Page 35 of The Blood that Binds Us

“I don’t have a choice. If I don’t return, Singard will track me with his ridiculous stalker spell, and I don’t want him coming here.” I resist the urge to glance over at him, knowing he is listening to every word between us.

“Let him come,” Eldridge growls, his knuckles lengthening into claws.

“No. If he’s already planning on committing genocide, we can’t provoke him. He knows what you guys are. Right now, we need to worry about Legion and finding Cosmina. Everything else is secondary.Iam secondary.”

Eldridge scoffs. “If that Black Art bitch hurts you, I swear on my life, Wren, I will make sure the memory of your face is the last thing he sees before I rip him piece to fucking piece.”

This time, I can’t help glancing at Sin, now with his back to me as he studies a painting of a bundling of wildflowers on the kitchen wall, but I swear the fabric bunches at his shoulder blades. It’s probably best I can’t see his face, not wanting to see the thought of choking Eldridge with the same magic he used on me burning in his irises. I don’t imagine many call the Black Art abitchand live to tell the tale.

Morrinne reaches under the collar of her deep blue sweater and unclasps a necklace. I recognize my sister’s sapphire pendant immediately.

“Cosmina left it with me before she went after you. She said if you were to return without her, you could use the necklace to find her."

Cosmina is the only other mage in my adoptive family, so it makes sense she would have left something she wore against her skin every day to agitate the potency of a locator spell. Transcendents have magic in their blood, but a different kind. Natural healers and alchemists, they are proficient with restoration magics and resistant to more harmful destruction casts, but a locator spell… that is witches’ territory.

I take the necklace and close my fist around it. “I can use this to track her, but I’ll need to rest beforehand.” There is no way my tired, aching body has enough stamina to hold the magical connection to her long enough for me to pinpoint her location, not without at least a few hours of sleep.

“Can I help somehow?” Zorina asks.

I nod. “If I can siphon a little of your magic while I do it, the spell should work more quickly.”

I catch Sin turning to look at me from my periphery, no doubt considering the most obvious course of action. If I siphoned some of the Black Art’s magic, I could find her in half the time, but given our current predicament, Zorina’s will have to do. She agrees instantly.

“You all get some sleep, I’ll take first watch,” Morrinne says.

“Let me do it. You need to rest, you old broad,” Eldridge huffs, but bumps her with a playful nudge of his elbow.

“You might as well get some shut eye, Eldridge, because I’m keeping watch either way. No way I’m closing my eyes with evil so close on Wren’s tail.”

I want to scold her for being stubborn, the darkness under her eyes telling me she hasn’t slept more than a few hours a night since I left, but I don’t. If our positions were reversed, I’d be saying the same thing. The creases around my mother’s eyelids are deep and worn in, her graying tawny hair now more silver than brown, and perhaps it is the time away that lets me see how quickly age is sneaking up on her. And if I wasn’t so drained from the ride, I would be arguing to keep watch tonight too, but sleep is critical for me to restore my energy enough to perform the spell.

Zorina turns and looks at Sin still lingering in the kitchen. “Your…friend… can sleep in Theon’s cot for now, but he’ll be back later tonight and will probably want his bed back…”

“I’m not sleeping tonight. It’s my duty to keep Wren safe, and I intend to do just that,” Sin says, walking towards us and stopping a few feet away.

I lock eyes with him and nod once, playing along. Sleeping in Theon’s bed isn’t an option. As soon as there is distance between us, Eldridge will surely smell the glamour on Sin and do something stupid, like assault the Black Art in his sleep and get himself gutted in the process. I don’t doubt Sin has more than just the twin swords on his back for weapons. Knowing him and his distrust of transcendents, I’m sure he has daggers stowed in every nook and cranny of his fitted pants.

“Fair enough. I won’t turn down the extra set of eyes tonight, but don’t think for a second I won’t be keeping one on you too, mister,” Morrinne warns.

I stifle a laugh at the thought of my fragile aging mother threatening the most powerful man on the isle and turn my head to hide the smile. Zorina tucks Galen into bed and then disappears upstairs to her own, while Morrinne fixes herself a fresh cup of tea and settles into one of the cushioned chairs with a leather-bound book, propping her feet up on the wicker footrest she constructed from plant material.

I head outside, and Sin falls into place behind me immediately. Neither of us speaks until we reach the horses and walk them into the clearing to tether them.

“Don’t let Morrinne’s age fool you—she’s still sharp as a knife. She’ll detect the magic on you if you stay up with her all night.”

He pets his horse on the nose, pulls out two apples from the saddle bag, and offers one to each steed. “She won’t notice because I won’t be near her. I’m staying out here until morning.”

“You’re going to sleep outside all night?”

“And give your uncivilized friend the opportunity to slit my throat in my sleep? How naïve do you think I am?”

I walk around to the side of his horse and pull out a few of the remaining strips of salted meat. “It’s not Eldridge you should be worried about.I’mmuch scarier,” I say, tearing off a piece of the jerky with my teeth.

Sin stares down at me, his dark hair and reddish-brown skin blending with the night, but I still make out as his lips curl into a facetious grin. I close the saddle bag and turn on my heel, but not before I hear him mutter under his breath, “Yes you are, little witch. Yes you are.”

Honey beams of sunshine nudge me awake, their warm buttery rays shining in through the now uncovered windows. For a brief moment, when I open my eyes and stretch out against the lumpy mattress, it is just another day.

And then the memories of the past couple of months snap back into place, and the brief comfort I felt in those seconds vanishes completely. I pull on a pair of light-colored trousers and a faded purple tunic with white floral embroidery and follow the smell of smoking herbs and citrus beckoning me from outside.

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