Page 73 of Amethyst and Iron
Our eyes locked.
“Sylas.” Emotion welled in his eyes, an extremely rare thing for Kai.
But with this… it cut at him more than even a close friend being in jeopardy. This hit right at the heart of him. We were the same when it came to this.
To our magic.
“Tell me,” I forced out.
The moment the words were spoken would make it undeniably real.
And I guess I needed to hear them to be able to do it, to accept that it had actually come to this.
He shifted his weight and grasped my hand, weaving his fingers with mine, struggling to meet my eyeline. “This sickness… the infection… it’s magical in nature. The damage to your body is its interaction with the magic running through yourblood. And such potent magic at that. It’s why it worsens when you expend great power.”
He knew I was already well aware, but he was telling me anyway, because I needed him to.
He tightened his hold on my hand. “As such, the only way to spare you is to remove the magical elements.” He swallowed hard. “To bind your power.”
“No more magic?”
“No more magic. It will be completely inaccessible to you, only able to be unbound by a being of Celestial blood.”
“How long?”
“Until we find a necromancer who can perform the spell. Or until an alternative solution is found. Cassius has already been searching out necromancers, but he hasn’t found anyone viable yet who can perform the spell.”
I frowned. “How is that possible? This is Cassius. With his power, he can sweep vast areas at a time and—”
“They were all dead. He’s located four and they were all found murdered.”
“Somebody is actively trying to stop me from being cured?”
“We don’t know the reason at this juncture, but it’s up there as a possible explanation for these murders, yeah.”
“Without a viable necromancer, there’s no way to cure me, to fix this. I could be bound for fucking ever, Kai. Even the backup plan of sacrificing somebody—Sorin was Cassius’ idea—wouldn’t be viable now, not after the violations I caused inside the Valley of the Dead earlier.
“Days ago.”
“Days? That’s how long I’ve been out?”
“Yes. I’m sorry.” He shifted his weight. “There’s always a way. You know that just as well as anyone. You’ve achieved what others had believed impossible many a time.”
That had been different.They’dbelieved it to be impossible, I never had.
But Kai was an optimist—in his unique dark and twisted way, but an optimist nonetheless.
That wasn’t me.
“Either I live without my magic, or I let myself die.”
He eyed me warily. “Sylas, if you die—”
“If I dienormally—not like the way I did to pull Velra out—like a necromancer, with magic still in my system and what’s left of my necromantic core, I won’t become just another of those roaming, lost spirits in the Valley of the Dead. I am a Master of Death. Being in the realm of the dead, I’ll be able to exert free will, to exist there as I so wish.”
“Your body here will be done, though. The rot will be irreversible. The only way you could be returned to the mortal plane would be as Animated Fleshwork.”
“Then, of course, I wouldn’t attempt to return. And I know thatyouwould stop any misguided attempts to resurrect me in that case.”
