Page 31 of Possess Me at Midnight
We’ll see what tomorrow brings.
Chapter
Thirteen
Sabelle
* * *
I collapse against the cool wood door, my heart hammering violently. Clutching the book to my chest like a shield, I will my racing pulse to slow.
Isdernus Rykard Called to me. Those ancient words still echo in my head, in my blood. Something desperate inside my chest yearns to Bind to him and seal us together for eternity.
It’s impossible. Bram would never condone such a mating—with good reason.
If I Bind to Ice, I lose Bram, my only family. I lose my status, my future, along with everything I’ve been raised to value. Even if magical law allowed status elevation through mating—which it doesn’t—Ice’s reputation would make me a political liability rather than an asset. The centuries-old prejudice against the Deprived that Bram has worked so hard to change would destroy our effectiveness in this fight. And Ice would gain a mate, but what would he lose? The Doomsday Brethren might reject him for crossing Bram. Then Ice and I would be outcasts, hunted by Mathias and distrusted by our kind.
But if I Renounce him? He loses the chance at a mate for eternity. His instinct has supposedly chosen me, and he can never take it back. He’ll potentially watch me mate with another while he remains forever alone, bound by a Call that can never be fulfilled. The cruelty of it squeezes everything in my chest like a vise.
On the other hand, Ice’s challenge rings in my ears: You’re fully transitioned. An adult. Certainly, you won’t let your brother make your decisions for you. What do you want?
What do I want? As if that’s the only thing that matters. Ice doesn’t understand. My choice of mate isn’t merely a personal decision. It may be the only choice that saves our kind from annihilation. With Mathias threatening the Council, my politically advantageous mating will secure crucial votes and solidify wavering alliances. The Doomsday Brethren can fight Mathias’s armies, but without Bram’s political voice, I’m our only hope for a majority coalition on the Council against Mathias’s evil. God, I wish my brother was awake and well so we could strategize together, as we often have. But until he recovers, the burden falls to me alone.
Besides, I can’t feel the instinct that tells Ice I’m his mate. Lust? Oh, my days, yes. I crave more of his hungry stare, his calloused palms sliding over my skin, his whispered growl of need in my ear… Even now, I can feel him in the next room. I still burn everywhere he put his hands on me. The hot ache of need he incited refuses to stop throbbing between my legs.
It would be so easy to abandon caution, tell myself that my choice of a mate isn’t that relevant.
I’d be lying.
Countless lives hang in the balance. If I selfishly follow my heart and Mathias seizes control, how many will die? How many centuries of tyranny will follow because I chose love over peace?
And can I truly trust that Ice didn’t Call to me simply for revenge against my brother? A lifetime with the wizard would mean both a rift with Bram and exile from everything I’ve ever known.
Yet…when Ice kissed me and breathed “my princess” against my mouth, I forgot everything else. For those brief, searing moments, I felt more alive than in all my nearly eighty-five years. What if he’s sincere? What if I’m turning away the one wizard who will always put me before all else?
Maybe that’s wishful thinking. I barely know the man except that he’s hotheaded, impulsive, and dangerously male. But a liar? He seems so bluntly honest. I’m not even certain why he and Bram hate each other with such venom.
Exhaustion seeps into my bones. The clock on the little bedside table says it’s almost three a.m. Eight hours ago, I was eating dinner in my beloved home. Now I’ll likely never see that house full of my treasured possessions and memories again. God knows where the other Doomsday Brethren are, if they even escaped alive. Can they warn the Council members of Mathias’s threat in time? Will anyone believe them? Take action?
I’m not hopeful.
I sit on the edge of the bed. In the low circle of light, I open the Doomsday Diary. It looks innocuous. Small. Red leather cover worn smooth at the edges, binding cracked with age. The symbol that represents Morgana Le Fay—the book’s evil creator—gleams dully while the pages, dry and brittle, whisper against my fingertips. This unassuming tome hardly resembles an object capable of ending of the world.
Looks are deceiving.
With a quiver, I stare at the empty, yellowed pages. Could I solve all my problems with a stroke of the pen? It’s beyond tempting to write a wish to save my brother’s life—along with our fractured world. But if Mathias can pinpoint our location when I teleport with the book, can he also track us if I merely use it? And if the Anarki find us—weary and wounded—how would I possibly protect Bram and the diary? I can’t risk either falling into Mathias’s hands any more than I can jeopardize Ice, who’s done everything possible to keep me safe.
I’ll try once we’re someplace more defensible. At least on that, Ice and I agree.
But that opportunity must come soon. If Bram dies, not only do I lose the last of my true family, but the leader holding our resistance together. The Doomsday Brethren will splinter, the Council will fall to Mathias, and magickind will be torn apart for centuries. I’ll be alone, homeless, and marked for death.
The weight of responsibility presses down on me like a physical burden. When did my shoulders become the ones to carry the future of our entire kind? When did my personal happiness become so irrelevant to the greater good?
I shove away my resentment. Since I can’t intervene now and Bram can’t wage politics from his sickbed, the responsibility of building a coalition capable of securing the voting bloc to save magickind falls to me, period. I’m one step removed from the Council, and my only leverage, my only tool to effect the necessary change, lies in a mate my brother would approve of.
So you’re going to let your brother pawn you off on another Privileged prick, even if he has no instinct to mate you, so Bram can secure his power on the Council? Regardless of whether you’re happy?
Ice makes Bram sound cold, unfeeling. But a selfish choice on my part could doom us all.
