Page 37 of Marked by the Enemy (The Binding Vow #1)

Chapter twenty-six

The Fifth and her Twelve

T hat night, in the largest fighting ring, the corridor opened on its own.

Light twisted upward from the circle of memory stones, curling through the air like steam from a held cup.

I stood at the threshold. The others gathered behind me, some stepping closer, some staying back. The tie inside me held still.

Darian arrived without speaking. He leaned in, his warm breath near my ear. “I thought it would wait until morning.”

“It’s waited long enough.”

Willow touched the stone first. Her fingers brushed the curve of the frame, and she stepped inside. Rainer followed. The corridor didn’t pulse or ripple—it welcomed. Others moved too, feet silent against the frost-bitten grass.

Darian’s fingertips touched the back of my hand. “You first this time.”

I nodded and stepped into the corridor. The world bent.

Walls widened. Floor solid. The tie stayed quiet.

The three wolves came as well. I gasped.

They had entered the corridors with us, and on their shoulders sat the falcons.

The snowflakes on the wolves’ fur and the falcons’ breasts flashed black and white in turn.

Our large congregation walked along the corridor, lined with mirrors. The corridor curved into a space I hadn’t seen before, where twelve people, two wolves, and two falcons stood in a grove, under a stormy gray sky.

Abigail, the redhead, with the five rings interlinked on her forehead, stood in the center, wearing a stormy ocean cloak that roiled and crashed on the shore.

Seeing her again should have relieved me since she might answer my questions, but I felt an itch on my left arm and chest. Below, glowing white and silver, worm-like markings writhed.

They were three identical runes, like the Water Seat of the Moon Court rune on my comb—crescent moon cupping a single drop above waves.

My throat tightened. I tugged at my collar, pulled it wide, and looked down. The flower on my chest vanished. In its place, the same rune formed again, clean and whole.

Abigail raised her palm. The same mark shone from her hand. She turned slowly, offering it to the people, wolves, and falcons who stood beside her.

The bond stirred in my ribs and gave me a name. She was mine. My great-grandmother. I saw her hazel-green eyes in my own face. I had never known.

Abigail’s voice echoed through the corridor. “I am the Water Seat of the Moon Court, and I release the Binding Vow from the ten Bone Seats and their meddling ways.” As she spoke, the rune on her palm flared.

Water surged as a column of silver-blue light. It beamed from her chest and palm into the center of the circle. The circle tremored, pulled into motion by her words.

To Abigail’s left stood a woman crowned in gold, her curls a nest of flame-bright ginger beneath the circlet. Her robe shimmered with threads of pale pink and soft yellow silk, the fabric so fine it caught the corridor’s light.

Tiny citrine and rose quartz jewels rimmed her sleeves, sparkling even under the stormy sky. Her crown glowed with pink sapphires and diamonds, nestled between gold leaves that curled like petals. She lifted her palm. A pale pink flower sigil burned from its center.

Lina drew a sharp breath. “That was my court.” Her voice cracked. “It isn’t a kingdom anymore. Holt gave me a comb with runes representing it.”

I turned. “He gave you a comb, too?”

She smiled proudly and nodded.

“From the Flower Court?”

She nodded, and her expression changed. her jaw was tight. “They slaughtered her family—sons, husband, everyone. Burned the garden palaces to the root. She lived. But the court didn’t.”

“The lost kingdoms,” I murmured, startled by the heat in her voice.

“There were three,” Lina said. “Ours fell first.”

The queen stepped into the center, across from Abigail. Her voice rang out, even and bright. “I am the Queen of the Flower Court, and I release the Binding Vow from the ten Bone Seats and their meddling ways.”

The sigil in her hand glowed brighter.

Pink light laced with gold streamed from her palm into the circle. It met the water-column Abigail had called.

A man stepped forward. His robe rippled with soft whites and pale blues, like clouds pulled through wind, and the hem whispered as it shifted across the corridor floor.

Wisps of breeze curled through the fabric, as if his body was half-air.

His hair was electric blue, standing wild above sharp brows.

His eyes matched—bright, almost glowing.

He raised his palm. The shape of a wind-bent tree stretched across it in shadow—deep and sharp, even under the corridor’s silver glow. The mark moved with him and threw a long, reaching shadow across the grass and stone at his feet.

“Wind Seat of the Shadow Court,” he said. “I unbind the vow.”

Holt staggered back a step, breath caught. The burn scars down one side of his face stayed still, unreadable, but the unburned side twisted with something close to awe. “My great grandfather.”

He looked down at his own hand. So did the marked around him .

There, on Holt’s palm, the circle cracked open and turned. A tree appeared. Wind-twisted. Rooted to his skin. And just like the older man’s, it cast a shadow—one that spread across Holt’s hand and across the grass, where it stretched and curled around the Wind Seat’s feet.

“I thought it was a trick of light,” Holt whispered.

The Wind Seat of the Shadow Court shook his head. “It isn’t a trick. You carry it. As I did.”

Elders Jack and Ruen, one Black, one white, stood close, arms rigidly at their sides.

Stepping forward, the tall woman’s skin was the color of rich earth. The fabric of her silver and black robes rippled like liquid metal, as if still being forged. Her eyes were pure black with stars swimming inside, and she had braids which cascaded down to her ankles.

She raised her palm. A rune glowed there—two blacksmith tools, a silver hammer crossed with a pair of tongs, encircled by a twisting loop of turquoise ivy. Ruen’s mark answered. So did Jack’s. The sigils bloomed across their palms, arms, and even their foreheads. Verdant and Iron.

“I am the Iron Seat of the Verdant Court,” the woman said. “And I allow the Binding Vow to be free of the ten Bone Seats and their meddling ways.”

Ruen exhaled. “That was her. That was our ancestor.”

Jack touched the new rune at the center of his brow. “In the past I would have been surprised to have an ancestor with skin so dark when mine’s so pink and white!” He gave a hearty chuckle. “But now I’m more in awe of being related to the old Iron Seat of the Verdant Court.”

“I wonder how we’re related,” Ruen said.

They both shrugged and exchanged a laugh. The ground beneath their feet hardened, as if the roots below had struck metal.

Branwen gasped when a golden-haired woman stepped forward. Her crown shimmered with sunflower gold and curling ivy. Bright green leaves and sunbursts circled her wrist like a living brand.

“Summer,” Branwen whispered .

The queen held up her hand, and the sigil glowed—sunburst and vine, twined into a golden loop.

“I was Queen of the Summer Court. The Binding Vow has stopped being theirs to hold.”

Beside her, Nessa was shaking slightly. A navy mark blinked across her forearm. It grew darker, twisting until it formed a flame caught inside a twilight star—burning blue from within.

The man before her had the same. His robes were flame-touched, but his eyes were dark as the ocean at dusk. “I was the Flame Seat of the Twilight Court. You, Nessa Tidehook, carry both.”

“I thought I belonged to water.”

“You still do,” he said. “But your fire was never for destruction. Only warmth.”

Ulric stepped forward before his match could speak. The brown-skinned woman wore the same robes as Jack and Ruen’s ancestor—the robes of the Iron Seat—and had eyes like a black sky with swirling stars.

“Storm Court,” Ulric said, already knowing, and lifting his arm. His runes had already transformed into a smithing hammer and tongs crossed with a streak of lightning, one, two, three, four times, on his palm, wrist, forearm, and chest.

The woman nodded once. “I grant the Binding Vow its freedom.”

Fen blinked when a man cloaked in stars stepped forward. His robe rippled with fire, like a flame kept alive across centuries. The folds flickered orange and red, then deepened to amber. The stars across his chest did not burn out.

His skin was deep bronze, and his eyes were molten yellow. When he raised his hand, the fire in his robe flowed into his palm. A rune flared across Fen’s forearm. It took the shape of a yellow flame in a star.

The man nodded and stared at Lord Fen. “I am the Flame Seat from the Star Court, and I am your great-great-grandfather.”

The Star Court flame flickered in Fen’s skin. He didn’t speak. The fire spoke for him.

“You read patterns. I watched the stars, too. But you see more than I ever did.” He raised his hand again. “Let The Binding Vow return to what it was. ”

Lord Jeyin and Lymseia were already kneeling side by side. The woman before them wore robes like layered stone—deep brown shot through with red and green, vines stitched into the folds like veins. Her sleeves shifted as she moved, and the cloak behind her rippled like moss stirred by wind.

She raised both palms. One glowed with the sigil of Earth—a spiral carved from bright red light. The other showed a curved arc of wind, edged in copper. Her eyes were the color of crimson clay.

“Ember Court. Earth Seat. Your line held, even when we fell, my cousins of cousins.” She turned, facing the center of the circle. “It has stopped being theirs to hold.”

The smuggler, Bramlin, stepped forward. He hadn’t spoken. His blind nephew, Ben, had been clutching his coat. But now the boy stood on his own.