Page 13 of Bonds of Blood
“One last time, Marina. You know how much I hate when you make me force you to do my bidding.”
Mom shook her head, buried her face in my chest. I cradled a handful of her hair, held her close, held my hand even closer to my medallion. One wrong move and I was more than willing to unleash hell on my former father.
Grand Summoner Baylor Wilde’s voice filled the castle, shaking it to its very foundations.
“I order you to obey me, undine. Heed the call of your master. Remember your pact. You cannot deny your summoner.”
And suddenly the library felt as cold as ice. I knew the chill came from within me, the horrible frost of realization, the familiar surge of fear. Marina Wilde was more than just an undine, more than just his wife.
She was his eidolon.
7
Every breath rippedlike knives down my throat, as though something within me had been cut from the inside. An undine marrying a summoner — I should have known. Every exhalation swirled inside my chest in sharp, horrible circles.
“Mom?” I whispered, my voice trembling. “Is that true?”
She clutched at her head, her hair spilling between her fingers in confused tangles. “A battle. Something fiery and deadly. A dragon? No. A demon? I can’t remember. Almost killed me. Your father — wanted to test his limits.” Her hand ran under her eyes, wiping away at sudden tears. “Wanted to testmylimits.”
The world had compressed to a sphere that contained only me and my mother. Everything around us seemed to move in slow motion, sluggish, as though through heavy water. Sylvain knelt, tending to Alister, freeing him from his restraints. Satchel stammered, his words in a desperate, frightened stream, his little hands inspecting Ember for injuries.
And the headmasters. Where were the headmasters?
I propped my mother up as best as I could, my gaze still lingering on Baylor Wilde, who stood only several feet away. Emerald-green magic crackled in his fist, this man who I’d sometimes feared, sometimes admired. But now? He was good as dead to me. I should have killed him in my heart a long, long time ago.
“Mom. Please. I don’t understand.”
Baylor scoffed. “She was my eidolon. Plain and simple. What part of that is so difficult to grasp, Lochlann?”
“That can’t be. You said so yourself. You’d never heard of it happening. Summoners and eidolons falling in love, it wasn’t — ”
“I said many things, boy. What have they actually taught you here? Have you forgotten? We are mages, but we are summoners most of all, and our greatest weapons are not our eidolons. The deadliest armaments of the arcane, Lochlann, are words. Words such as these.”
He threw out his hand, his finger pointing in my direction, and yet distinctly past my head.
“You. Familiar. Fetch the medallion.”
I gasped, the air stabbing my lungs once again. Past my head. Behind me. The bookshelves. Satchel grunted as he gripped the edge of the shelf, resisting with all his might. Shackles of green light glimmered around his wrists, his ankles, his neck. If I stared hard enough, I could see the slender, delicate chains that connected his restraints straight to Baylor’s hand.
“No,” I shouted. “You can’t do this to him.”
Baylor tugged his hand. Satchel screamed, spinning through the air as he tumbled, wheeling straight toward me. Maybe I could help by severing his chains — but how? All my years at the Wispwood under Dr. Fang I’d only learned how to become a summoner on my own. There were very few lessons on how to stop another one.
“Master Baylor, please,” Satchel sobbed, tears already streaking his cheeks. “I don’t want to do this. Locke. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
Sorry for what? Before I could tell him everything was okay, before I knew what had happened, Satchel disappeared from sight, zipping through one of his pocket dimensions. I whirled in placed, looking for him. My heart plunged when I found him hovering just by Baylor’s head.
Dangling from Satchel’s hands was the chain I wore around my neck. On its end, swinging like a pendulum, was the glittering gold of Aphrodite’s medallion. The elemental gemstones I’d fought for — that I’d earned with my friends at my side — stared at me like four cold, unfeeling eyes. Unfamiliar.
“No,” I breathed, reaching for my neck, searching for something that I already knew wasn’t there.
Baylor held out his hand. Helpless under the sway of his former master’s commands, Satchel dropped the medallion into his palm. My skin prickled, crawling as if raked with little needles made out of ice. Gods above and below. Wasn’t Baylor powerful enough? What happened now? Could he control my guardians, too?
“Wonderfully done, Satchel. Excellent work.” Baylor grinned, smug and superior. “A gift from a goddess. These guardians shall make a fine addition to my collection.”
“Locke,” Satchel wailed. “I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”
I shook my head, struggled to speak words of comfort. “It wasn’t your fault, Satchel. None of this was your — ”
