Page 26

My fingers come away stained crimson, blood welling from my nose. The world pitches sideways. I lock my knees, refusing to crumble.

Not here. Not with Sorcha watching.

“Kameron?” Kiaran’s voice cuts through the static. He’s beside me in an instant, arm hovering just shy of my elbow as if to catch me. “Are you all right?”

I drag my sleeve across my face to clean away the blood and straighten. Summon a smile that feels more like baring my teeth. “Fine,” I bite out.

“You little bitch,” Sorcha snaps, spitting on the ground. “Now I’ll never forget the foetid stench of your disgusting mortal mind—”

Something dark and ugly unfurls in my chest, straining against the cage of my ribs.

“Oh, you didn’t like that?” I cross my arms. Reading her memories may not have been intentional, but I’d sooner set myself on fire than admit that to her.

“A terrible thing, isn’t it? Having someone else rummaging around in your head, rifling through your most private thoughts.

Your brother did that to me if you’ll recall. ”

Sorcha snarls. “Whatever borrowed powers you’re playing with don’t make you fae, little girl. Let me out of these chains, and I’ll feed you your own insides before I paint the walls with your blood—”

The darkness inside me rears up, a thing with claws and teeth, and before I can stop myself, my powers lash out. Sorcha’s voice cuts off in a strangled gasp, the threat dying on her tongue as invisible fingers close around her throat.

The Cailleach’s power hungers for blood. For vengeance.

It would be so easy. To keep squeezing until something vital breaks. Just a bit more pressure—

Kiaran’s hand on my shoulder yanks me back from the abyss. “All right, Kameron. That’s enough.” He brushes a kiss against my temple, murmuring, “She’s no good to us dead, mo chridhe . We still need her blood to find the Book.”

I exhale slowly. Flex my fingers and focus on reeling in the power pulsing beneath my skin. “You’re right. I’m sorry.”

“Never apologise.” Kiaran tilts my chin up with a gentle finger. “Not to me. Not for this. You’re exquisite in your rage.”

Sorcha makes a gagging noise. “If there was even the barest chance I might help you cretins before, consider it revoked. I’d rather hang here until I rot.”

My hands curl into fists, but before I can act on the impulse, Kiaran catches my elbow. Holds me back with that barest touch. That’s all it takes these days. The slightest brush of skin on skin, and I’m tethered.

He’s watching Sorcha—too focused. I know that look. The shrewd calculation, the careful weighing of poisoned choices. Dread curls in my belly.

“MacKay,” I hiss, “I don’t like that look—”

“Name your price.”

My heart stumbles. Crashes. Surely, I heard wrong. Surely, he isn’t that foolish.

But Kiaran doesn’t glance my way. His stare is fixed on Sorcha, unwavering.

“Tell me what you want,” he says, “and it’s yours.”

Fury floods my veins. “Have you lost your mind? We’re not negotiating with her.”

The curl of Sorcha’s smile is a hook caught behind my ribs. Peeling me open, inch by inch, until my ugly insides are exposed. She knows. Of course, she knows how to twist the blade.

“Your little Falconer has figured it out,” Sorcha says. “Haven’t you?”

Kiaran. She wants Kiaran’s consort mark.

My nails bite into my palms. “Go to hell.”

Her answering laugh is broken glass. “Oh, I’ve already been. The Morrigan is such a charming hostess, and I became accustomed to the ambience. And I’m content to go through hell again for the right incentive.”

And there it is. Another blow.

The Morrigan is alive. Still there in her prison realm. Waiting.

I can’t process the enormity of it. Can’t begin to wrap my mind around the implications when Sorcha’s request is still working its way through me, infecting everything it touches.

“You’ll need my blood to open the Book too.

You can even have it when all is said and done.

” Her stare fixes on Kiaran. “But you, Kadamach? You’ll be mine.

Forever. Your Falconer never sees you again.

” She pauses, letting the implication settle like a noose around my neck.

“Your mark in exchange for that precious Book. Those are my terms.”

Red.

Everything goes red.

A haze of fury descends, blotting out rational thought. There is only the thundering rush of blood. The wild, chaotic pulse of my magic begging to be unleashed. To blacken and char and raze until nothing remains but ash.

Perhaps Sorcha senses it—the dark thing wearing my skin, hungry for ruin—because the vindictive curl to her lips only sharpens.

“What say you, Kameron ? Do we have a deal?”

“No,” I snarl. “No, we don’t have a fucking deal.”

But when Kiaran’s eyes meet mine, I can see he’s already decided. Weighed our paltry options, found them wanting. Tallied our alternatives and judged this path the easiest to victory.

When he speaks, it’s carefully neutral. Devoid of emotion. “If I do this, you will abide by my terms. No circumventing. No exploiting loopholes. You’ll vow not to harm Kameron. Or Aithinne. Am I quite clear?”

“Naturally.” Sorcha couldn’t sound more delighted if she tried.

“And the same goes for you, Kadamach. If she tries to break your oath via creative semantics, you die. Attempts another consort mark after our negotiations? Again, dead. If she so much as glimpses you after we locate the Book? Well, I’m afraid I can’t be held responsible for my actions.

I learned the hard way regarding the slippery nature of vows, as you know. ”

My brow furrows. What is that supposed to mean?

Kiaran nods once, sharp and perfunctory.

“The Book is Kameron’s to use as she sees fit.

No games. No twisting intent. And if you even contemplate dooming Kameron to some half-life, eternally slumbering state as a means to sidestep your vow?

There won’t be enough of you left to fill a thimble once I’m through. ”

“Your concern for her health is so endearing,” Sorcha coos. “But I can assure you, I’m quite invested in her leading a long life. Ideally, one filled with the acute awareness that she’ll never see you again. That has a certain poetic ring to it, don’t you think?”

Something inside me snaps.

I seize a fistful of Kiaran’s shirt and haul him bodily away from Sorcha before I do something irrational. Like wrapping my hands around her throat and squeezing. Use her bones for kindling in some meagre fire out in the woods while I brood.

“We need to talk,” I bite out. “Now.”

Kiaran goes with me into the corridor without protest. I understand his decision on some level. I do. He’s been weathering assaults against impossible odds for centuries. Making practical choices.

But this? This is a bridge too far.

“ What are you thinking ? ” The words explode out of me. “Selling your soul to Sorcha? Shackling yourself to her for god only knows how long? Please, enlighten me—in what realm does this seem like a sane solution?”

Still infuriatingly calm, Kiaran spreads his hands. “What other alternatives would you have me consider? Aithinne’s death? Yours?”

I wish he would shout. Then we could spar, and I could match him blow for blow until we’re both left bloody in the wreckage, too drained for anything but a hard-won accord.

But this quiet resignation? The soul-deep weariness? That, I don’t know how to combat. It’s too close to surrender.

“We’ll hunt Lonnrach down. Shake his family tree until something useful falls out—”

“With what time?” he demands. “The Cailleach’s power is eating you alive , Kameron.”

I look away. The grief already gathering.

I wonder if he’s thinking of those stolen moments. The times we drowned out the chaos and the duty and the thousand impossible demands, to just . . . be. Wrapped up in each other, nothing existing beyond the give and take of breath and skin and pleasure.

Nothing beyond the steady thump of his heart beneath my cheek. The glide of his hands mapping my body as if committing it to memory.

I know I am.

I press my palm flat on his chest now, just over Sorcha’s mark. Feel the way he shudders at the contact. Because I can touch him now.

And once Sorcha has him, I can’t.

“Make her swear not to twist the wording,” I whisper, hating the tremor that sneaks in to betray me.

“Bind her to the spirit, not just the letter.” I lift my eyes to his, refusing to let him look away.

To pretend either of us will emerge from this unscathed.

“Then when we find the Book, I’ll use it to rip that vow out of your skin. ”

“She won’t accept any terms that leave her vulnerable—not when she’s found the perfect leverage. Even the Book can’t undo a binding oath.”

“You’re not a possession,” I tell him sharply. “A consort mark doesn’t give someone ownership over you. It never did.”

At that, Kiaran’s expression softens. “Do you know what I’ll miss most about you, Kameron?” Kiaran smooths his thumb along the arch of my cheekbone, his touch tender. Reverent. “This,” he murmurs, “right here. The way you look at me.”

His hand drifts down to curl around the back of my neck, his fingers tangling in my hair. Tugging me closer still until our foreheads touch, until we’re sharing breath.

“I never needed to wear your mark to know I’m yours,” Kiaran says. Quiet and fervent as a prayer, as if the words are being ripped out of him. “That I’ll always be yours in every way that counts. No matter where I am or who I’m with or what fresh hell I’m carving my way out of.”

And then he’s kissing me. Soft and sweet, and gentle.

“One day,” he breathes against my lips, “you’ll tell our story.

Of the Unseelie King and the human woman who brought him to his knees.

You’ll whisper to the stars how he counted every one of her breaths.

And how he watched from afar as she lived out twenty thousand human days.

If she listened during winter, when the wind was cold and the nights were longest, she could hear him tell her he cherished her so much he was willing to give her the world. ”

Something in my chest splinters apart. I fist my hands in his shirt, fingers clawing into the fabric as if I could burrow beneath his skin. Anchor him in this moment. To me.

“What if I don’t give a damn about the world?” I hiss. Selfish in my grief, in my fury. “What if I just want you?” Kiaran’s eyes fall shut. “You already have me,” he says.

“This doesn’t change that.” Another kiss. “I’m not asking for absolution. Or permission. I’m telling you to let me go.”

“I know that.” The words rasp out of me, jagged. “But I can’t listen to you barter away your soul. Not even to save mine.”

I pull away from the warmth of his body. Take one stumbling step back. Then another.

And before he can stop me, I turn on my heel and walk away.