Page 21 of Blood Freed

You need a plan.

I roll my shoulders, loosening the tight muscles there. The harder I think, the fewer options I come up with.

“You’re fucked, Daire,” I mutter under my breath.

Mia.

She’ll fight for me. I know she will.

She can’t.

I can’t allow it.

The decision crystallizes like ice in my veins. I have to push her away. Make her believe I don’t care. It’s the only way to keep her safe from Lucien, from the Council…from me.

My throat tightens at the thought of what I’ll have to say to her. The lies I’ll need to tell. She’ll see through them – Mia’s too perceptive not to. But if I make the rejection cruel enough, definitive enough, she’ll have to accept it.

Like watching Ingrid burn all over again.

But this time, it’s my choice. My sacrifice. The image of Ingrid’s final moments haunts me. I couldn’t save her then. I won’t let history repeat itself with Mia.

The weight of this past year crashes over me. Nearly three hundred and sixty-five days of watching her captivity. Every moment I stood by, every time I had to turn away from her suffering… The guilt threatens to choke me.

She’s forgiven me. Somehow, impossibly, she’s forgiven me. I don’t deserve it. Don’t deserve her.

Our connection pulses, warm and alive despite the wards. I feel her presence like a warm breeze on my skin, seeping deeper. She’s thinking of me, worrying. Planning how to save me.

I can’t let her.

The Assembly will show no mercy. Lucien will use her against me if he can. The only way to protect her is to cut her free. Make her hate me enough to stay away.

I close my eyes, steeling myself for what I must do. Then, deliberately, painfully, I begin shutting down our connection. Building walls around my mind, around my heart.

I feel her confusion, her hurt, as the warmth begins to fade.

Forgive me, Mia.

8

Chapter 8

Mia

Isit cross-legged onmy childhood bed, watching dust motes dance in the twilight streaming through my old lace curtains.

My collection of crystals still lines the windowsill, catching the fading light. The bookshelf holds my old spellbooks, their spines worn from countless study sessions. Yet after a year away, these once-comforting objects feel like artifacts from someone else’s life.

The soft scent of healing herbs lingers in the air – chamomile and lavender from Mom’s earlier treatments. It’s combined with something richer, more aromatic. Something’s cooking. My mouth waters. I’m hungry. My body still aches, but strength slowly returns with each passing hour.

I close my eyes, trying to steady my breathing into a meditative rhythm. But all I can think about is that desperate kiss through the barrier, the surge of power when our lips met. The memory burns through me, makes my heart race.

“Soren,” I whisper, reaching for that warm thread of connection between us, the presence at the edges of my consciousness, like sunlight on closed eyelids.

It doesn’t take long before I feel it. Him.

I sigh.

“Oh God, Soren,” I breathe the words beneath my breath. “I’m so sorry this is happening to you.”

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