Page 73 of The Mirror in the Mountain

My stomach dropped as those eyes went still and cold.

“You should hear him screaming,” Aviel whispered into my ear, teeth biting down on the lobe so hard I cried out. “Begging you to stop him. To kill him before he can hurt you.”

Bile burned my throat. “Bash—” My voice broke as I battled against the body I knew so well. “Fight this.Please.”

A flicker of anguish and something like loathing crossed his face. I could see it as he fought, throwing himself against the cage of his own mind, his body trembling from the battle within it. Fought…and lost, his irises freezing over once more.

A cruel, wicked grin spread his lips wide, and my skin crawled.

“You were foolish to think she could ever be yours,” Aviel sneered, pure hatred burning in his ice-cold gaze. “Not when I claimed her first.”

With a curse, I threw myself against Aviel’s hold. But his hands held firm, his grip bruising as he pushed me down into the bed with Bash’s superior strength. He let out a dark laugh, then his teeth found my neck—that same scarred spot—drawing blood as he bit down. I couldn’t help my cry of pain.

Instinctually, I bit down in response, my teeth sinking into his shoulder. Aviel’s grip on my wrists slackened. I shoved as hard as I could into the center of Bash’s chest, pushing him off me before launching myself off the side of the bed. Aviel moved toward me, but I had already palmed Bash’s dagger from the bedside table, pointing it at him.

I was shaking so badly the tip trembled.

“Here I thought to keep you somewhat dressed while in my bed,” Aviel’s gaze lowered, and I had never felt so exposed. “I prefer this for next time.”

He moved closer, his sneering smile widening as he did. So close now that Bash’s chest touched the tip of the blade?—

I froze. With a sickening grin, he leaned into it.

I pulled the blade back with a low cry, unable to look away from Bash’s blood as it welled from the shallow wound on his chest. But his eyes flickered from solely blue to their normal split shade, just for a moment. So quickly I might have imagined it.

Aviel’s vicious laugh had no trace of Bash in it as his hand gripped my arm with bruising force, pulling me back against him. “What exactly are you going to do, darling? Stab youranima? Somehow, I don’t think he’ll appreciate it.”

I didn’t let myself second guess what I was about to do.

“Then you don’t know him very well.”

I sliced downward, watching Aviel’s eyes flare in shock.

The blade embedded into Bash’s thigh, and Aviel let out a startled shout. Not too deep—nothing that would slow him down for long. Just something jolting and painful enough to break Aviel’s link to him, as it briefly had already. To interrupt that bastard’s concentration long enough to give Bash a chance to?—

“Eva,” Bash choked out, his body crumpling.

I sucked in a breath that sounded more like a sob as I threw myself at him, dropping the dagger to the floor. My relief was so potent I felt lightheaded.

“Bash.”

I wasn’t sure which one of us was shaking harder as he held me, and held me, and held me.

Chapter 33

Bash

That feeling of being caged in my own mind would haunt me forever. Of silently, futilely screaming against the intruder using my body like a marionette. Begging Eva to stop me, fight me,killme, before I could so much as bruise her.

But gods damn me, I had done worse than that. And I would sell my soul to never have her look like that again—helpless and completely terrified—not for herself, but forme.

Possession magic was so dark and dangerous it had been forbidden long ago, though evidently not forgotten. That bastard had gotten in tonight because I had been drained from the fight, distracted, and unprepared for the surprise assault on my mind. But even though I had finally pushed him out with her help, I wanted to rage at what I had been forced to do to her. At what I had been so powerless to stop; the utter betrayal of my body, my mind, and my very soul.

Eva sucked in a broken breath that cracked something in me. Her fingers were ice cold and shaking as I took her hand in mine, trying in vain to let go of the wild, feral feeling I knew she could sense.

“I hurt you,” I whispered brokenly. “Eva, I’m so–”

“Istabbedyou,” Eva gasped out.

---