Page 42 of Magic Hunted
“Are you expecting someone else to join us?” I indicated the piled platter.
“It’s just the four of you. And don’t look at me like that. This is a normal serving. You need more meat on your bones with the nerves you’re living off,” Shanyirra said.
All this food was mine? I didn’t have to be told twice. I picked up a yellow piece of fruit. It was sweet and sticky and the moment I popped a piece in my mouth I reached for another, stuffing that in too.
“You like that? I funnel the magic we have available to grow fruiting tropical plants. There aren’t many options to grow vegetation down here without a natural sun,” she said.
“Living off the magic has to be the only way you’ve survived down here for so long,” Ashir said.
Shanyirra nodded, pouring steaming tea into four mugs and setting them on the table. “Yes, but it’s dwindling.”
The huts looked ragged, some areas needing repair. They were only small, but I noticed the small things. As well as making connections. They’d lived there since the world changed. Hundreds of elves had to be fed. Protected. Hidden. The magic needed to do all of that was monumental and, without a connection to Faerie, also finite.
Suddenly the breakfast I’d eaten churned in my stomach because I’d made the biggest connection of all; why she’d put me in a bedroom with three virile alphas convinced I was the mate they should have. The mate they needed to bond. I pushed the half-eaten plate of food away from me.
“That’s the real reason you want us, isn’t it? You want us to bond because you want the grimoire. It has enough magic to last you for centuries. It has nothing to do with being Chosen, or fighting The Six.”
I stood up, trembling with rage, pressing my palm into the table, seeing everything for what it was. They didn’t care.Nobodycared. I ignored the crush of their soul-lights battering the barrier. Ignored their protests because it didn’t matter. None of it mattered when I was the only person to see the truth.
“You don’t care about us. About what the bond will do to them. That I will either taint them with my soul or kill them because of the bond. All you want is the magic. I’m telling you, it won’t happen. I refuse to tie them to me. I will not bond!”
I cried out as agony flared across my collarbone and burned through my body as each slave stud lit up with fire.
“What is it, Haera?” The chair fell to the sand behind Ashir as he stood and held my shoulders to stop me toppling. Savvas and Dias leaped to their feet, and I hated myself when I reached for them.
Tears streamed down my face as I gasped for breath. “Titan.”
My knees buckled beneath the next wave of agony and my vision blanked. The white noise in my ears drowned out my mates’ desperate cries. Titan was finished waiting for me to come to him. The pain was too great for that. Too overwhelming. This time, it would kill me.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Shanyirra’s watery form bent over me as I writhed on the sandy floor. Her eyes glowed a brilliant white that illuminated her face.
“Chant with me, child,” Shanyirra’s voice floated through the fiery haze in a language that was both foreign and somehow familiar. She planted her hand on the studs and chanted with soft lyrical words. They washed across me, silken threads that held weight. Immense power. I sucked in a breath, chest constricting as they sank into my skin, into my muscles and bones, flowing through my body, in my blood. My lips moved of their own accord, locking onto something dormant in me, forming words I had never said before as I chanted with her.
The grimoire vibrated as the words latched onto it. Into it. The magic responded, sending a golden river of power gushing into the studs. They heated, resisting. I arched on my back, my vision hazing with white. I was sure my bones would turn to ash at any second.
Shanyirra again placed her palm over the studs and hissed. White magic flared around them, taking away the burn for a few blessed moments, but Titan’s magic surged, washing hers away. Her face twisted in horror. “This magic is corrupt.”
It was as corrupt as Titan’s soul, but I couldn’t draw breath to tell her that. Her silhouette blurred and divided. Dots danced at the edge of my vision. My chest clamped at the fire racing through my body. I had no doubt I would die. It was a fifty-fifty chance that I would reanimate only to die again or my body would be nothing but powder finally incinerated by the magic. If that happened, I might finally be free of this life, this fate–but I would leave my mates to a desolate life with Titan as their master.
“I’m not strong enough, but you are, child. Use your own magic. Not the grimoire. Yours,” Shanyirra said.
I tried to tell her I didn’t know how to use my magic. Blood flooded my mouth when I bit my cheek. White hot agony consumed me. I couldn’t string a thought, let alone think how to use magic I never knew I possessed.
“Feel my magic. Let me guide you.” Shanyirra’s voice shook with so much power it cut through the roar in my ears.
A rush of white light sank into me, down past the grimoire to pull at a foreign strand that was buried deeper than the grimoire ever was. The strand glowed with bright green, pulsing with immense power. It burned with the same bright green of my soul-light. The same magic that had poured from me when I’d lashed out at Taredd.
Shanyirra’s hand pressed with more force in my chest. “Your magic is a part of you, child. You are one and the same. Youareyour magic because you’re both shifter and human. Fae and Earth. Embrace both your halves. There’s nothing to be afraid of.”
“Please, Haera. Listen to her,” Ashir said.
“Come on, magic. Fight it. Fight it for us,” Dias said.
A bead of sweat dripped down the side of Savvas’ face. His features were etched in pain. Ashir was pale, his skin shining with a layer of perspiration. Dias swayed, clutching Ashir’s shoulder for balance.
But why would they feel any pain when…?The scar on the bond went both ways. Titan’s magic was leeching through the fissure and attacking them. Gods. I had no choice. If I didn’t at least try, Titan’s magic would kill them. Always, their lives were in danger because of me.
