Page 2 of Mantle (IMMORTAL FLAME #3)

From what I’d heard about the very rare occurrence of the Ashbinding process being interrupted and stopped prior to completion, it would take time for me to actually invoke it and breathe dragon fire again. A few days, maybe.

But, still, relief rolled through me as his chant, his magic, enabled me to feel the deep warmth of it still being there and spreading slowly, holding on… not fading away.

It would remain now.

I would recover.

In time.

But that was something we didn’t have the luxury of right now.

That was made especially apparent as I finally managed to push to my knees, and I saw Kai’s hands shaking as he held one with a rose-gold glowing barrier against Zepharion and Serapha, stopping them from coming at me or him, while the other was somehow wielding dragon magic to keep back the ten enforcers.

I struggled closer to Kai, pushing off my knees, only to crash right back down on them just a foot from him. “We need to leave. Forget this… punishment.” I choked, hacking up a lung almost in the process.

“We can’t. Not yet.”

“What are you—”

“You need to siphon me. Now.”

“What? No. Our physiology isn’t compatible for that sort of thing. Sorcerer to sorcerer, fine. But this? It’ll hurt you. You’ll feel like your veins are on fire.”

“You healed me before. Consider this balancing that out. Giving comfort versus causing pain. It’ll cancel it out.”

I gave him a withering look. “Kai.”

“You have to. A Blood Anchor spell is in place. Territorial magic cast by Zepharion and Serapha. They laid the seal in advance to ensure you couldn’t escape once they ambushed you. To ensure that no one can unless they lift it themselves.”

“Wait. You would have felt that before you even breached the Dracoryn Realm gates.” Holy hell. “You came in here knowing you couldn’t get back out?”

Instead of directly answering, he focused on the strategics of the situation. “There is nothing I can do against that. But you can. You can force their will with your Command of Beasts ability.”

There was another way.

And it was clear that he was purposely not speaking it—again, for my benefit.

To kill my parents would extinguish the spell—all their spells.

But Kai didn’t want me to have to go that route. Even after what they’d done to me… taking their lives… it wouldn’t be good for me. It would… taint me. Scar me. Blacken my soul.

“Serapha is pregnant… with my brother.”

“I know. When I invoked dragon-based magic, I felt the additional presence of one not yet birthed.” He gestured at his hand currently keeping the ten dragons down, their roars of both pain and indignation filling the room and echoing off the walls.

“Grab my wrist there and start siphoning. You’ll need to be quick once my magic starts tapping out, or they’ll overwhelm us. ”

“I can’t just…”

“You’re too weak to employ that ability without me boosting you. Majorly. Take what you need and don’t fucking hold back, or you’re dead and I’m trapped here.”

Yeah, they wouldn’t kill the heir to the Maven Coven.

The political fallout would be catastrophic.

But they could definitely imprison him here for some time for breaching their territory uninvited and aggressively.

No doubt, with him unable to defend himself and me dead and unavailable as a witness, my parents would spin the narrative in their favor so that they were the victims and Kai was the aggressive and arrogant, misguided interloper.

“I’ve only used the Command of Beasts ability once and it was by accident. I don’t know if I can call it or even control it like we need.”

“You have to. And you absolutely can. I’ve seen you with the Primal Celestial Resonance and how quickly you took to it once we started training.

” His eyes darkened. “We’re in a battle situation, a battle for your very life.

You’re dragon—threat and danger call to your primal instincts like nothing else.

You’ve been weakened, so that’s dampened right now.

But it won’t be as soon as you draw from me.

And that —that need, that determination and conviction to win out and protect—is what will allow you to access that ability much more easily than it normally ever would be possible. ”

I gritted my teeth.

Then I craned my neck, even straining just to do that in my current state, to see the dragons and my parents held at bay by Kai’s magic, but Zepharion was snarling and managing to push against it a little.

I turned back to Kai. He was exerting himself too much.

Holding back ten of our mightiest dragons within House Titanus and my parents—it was another fucking level. It shouldn’t be possible.

I lurched up and grabbed Kai’s wrist.

Wavering on my feet, where I shouldn’t really be right now, but I had to be because Kai couldn’t shift to a lower position with the way he was needed to hold off the threats against us, I managed to latch onto his power, feeling him opening to me, allowing it to happen.

And then I pulled.

Hard.

He was right; it had to be fast. Really fucking fast.

I watched Kai, doing everything I could not to hang onto him for support while he was already fighting back so much. I saw him wince, but quickly cover it up as I kept siphoning him, until I felt a massive rush of strength and power flow through me. Holy hell… it was out of this world.

His power started sputtering out.

“More. Harder,” he told me.

“Fuck… under different circumstances, hearing those words from you, sorcerer…”

He managed a weak smirk.

It was messed-up to be going there in the middle of all of this, but some levity and hope was needed, no doubt. Especially as Kai let out a pained cry, really feeling that on-fire sensation I’d warned him about.

He collapsed to his knees.

Seconds later, his magic went out entirely.

As I stared at him in pain for me, doing all of this for me… anger surged. Intense protectiveness rising like a beast.

A beast just like me.

Power and strength coursed through me.

And then, as I heard Zepharion and Serapha both give the command to attack us, thinking we were now vulnerable, a bellow tore from my throat, and I spun toward them.

I summoned the memory of the one time I’d used this particular special ability before.

The sensation behind it—dominance in the form of protection.

I thrust my hands forward and my red magical flame burst forth, powered by Kai’s raw power pervading every part of me.

It swirled around all twelve of our enemies in the Throne Room.

In an instant, they all stilled.

I sucked in a harsh breath as my hands shook from the force of controlling them, and the shock of being able to pull it off.

Their expressions were blank as they were held immobile.

Completely at my will.

I glared at my parents. “Take down the Blood Anchor spell. Immediately.”

The shocks kept on coming as I watched them both summon their power, moving almost robotically and in unison, then uttering the necessary chant to accomplish the task.

The room shuddered, and then tiny sparks of red magical glass rained down, indicating that the spell had been shattered to pieces.

I swung my head toward the ten enforcers. “Sleep until morning.”

In an instant, all of them dropped and fell into slumber right there on the Throne Room floor.

“You’re right,” I told Zepharion and Serapha.

“I am no longer your heir or your son. But let’s clear something up right here and now.

I denounce you. Not the other way around.

You see the power I hold—it can be no other way.

And, mark my words, I won’t allow what you’ve done to me to befall my brother.

” I snarled, gnashing my teeth at them. “You’ve made an enemy tonight.

And soon you’ll feel the full wrath of that. ”

In the next second, I spun, gathered Kai into my arms, then teleported us the fuck out of what was now nothing but a hellhole to me.