Page 133 of Tales of a Deadly Devotion
He recoiled from me as if he heard it too, forcing me away. Gideon was suddenly there to steady me. Emrys stumbled slightly, shaking his head as he fell to his knees, fingers curling into his hair, bending forwards with a silent scream on his lips. The house was groaning around us, cabinets and drawers rattling with worry.
‘He needs to stay still.’ Gideon said, his voice breaking as if he couldn’t bare it.
‘Emrys.’ I dropped to the rug before him until our knees touched. Pressing my hands against his bare thighs. Only for his skin to become nothing but black smoke beneath my touch. Warping and changing, slipping between my fingers as if desperate to hold on.
My breath was tight with panic as I clutched uselessly at him. The bite of his magic was frantic. I could feel him flinch and tremble. His head shook again as if refusing to listen to the voice in his head.
A voice I’d heard too.
The fury of my fire bit into my bones, straightening my spine and hardening my will.
Yes, I could keep him … because he was mine. He’d given me that vow.
Gideon moved around to his back, resting an arm across his shoulder, almost holding him up. Not caring for any of the darkness consuming him, nor how it bit and twisted. ‘Don’t listen to them, Emrys. You’re home.’
Emrys began to shake, his fingers like claws digging into his own temples.
‘Keep him still, Kat,’ Gideon ordered.
I cupped his face so gently between my palms, thumbs running over his cheekbones, over that scar that pulled painfully, as his skin became shadows and strange demon fire between my hands, but I didn’t let him go. Couldn’t.
I’d promised him I wouldn’t.
‘Serus,’ I called softly, startling Gideon. His eyes burnt bright blue with witch fire and warning.
Emry went still beneath my touch, eyes opening. Nothing but darkness answered. No recognition, just that strange stillness.
This was his Verr form. A child of the Old Gods. Yet he wasn’t a myth or a story. He wasn’t a fear or a nightmare. Not as I drew in the barest scent of beasam bark. The rich scent of his summoning and him. The gleam of my blade that hadn’t left him in this form.
He was mine.
Bright blue embers of Gideon’s aether flared in the hearth. Emrys seemed to recoil from the heat but Gideon tossed something into it. Whatever he’d been searching for.
Thick white smoke suddenly curled from the hearth, smelling of healing herb, lavender and beasam bark. The mixture surrounding us in a strange fog.
Emrys flinched, tried to pry himself from Gideon’s hold almost desperately. Only Gideon was unmovable, that metal arm a band across his chest, forcing him to drag the mixture into his lungs. One breath and then two, deeper as his tension dissipated ever so slightly.
I ran my trembling hands up his throat to ease him. Feeling the frantic beat of his pulse against my palm. ‘Eria.’
That word he’d given me. All the promises too. The house quieted in a moment. Gideon’s breath was unsteady, as if holding it with hope that something as simple as those words could work.
Then there was the barest flicker of life in those dark eyes as he came back to me. As that gaze ran over my features. He became real beneath my touch. Smoke dancing and slipping back into his skin, content.
I kept touching him, trying to soothe his tremors.
‘You burn, I burn,’ I whispered. Even if it all fell apart, we’d fall apart together. Even as that darkness burnt through him, just as my flame burnt through me.
‘You’re mine,Serus,’ I commanded in the old tongue, feeling magic flare in my palms, a lavender hue and I knew he felt that warmth bite into his skin. Just as the ferocity of his own summoning could bite into mine.
‘Tauria,’ a hollow voice answered, filled with nothing but darkness. Guttural with pain.
Gideon jerked in surprise.
‘Yes,’ I smiled, brushing the damp hair back from his forehead. Then those dark hands moved, confused and sluggish to rest over Gideon’s arms around him. His head turning to see his brother.
He blinked once, as if struggling to recognise him.
‘Gideon?’ he asked. Gideon’s smile was small but I saw the wetness gleaming in his eyes.
