Page 210 of The Iron Flower

And that’s when I buckle.

I let loose with a terrible wail and go limp, letting them drag me out as I shatter.

* * *

Into the carriage, out of the carriage, through the ornate halls of some town’s council magistrate hall.

There are high-level soldiers everywhere. A white-bearded priest dressed in sacred robes stands in front of a small altar, his wand in hand, the white bird symbol of the Ancient One embroidered on his chest.

I’m pushed roughly forward, and I fall to the ground in front of the priest.

The click of my aunt’s heels sounds on the tile floor as she walks up beside me and comes to a stop.

Her voice is glacially calm when it comes. “Though it makes me question his sanity, there is one young man who, miraculously, is still willing to fast to you. That is, if you can be fastedat allat this point.”

“I didn’t do anything with Yvan!” I cry, terrified of what they might to do to him. To his mother.“Nothing happened!”

“We shall see about that soon enough,” Aunt Vyvian snipes. “I am going outside to await your fastmate’s arrival.” She lowers herself down and brings her elegant face close to mine. “I trust you will not be foolish enough to follow Sage Gaffney’s path once you are fasted. They say the pain of a broken fasting is ten times worse than being branded by hot irons. And it lastsforever.”

* * *

I’m slumped on the floor, sobbing, snot running from my nose, when the door to the room opens again with a loud bang.

Lukas strides in, trailed by several soldiers, his black cloak billowing out behind him, his gleaming sword and wand sheathed at his sides.

He barely glances at me as he passes, exuding only dominance and anger. “Let’s get this over with, shall we?” he says to the priest, but it’s more of an order than a request. The priest bows his head to Lukas repeatedly as he readies his wand and opens upThe Book of the Ancientson the altar before him.

Two guards roughly pull me up from the floor, and I struggle against them as they drag me over to where Lukas and the priest are waiting. They force my hands out in front of me, and Lukas reaches over to clasp his hands over mine.

“I hate you for doing this!” I snarl at him, tears falling from my eyes, one of the guard’s nails digging into my wrist.

“They’re going to wandfast you today, Elloren,” Lukas spits back. “It can either be to me, or to someone far worse.”

“How can you do this?” I cry. “You said you were myfriend!”

“If I walk out of this room right now,” he says through clenched teeth, his voice so low it’s almost a whisper, “your aunt will still be fasting you to someone who, in her exact words, will ‘beat some sense into you.’ I’m here because Iamyour friend, whether you think I am or not. Believe me, I’m not thrilled about someone fasting to me only because she’s being held down by two armed guards.”

“Then don’t do it!”

“Maybe if you don’t want to be placed in a situation like this,” Lukas snipes, his face furious, “you should avoid spending the night half-naked with aKelt.Oh, yes, Elloren, your aunt told me all about your night with Yvan Guriel. We’ll see just how innocent it was in a moment, won’t we?”

“What do you care?” I snarl back at him. “You don’t even love me.”

Lukas’s face takes on an expression so dark that for a moment, I fear he’ll strike me. He looks away, his mouth pressed into a hard line, like he’s at war with himself, then he glances back down at me again with intense frustration. “I’m trying tohelpyou!” he grinds out.

“I will hate youforever!” I seethe, straining against the guards, against Lukas’s hands on mine.

Lukas’s neck tenses, and his face clouds over with disgust. He quickly composes himself and turns to the priest. “Just do it. Fast her to me. Then seal it.”

“No!”I cry as they hold my hands in place, the priest reciting the fasting spell, his voice a nightmarish, monotonous drone.

The priest waves his wand above our hands, and I flinch as a slight sting races over my hands and branches out, thin black lines flowing out from the wand’s tip and around my hands and Lukas’s. I cry out in futile protest as the fasting lines curl and spiral, then darken as the sealing spell takes hold, like a spider’s web wrapping me up.

And then it’s done, and I’m released.

I fall backward and splay my hands out in front of me, horrified by the black lines now permanently branded on my skin.

Lukas is in charge of me now. Heownsme.

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