented soul began to piece itself back together.

She fell to the ground, her knees coming to her chest as she shook violently in response to my power. I could almost see the spell breaking, whatever leash had been wrapped around her slithering away to die.

And leaving behind a furious female in its wake.

“Hello, Fallon,” I said as I slowly walked around the witch to meet her burning gaze. “My name is Nyx. I believe we have some magic in common.” I looked at her wrist. “Or we did until your mate killed it.”