Page 49 of The Blood that Binds Us

“How convenient for them then, given they know precisely where you are.”

“I suspect Legion plans on bringing Cosmina to Scarwood as leverage to try and persuade me to turn on you, on the kingdom. To offer me her life in exchange for the taking of yours.”

His hands clench slightly where they grip his opposite elbows, his arms still folded tightly across his chest. “And what do you plan on doing if your suspicions are correct?”

Sin’s stare is everywhere—my eyes, my mouth, my hands—watching every movement and burning holes in my flesh all the places he drags his heated gaze. Where I rely on my gift to detect when I’m being manipulated, Sin uses years of experience sniffing out traitors of the throne.

I blow out a deep breath, knowing now is not the time to let my pride get in the way. For once, speaking openly about who andwhatI am may be the best course of action to getting what I want. What I need.

“I have been hiding from Legion foryears. Trying to prevent them from using me as a weapon and forcing me into becoming the monster I’ve never desired to be. I am telling you this… because I don’t want to hurt anyone. But I will do what I must to keep my sister alive. She is not like me, she isgood.

“And if they hurt her… I don’t know that I can hold myself back from slaughtering every last one of them. I hesitated telling you because I feared you may have resorted to chaining me in iron and locking me back down there. I am asking for your help, Sin… help me help her. Whatever you must do with me afterwards… just let me save her first.”

His eyes dart between both of mine, scanning for distrust I’m sure, though his expression reveals nothing of his thoughts. Sin’s face is a calculating front, running through every possible scenario and outcome of what I have just suggested.

Tension rolls off him in such heaps, I can nearly taste it on my tongue. Keeping his eyes locked on mine, he asks, “With this new discovery, should I assume you are willing to swear fealty to me and fight alongside us?” A careful question.

I give an even more careful answer. “I will fight with you against Legion,” I vow. “In order to free my sister and eradicate their army as Legion will always be a threat to my family because of me. I will not, however, fight alongside you if you go forward in waging war on transcendents.”

A flicker of dark amusement tugs up the corner of his lips. “Will you fightagainstme then? If I do declare that war?”

I snatch my bottom lip with my teeth as I mull over my answer, choosing my words with care. “I will do what I must to protect the ones I love, and the ones who are helpless.”

Sin’s footsteps echo through the room as he takes purposeful steps to close the distance between us, his eyes never leaving mine. Holding as still as a deer caught in a wolf’s sights, my feet flex inside my boots, ready to dodge if he decides I am not worth the risk and attempts to put me down. He stops when his body is mere inches from mine, the tips of his inky hair grazing the tops of my breasts.

“That’s a bold statement to make to your Black Art,” he purrs, no threat in his words, but his tone cold enough I don’t risk moving just yet. I plant the soles of my boots against the stone floor as his fevered stare threatens to knock me backwards. And then with a note of indifference, he says, “You begin training tomorrow.”

“Training? Do you doubt my capability?” I ask incredulously.

“Not with magic,” he allows, “but how are you with a blade?”

I’m decent with knives and have sparred with swords before, but only in a casual setting with my adoptive siblings, and certainly not enough to hold my own on a battlefield. He swipes the answer written on my face with an arrogant smile.

“Your law says I should be killed because my magic is too powerful, and you’re concerned I don’t know how to wield a piece of metal?”

He inches a half step closer to me, shrinking the already too close distance between us. “The first rule of combat—physical or otherwise—” his arm cuts the air, and before I can track the movement, the unmistakable chill of metal grazes the underside of my chin. His dagger flirts with the delicate skin of my throat—the knife he pulled from somewhere hidden in those fighting leathers, “is to never rely on one weapon. Even magic,” he murmurs, his voice a velvet whisper in the room.

I don’t jerk away. I remain a statue as my body internally ignites with the surge of my collective, ready to weaponize myself at a moment’s notice. The Black Art’s lips part in a rapacious smile, his tongue gliding over the fronts of his top set of teeth, and he lowers his blade, returning it to its hidden holster with the same swiftness he had drawn it. I don’t need to imagine the damage he could do with theswordthat still hangs at his waist.

“You make your point,” I spit.

He chuckles and runs a hand through his hair, sending the layers falling down his back, his mood seemingly lighter now.

“But I’m confused. Why are you so willing to let me fight with you? You’re not worried at all I’ll try to turn on you the moment they bring her here?”

“You underestimate me,” he says, smoldering heat still simmering in his eyes.

“No. I think you underestimateme.”

River had said Sin lacked confidence, that he could stand to learn some things from me, but I think it is precisely his overbearing arrogant attitude that has him dismissing the threat I pose so easily.

He shakes his head. “You’re wrong. I have thought a great deal of things about you, but dismissing your power has not been one of them. But if you were going to try to kill me, you would have done it already.”

“I could say the same about you,” I challenge. “I didn’t know Legion was holding my sister captive before. How do you know that hasn’t changed things for me?”

“You just gave me an unbeatable weapon to use against them. Perhaps that has changed things for me,” he suggests with a smirk as wicked as it is devastating.

I command my body to move again, but pause at the door before leaving. I study his face as I sift through his collective with my own, feeling his immense pride and amusement blossoming in my gut. Amused that I have now willingly pledged to fight alongside him, ensuring a victory for the kingdom I loathe.

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