Page 17 of Before the Bond Breaks
At the car, Talon brushed his hand against mine, grounding me with the smallest touch. He leaned in and kissed my forehead. “We’ll return the rental and portal home. Hopefully, Winter and Quil have an update for us.”
10
BALDER
The crystal glowedwith the stolen Valkyrie magic, illuminating my study. I held it in my palm, feeling the way it pulsed. Such potential, wasted on loyalty to the Valkyrie it once belonged to.
Behind me, the door opened then shut with a soft click. Bryna, my Valkyrie spy, crossed to the center of the room. She bowed her head and kept her tone steady, but it was laced with tension. “My lord, Maze found the ledger.”
For a heartbeat, silence pressed between us. I’d been looking for the ledger ever since that traitor, Dustin, stole from me. I had my suspicions that the witch gave it to Jessica before my eitrborn caught up with him. The fact that Maze found it confirms what I knew all along. My men couldn’t get into her apartment because the damn wards were too strong.
It was a good thing that I was good at adapting and strategizing on the spur of the moment. I’ve already adjusted my plan and moved it in a new direction. One that would still give me the same result.
“Let Maze chase the clues her sister died protecting.” I set the crystal down carefully on its pedestal, watching its glow dim as if in obedience. “Every step brings her closer to my trap.”
The ledger had links to a handful of my labs. It was coded, of course, but the Valen sisters would break the codes on the locations and whatever else Jessica uncovered before I could capture her. It didn’t matter. As soon as I realized Jessica had hidden the ledger, I moved the labs and destroyed all evidence that could be traced back to me. I wasn’t ready for the Valkyries and their shifters yet.
Bryna’s breath hitched, though she hid it well. She feared me, as all of them should, but she also admired her High Matron. It was written in the tremor of her aura, the way her loyalty wavered like a weak flame. A pity. She could have been more.
I moved to my desk and opened the Valkyrie Prime’s grimoire. A drawing of the Severing Stone was in the center of the page, its lines etched in the Prime’s meticulous runes. The relic was the key to breaking the bond between Talon and Maze. And it would be mine.
Several minutes after dismissing Bryna, I left the study and walked the halls of my sanctum. Downward, into the gutted remains of the lab Jessica had once clawed her way free of. The air still stank of her blood, faint but lingering, burned into stone. I would have to burn this place to the ground and relocate my home base in the next few days. My eitrborn had already started packing the house and moving it to the new location.
Tables lay overturned, chains scattered across the floor, and the residue of wards lingered like ash on the walls. My footsteps echoed as I moved between them.
I stopped where she had stood the night she broke free. For a moment, I could almost see her, panting, bloodied, power blazing from her skin like a Valkyrie flame. For that single heartbeat, she had been magnificent.
“She was almost worthy,” I murmured, the words curling into the stale air. My fingers brushed the wall where her magic had flared bright enough to scar the stone. Right before I drained it all out of her, taking her life essence. “Almost.”
But Maze…
Maze would not falter.
And when I remade the world, she would either kneel beside me or be the first broken on the stone.
11
MAZE
Talonand I stepped through the portal into my office at Valen Protection Agency. His presence filled the space, grounding me. I watched him for a few moments, thinking how being around him for a little over twenty-four hours had only made me feel more for him.
Then, a thread of guilt twisted inside me. “I should have come to you sooner.”
Talon wrapped me in his arms. “You were doing what you thought was right. Now, we’ll all work to find and stop Balder.”
I tipped my head back to meet his gaze. “What if we’re too late?”
It wasn’t like me to feel so much guilt and uncertainty. My growing link with Talon was pushing his emotions into me, breaking my own from their cage in my mind. I hated the emotions.
Talon cupped my cheek and pushed his thumb across my bottom lip. “We’re not.” Then he leaned in and pressed his lips to mine. “Are you ready to check in with Winter and Quil?”
Taking a deep breath, I nodded and stepped out of his embrace. “Let’s do this.”
We made our way down the hall to Winter’s domain. She had the bigger office space at the end of the hallway to house all her tech toys and whatever magically infused invention she was working on.
The double glass doors slid open with a hiss into the chaos that was my sister’s office. Winter sat cross-legged in her chair with her dark blond hair piled in a messy knot on top of her head. The wall of screens in front of her bloomed with shifting maps, cascading code, live surveillance feeds, and other stuff that only made sense to her.
Quil was beside her, his lean frame bent toward her screen, one hand lazily twirling a pen while his leopard energy coiled tight around him. His eyes flicked up the second we entered, his smile quick and easy, but his shoulders didn’t lose their tension. The warrior in him was always on alert for trouble.
