Page 66 of The Chains You Defy

“Don’t worry, that’s not a place I want to be in.”

Two hours later, we left the otherwise empty mansion. There wasnothingelse we’d found.

Before we exited the compound, I stopped and glowered at Fig with impatient expectation. When he didn’t react. I lifted my arm. “Take this off.”

“Will you lose control again?”

“No.” Fine, there was a chance.

“Better not to take risks.”

“I said no.”

“And I don’t believe you.”

“You can’t expect me to run around with my magic reduced to nothing.”

“More sensible than dropping your Glamour while you discard any resemblance to a being capable of reason. That’s not a gamble I’m willing to take.”

“So, your suggestion is to bind me in hematite until when?”

“Well, the restraint has to come off once we’re in Galanta.”

“You’d better not be serious,Fiolar.”

My general’s stern expression softened, and the fucker had the audacity to laugh.

As I showed him my teeth, a steady rumble was the only warning of my annoyance he’d get.

“Hold your horses. We’re not far from the castle. There, Nayana can remove the shackle. She has an excellent influence on you.”

Scoffing, I bared my teeth another time. “Leave her out of it.” And he’d better keep her name out of his mouth and all of her out of his thoughts.

“If you can’t see she’s in the middle of everything already, you’re more delusional than I thought. She’s bound to you through divine magic, for fuck’s sake.”

“Which makes her mine to protect. So I’m the one to decide what she has to know and what she doesn’t.”

“You’re the most crazed and obsessive male I’ve ever seen.”

“I’m neither crazed nor obsessed.” More lies.

Yes, I’d lied to myself for the longest time, but not anymore. Especially not since I got a taste of her, in more than one sense. Of course, I hadn’t fully come to terms with the implications, and I had yet to make a plan of how to win her over. Persistence would be key—after all, there was the mystery of whether or not she’d forgiven me since yesterday.

My patience was already wearing thin. In the end, the question wasn’t if but when she’d cave and see reason—she was mine. Even if she had those disillusions of a life where she was free, independent, and unattached—how she could believe such bullshit was an enigma to me—there wasn’t a single doubt in my mind. Like I concluded earlier—once sherealized I considered her my forever, she’d hurry into my embrace without a second thought.

So what if we still hadn’t spoken about what had happened in the crypt in Amalach before the rite, when I informed her for the first time that she was mine—although that had been a spontaneous act. Her actions right afterward told another tale than her words.

Then, there had been her divine oath. Granted, I’d written the wording for her, but she hadn’t even tried discussing her part with me. Something she always did when she disagreed with me. Even if I might have implied that those lines were a ceremonial fixture—who could blame me?

My thoughts returned to last evening. She could fib to herself as much as she wanted; we were more than friends helping each other.

If denying the truth for a bit longer helped her to come to terms, then I wouldn’t object. I’d give her time—at least a little while—before I’d nudge her in the right direction. With gentle encouragement, Nayana would get used to the idea that I’d never let her go.

Of course, she’d also embrace the concept of never being in close vicinity to another male ever again—and by near, I was implying more than a few hundred paces.

Oh.

Hmm.