Page 4 of Bound By Dance and Desire

We ignored that he’d just called me stupid—we were rattled.

A mental lock so instinctive, so seamless, that it had taken me a split-second to understand I was seeing myself through her eyes?

“No, no matter how improbable, this could not be engineered.” I shook my head, expelling a harsh breath. “If prescience is an affinity of my bloodline, we’re also plagued with another peculiarity.”

Our bonded. For every three members of House Casakraine, two would be taken by soulbonds.

My sister and I were under five centuries of age, so had not yet fallen victim. My mother had escaped hers only because she'd wed young and remained paranoid to the point of refusing to take a lover after my father was executed.

It wasn’t a gift.

It was a curse.

A weakness.

Now I understood the craving in my blood hadn’t been for war. . .at least not that kind of war. But now I must prepare for a battle on two fronts; winning her, and keeping her. The Court would try to take her from me, they would be unable to help themselves.

Glancing at Constin, I slipped the telegem into my pocket. Enough stalling.

“Have Mathen find out who the girl is. Everything about her. She has formal dance training, or I'm a twit. Start with the local dance academies that accept humans.”

One of my mother's pet Fine Arts projects, a mixed species contemporary ballet company, hosted a competitive showcase audition every four years to select fresh dancers.

“This is too much of a coincidence,” my luudthen muttered, and I agreed.

Unable to halt my fate, I crossed the cobbled street like a male walking to his execution.

Chapter

Two

Constin walked at my back, the remainder of my guard effectively invisible in the crowd.

I stopped a safe distance away. Safe for me, not for her. I could close those paltry few feet in a second and take her off the streets. But that second would remind me of my duty.

She was mine. I would have her. But with the claiming of that right also came responsibility, and before I brought her publicly into my world, I would have to ensure she was protected, and prepared.

Which meant exerting patience. For now.

“You dance like the wind,” I said, reminding myself to be gentle. This wasn't her fault, though she would suffer the consequences of it, whether it was her fault or not. We both would.

The human slowed her movements, turned her head with obvious reluctance to meet my gaze.

My eyes traced the sweet fullness of her lips, the curve of her cheek. Her lashes fluttered as she looked down, then forced herself to raise her chin and square her shoulders.

I gave her my sweetest smile, the one that had softened many of my mother’s more dangerous moods, tilting my head to look at her under my lashes. Some instinct told her I was dangerous, but she refused to show weakness.

That was good. I would kill anything that hurt her, but she would still requiresomespine to survive at Court.

But I didn’t want her to know I was dangerous, not yet.

“I'm a bit heavier than wind,” she said, words slow and soft.

The hesitance was not shyness—no, I recognized calculation. Canny intelligence slid behind her gaze as she glanced between myself and Constin.

“I can’t lie to you,” I said. More than one meaning in the statement, but let her make of it what she would.

She shrugged a single shoulder, the movement stiff. “I train very hard to make it look easy.”

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