Page 111 of The Sacred and the Tormented

Her heart jolted at the name, but she supposed she shouldn’t be surprised. “So your solution is to just kill everyone?”

“It would be the easiest at this point. I’ve spent plenty of time trying to change it.”

“You’re talking about murdering innocent people. It’s not their fault they have a mating bond.”

“It’s their fault for being complacent in it. It’s their fault for not rising up.”

“You want them to rebel against the gods who created them? The bond was a gift. The thing they feel for their bonded partner isn’t something bad. It feels real to them. It feels right.”

“Only the young can say such things. You’ve never come across someone unhappy with the bond, have you?” She didn’t respond. “I consider myself fortunate to have never experienced it. To not be shackled and forced to call it fate.”

Another beat of silence passed, then he stood and every cell in her body sprang to life. The creature inside her prepared itself, as if it weren’t held back by the iron shackles.

Vairik crossed the space and leaned down, placing his hands on either side of the armchair. Arianna shrank back into the old cushions, her heart beating wildly as that eye studied her. She could fight, shove him back, lift her legs and kick him across the room, but something told her it wouldn’t matter, that if she so much as shifted a muscle, his magic would lash out.

“I can smell her on you.” His gaze traveled down to Arianna’s chest, right over her sternum where her magic buzzed beneath her skin. “You’re still here, aren’t you dear Laoise?”

Arianna’s magic jolted at the name, flaring beneath her skin. The iron around her ankles sent a violent shockwave through Arianna’s body that had her arching off the chair. She gripped the edges, her fingers tearing into the fabric.

The creature within her beat against the cage over and over again, sending wave after wave of pain through Arianna’s body.

Stop, Arianna begged it.Please stop.

“It seems we’ve both been trapped in a hell of our own creation.”

“What—are you talking about?” Arianna breathed through the aftershocks racking her body.

He leaned impossibly closer. “Can you not feel her writhing within your bones, struggling to cleave her way into your world and set it on fire?”

“What?”

“The magic, dear girl. Do you think that fire in your soul is yours alone?” He smirked again, hanging his head and shaking it slightly. “And all this time I assumed you were in the afterlife with that bastard. It’s almost reassuring to know I haven’t been the only one suffering.”

“I have—she’s inside me?”

Vairik’s gaze returned to her. “Her essence is. It seems she’s defied the gods in her own way as well. I suppose that explains why my son made no progress with you. Laoise always was resistant where mind manipulation was concerned. No matter, I’ll take care of you myself.”

Cold fear trickled down her spine.

“Don’t worry, I won’t kill you. I want to play one final game before this ends.” He gaze twisted back to her chest. “Thank the gods they didn’t make you look like her, otherwise this would have been much harder.”

“Wha—” His hands moved fast and those slender fingers gripped her like a vice.

Blinding white hot pain seared through her mind and Arianna screamed all over again, feeling the seams of her reality split into a million pieces.

The creature, Laoise, fought, but even it wasn’t enough to stop Vairik’s invasion.

He dove deep into her mind. Swimming through it, tearing her apart as if he had barbs on every part of his mental body.

Vairik didn’t stop until he found the moment she and Rion first met. The day she’d knelt on the cold cabin floor with The Demon standing over her. Arianna relived the fear she’d experienced at that moment, then it wisped away into darkness, fading like smoke carried away by the wind.

Vairik shifted through her memories, flipping through them like the pages of a book until he found the moment she’d first made Rion soup, hoping to placate his anger with her cooking. That image dissolved too, the colors blending together until they were nothing but darkness.

He moved again, sifting until he found the memory where Rion had stumbled in injured. He let it play for a moment but jerked it away before she could offer Rion—what had she offered him?

Arianna found herself standing before a red-haired male in a cabin next, her hand glowing against his chest. Her own heart was heavy with emotions she didn’t understand. She tried to look up at his face and study it, but the image burned before her eyes, then the flames consumed her as well.

She loosed a silent scream as she fell into another image of a male being tormented by her father. Her body moved and she intervened, but Arianna couldn’t remember why she’d bothered. She’d screamed a word and had growled at her father. She never growled at her father. The word was lost. She didn’t resist when that one turned to ice and shattered into nothing.

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