Page 10 of Enthralled

I scream as the woman bends over the table and my exposed body. Blind panic burns through me. I feel pressure against my inner thigh and then—

A roar fills my ears. The rafters overhead groan, crack, break like matchsticks and blow away under a tremendous whorl of pure power. Bursts of light in colors for which I have no name, heat and sound and dread all explode across my senses as a beam of pure white light falls into the circular chamber and decimates the shadows in a single, heart-stopping instant.

Someone is screaming. Me? No, the woman. Oscar shouts as well, bellowing words I cannot comprehend, for my attention is fixed on the image above me, appearing in the center of that blinding light. A winged man, slowly descending through the now open roof. He wears a crown of some dark stone across his brow. His hair is iron gray, falling in waves across his shoulders. His face is lined but beautiful. So beautiful, so overwhelming that, despite the terror bursting in my head, my breath catches at the mere sight of him.

He looks down at me, his arms outspread as though he has just burst the roof apart in a single great gesture. His shining wings beat the air at his back, holding him suspended overhead. His eyes widen. His expression becomes one of rapt revelation, as though he’s just been given a glimpse of heaven itself. I don’t understand. I can only stare back, numb, my lips parted.

Then he speaks in a deep, reverent voice: “Darling?”

With a shriek the shining woman leaps across the slab. Still clutching the long knife in one hand, she holds the point of the blade against my temple. “Begone from here at once, Prince!” she cries. “Fly from here, or I will kill her before your eyes!”

Somewhere, in some distant realm of comprehension, I hear Oscar screaming, “No! Don’t hurt her!” But I cannot think of that, cannot fathom anything beyond the pain of that knife biting into my skin and the intensity of those two violet eyes lancing down at me and my captor.

“Harm one hair on her head,” the stranger says, raising an arm, “and I will blast you to oblivion.” Sparks of energy and churning darkness move and play between his fingers. Is this the same power which blew away the roof? Whoever and whatever this man is, he means his threat quite literally.

“Do it!” the woman cries, gripping the top of my head with one hand, her long nails digging painfully into my scalp. “It won’t change your fate. When she is dead, you will die soon after, and all Aurelis will fall into chaos without an heir.”

“Better than letting it fall into your hands, Estrilde.”

“Go on then, Castien,” the woman snarls. “If you dare.”

Castien.There’s something in that name. I don’t understand it, cannot begin to comprehend how it burns in my head like living fire. My lips move, trying to form the sounds but cannot seem to remember how.

The stranger lowers his hand. His gaze rips from me, traveling around the small chamber in a quick scan. “And what is it you’re trying to accomplish here, cousin?” he demands. “Not murder, it would seem. You’ve set up a spell. A summoning.” His eyes snap back to the woman’s face, and his lip curls in a snarl. “Are you trying to bring him back? Because you know my wife’s blood will never suffice. It must be mine or nothing. The Rite of the Thorn demands it.”

His wife?His wife?My heart surges. I stare up at that gray-haired stranger, that beautiful apparition hovering overhead like an avenging angel. I must not have heard right, must not have understood. Fear is addling my brain.

“You think I don’t know that?” the woman hurls back. “Not even a Fatebond is strong enough to satisfy the Rite of the Thorn. But the beating heart of your living child will serve well enough.”

The stranger rears back in the air as though struck by a blow. His wings beat storms into being behind him. Darkness and power gather in his fists. “What did you say?” he demands.

The woman laughs, a lovely, musical sound. “You could have seen for yourself had you delayed your arrival by another five minutes! I could have introduced you to your child personally.”

What? What are they talking about? What child? I writhe, straining in both body and soul to make sense of what’s happening. That long knife . . . what this woman planned to do . . . but . . .

“There’s been some mistake!” I cry. “I’m not with child! And I don’t know who this man is, but—”

“Quiet, Clara!” Oscar barks from where he crouches against the wall.

The winged stranger’s gaze shoots straight to him, pinning him in place. “So you’re in on this plot too. Are you so deeply enthralled that you would murder innocents for the sake of your lover?” He looks ready to strike my brother dead. I open my mouth to protest, to plead for his life. Instead the stranger turns to the woman once more. “The Rite of the Thorn requires willing blood.”

The woman shrugs. “Deathblood is strong. It will serve my purpose.”

“It will not.”

“That’s a risk I’m willing to take.”

“You’ll not get the chance.”

“Perhaps not. Perhaps I’ll die here over the corpse of your wife and your unborn child.” The woman’s grip on my scalp tightens. I choke on a scream. “Unless, dear cousin, you can think of an alternative that may bring satisfaction to all.”

The look on the stranger’s face is impossible to describe—somewhere between ravenous hunger and bloodthirsty rage. He seems to be trying not to look at me, but his gaze is drawn back to mine. Those eyes of his capture me, so strangely familiar and yet so wildly foreign all at the same time.

“What do you say, Castien?” the woman cries, twisting her knife slowly against my temple. “Will you give me your willing blood? Will you open the gates to Saalvru and summon Ivor forth?”

“You may not like what he has become, Estrilde,” the stranger cautions. “It’s been too long. He won’t be the man who left.”

“Yet another risk I’m willing to take.” The woman sneers. “And what about you? Are you willing to risk more than you’ve already lost?”

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