Page 27

Kiaran

I return to Sorcha’s cell the second Kameron is gone.

Wrath unfurls in my veins, howling for blood. I was a heartbeat away from slamming Sorcha into the walls until nothing remained but ruin. I would have revelled in it until her innards painted the floor—enjoyed the echoing ache through our vow.

But I stayed my hand. For Kameron.

And now I’ll sell my body and soul to keep her heart beating, because a truncated life is out of the question.

So I let the cold settle deep into me. I welcome the familiar ache, the emptiness where something vital used to reside. Before her fingers stole in and cracked me open. Before the woman who unmade me down to my rotten foundations and built me anew.

She crawled out of her grave for me.

For her, I’d rip this world down. Tear into the fabric of reality and reshape it for her. And when I was done, I’d lay the bloodied remnants at her feet in offering. If she asked.

But she wants me to save it, so I’ll do this for her.

The cell door slams shut behind me, the impact reverberating through the stone. Sorcha doesn’t startle at my return. She regards me through fevered eyes, something ugly twisting her lips.

“Would you care to let me down and complete our deal?” she asks, “Or would you prefer to whisper sweet nothings while you flense the skin off my back first?”

I smile, letting her see the edges. The promise of brutality barely leashed. “If I wanted you to scream, I wouldn’t need knives. Or have you forgotten how creative I can be?”

She doesn’t flinch. The defiance has always been what I admired most about her—the sheer bloody-minded stubbornness. Before it became a thorn burrowing deeper beneath my skin with each year.

Before she made me regret ever commanding her master to tear off the collar so she had her freedom. I let loose a predator.

But she keeps forgetting I’m the one built to break her.

Or maybe . . .

My nostrils flare, catching the acrid stench of fear-sweat beneath the bravado. No. She hasn’t forgotten—she should be afraid. She’s seen what I am without Kameron’s gentling hand on my leash.

“Don’t look so sullen, Kadamach,” Sorcha says. “That Falconer is an inconvenience, just like the last one. Fragile. Temporary. There and gone between one breath and the next. The pathetic creature has already died twice and she’s all of what? Twenty-one? I’m offering you forever.”

A bitter laugh scrapes out of me. “Forever? You want to know what forever looks like?”

I seize her face between my hands, forcing her to meet my gaze.

To see the endless night lurking behind my eyes.

“An eternity watching everything I care for wither. Kingdoms rise only to crumble to ruin. Two thousand years kneeling in the ashes.” I lean close until our breaths mingle, until I can taste her fear, cloying and thick.

“Love. Vengeance. Retribution. It’s all the same to me.

In the end, there will be only hunger. So tell me, would you like a glimpse of forever?

Of the monster I’ll become when her bones are dust? ”

Silence. Even Sorcha’s silver tongue has abandoned her. I catch the minute tremor sliding through her, the gooseflesh stippling her skin. She believes me. As she should. She keeps forgetting. Keeps trying to leash the shark.

“Bind yourself to me,” she whispers. Almost tender, if I didn’t know better.

“I’ll be your weapon, as I was before. Your consort.

Your strategist. I’ll tear the realms apart if you want, until we’re the only two things left breathing.

Her life is but a mere blink. And when she’s long dead, and you have no one else to ease the howling ache, I’ll still be there.

In a thousand years, two thousand. However long it takes for you to forget her. You’ll need me.”

“You want to know what I need?” The words emerge guttural.

Raw. “I need my true consort. I need the world to keep turning on its fucking axis for long enough to let me memorise the way she feels in my arms one last time. But most of all?” I grasp Sorcha’s nape, nails sinking until I feel her pulse thunder against my fingertips.

“I need you to understand that my mercy ended the moment you shoved that blade between her ribs. If Kameron asked it of me, I would carve my name into your bones and leave you for the crows. If I didn’t need the festering cesspit you call a heart still beating, I’d dig it out with my teeth and eat it raw. ”

In the ringing silence that follows, Sorcha’s smile widens to a grin. She licks her lips, slow and deliberate. Tasting the ozone sting of my wrath on her tongue.

“There he is,” she purrs. “There’s my beautiful, brutal boy. Now say your vow before I change my mind.”

I’m going to kill her. Consequences be damned. I’m going to—

“Terms first,” I say, each word precise as a dagger’s point.

Sorcha sighs, as if this is all some grand inconvenience.

“Your precious Falconer will live a very long life. Well, for a human, anyway,” she adds with a smirk.

“I’ll even throw in my protection, since you’re so very concerned with her continued existence.

No trickery, no double meanings. She gets the Book to use as she sees fit. All above board.”

She pauses, letting the moment stretch taut between us. Watches me with those green eyes. Hungry. Triumphant. “And in return, you’ll be mine. Wholly and completely, Kadamach. Not just a consort mark—a full bonding. I want your soul entwined with mine for eternity.”

There it is. The price of my consort’s life laid bare. Such a small thing to give Kameron. Something few Falconers have enjoyed—a chance to grow old. To have a life not cut brutally short by duty and death.

An infinitesimal price, in the grand scope of things. For even one second more with her.

So I straighten my spine. Lock away the screaming, raging thing battering itself bloody against the inside of my skull.

And I speak the words that seal my fate.

“I swear to bind myself in body, soul, and power to you. I’ll seal this vow, that for all of eternity my life will be twined with your own, and my mark yours. Complete and irrevocable.”

Magic flares between us, harsh and blinding. Sinking in venomous hooks. I feel the vow take hold, those invisible chains coiling tight. The tattoos spreading across my skin, glowing with her claim. Tying me to Sorcha in ways that can never be undone.

Sorcha shudders, head tipping back in ecstasy as the vow snaps into place. As if she can feel me pouring into all those empty spaces inside her, reshaping her into something new. Something that belongs to me now, whether I want it or not.

A moan spills from her lips, obscene in the charged silence. “I could make you swear to me a thousand times and never tire of it.”

“Just remember,” I say, so soft it’s barely a whisper, “that you asked for this.” I yank her head back.

Admire the frantic thrum of her pulse just beneath the surface.

“And when I fulfil this bargain and give you my mark? When I’m forced to fuck you and you feel the ecstasy of our souls entwining and think you hold something precious?

” I smile, letting her see the monster. The cruel, pitiless thing that is my true face.

“Know that it will mean less than nothing to me. That you could spend a thousand lifetimes debasing yourself for my favour and still only ever be a convenient meal for when I’m starving. ”

A shudder ripples through Sorcha. Desire and revulsion, fear and heat. I can practically taste it shimmering in the air between us.

“And you’ll feel my hatred,” I continue mercilessly. “An eternity of it burning through our bond. Every loathing thought, every spike of disgust. You’re no better than the master I freed you from. Who used you as a tool to be broken.”

I shove her away. She hits the wall, slumping against my shadows. I let the cold creep back in, layering over my bones like armour. Crystallising into resolve.

“You want to leash me?” I laugh, and it’s a cruel, cutting sound. “Congratulations. Just know that I’ll rip out your throat the second you look away.”

And with that, I turn on my heel and start for the door, releasing her from my shadows.

“Get some rest. Tomorrow, I’m collecting on my debt.”