Page 64 of The Blood that Binds Us

It isn’t.

Sin swoops down with the speed of a raptor and grabs Thatcher by his shoulders. As if he was struck by the storm’s lightning, Thatcher writhes in the Black Art’s grip, his body jerking forward and back in rapid succession. Tendrils of blue magic emanate from Sin’s fingertips, but his hold never loosens, even with Thatcher’s violent convulsions.

The transcendent throws his head back in a blood-curdling scream, and the chains connecting his hands and feet begin to rattle. His body twists and contorts at inhuman angles, no longer belonging to himself, and his face begins to widen.

Sin is forcing him to shift.

He didn’t bind Thatcher in iron to protect himself. No, it was for show; to prove a point to the high lords he knew would gather here to witness the turpitude unfolding before us.

That even iron has its limits.

They won’t question that the most powerful mage of Aegidale had to flood the transcendent’s veins with magic to force his body to shift under the iron. They will only watch as Thatcher morphs into something foreign, something monstrous, and cheer as their almighty Black Art slaughters it before them.

Slayer of beasts, they will call him.

Thatcher’s face begins to blur as his features stretch and elongate. With a metallic ring, his chains break at the ankles as his legs widen and shift into thick, muscular stumps. He stands on his new hind legs, his shirt ripping across his chest that now emerges broad and covered in a yellow-tan coat.

The shifter tilts his huge, furred head back in an ear-splitting howl, and when he lowers it again, his light eyes are now set in a face of golden fur, his snout long and rectangular. His second skin is a mix of something canine and bear, and the size of a small horse. His ears are short and pointed, and now lowered as he bares his razor-sharp teeth at Sin, emitting a low guttural growl.

Thisis what Sin wanted. Because the scene unfolding is all these people will go home remembering about today: that the accused transcendent shifted under iron and threatened the Black Art.

Sin unsheathes the long sword at his hip and that sound—the sliding of steel against leather—will haunt my dreams, waking and not, until my final breath.

I don’t wince as his sword connects with Thatcher’s broad neck. I don’t wet my lips at the innocent blood that sprays onto the wood and speckles Sin’s dark surcoat, his face. I don’t hear the celebration at my back.

But I seehim.

Bloodied and severed and erased at the Black Art’s shoes. How soon after defeating Legion will Sin declare war on all transcendents? How soon after I help him stop Legion will he turn on me and send his men to hunt down my family like rabid dogs? Just when I thought thatmaybeSin wasn’t a complete monster, he reminded me why so many in Aegidale cower at the mere mention of his name.

I can’t make an escape and find Cosmina on my own. At least not flee with her afterwards so long as the tethering spell binds me to him. Sin would hunt me down. No matter how far we ran, or how deep into the woods we hid, he would find me.

He will always find me.

But if I slip away just long enough to find her—rescue her—I could accept my demise when Sin inevitably comes for me if it means freeing my sister on my own. It hadn’t occurred to me before, but the longer Legion remains a threat to the kingdom, the more time my family has to form a plan before war is declared on their kind. Finding Cosmina on my own is my family’s safest option. She could return to the others and together, they could hunker down in a new location.

But for this plan to work, I need to be as fast as the lightning striking overhead. I need to know Cosmina’s precise location.

And there’s only one person who can tell me.

Cathal looks terrible. He’s slumped against the wall of his cell, his dark hair tousled and overgrown, matched by the unkempt beard swallowing half his face. He doesn’t look up as I approach, likely assuming my footsteps belong to the guard responsible for coming down here and tending to him. Judging from Cathal’s disheveled appearance, I assume Sin gave orders to not tend too generously.

“They don’t know I’m here,” I say, announcing my presence in the dank, subterranean dungeon. I don’t have long before Sin and the others return to the castle after bidding their farewells to those in attendance. The stench of rotting food and urine assaults my nose as I step up to the cell containing the man who once abused me.

Cathal rolls his head up lazily to look at me. The skin around his eyes is swollen and purple, and his once straight nose now hangs crooked. His lips are cracked, and his dark brown tunic is torn and riddled with blood stains. “Come to let me out, sweetheart?” His voice is heavy and sluggish, dehydration and malnourishment rotting him from the inside out like diseased fruit.

My soft laughter has a hint of hysteria around the edges. “I’m onto your little plan, Cathal.”

“Pray tell sweetheart, which little plan is this?”

“The one where you expect me to hand myself over to Legion in exchange for Cosmina’s life. If you ever bothered to listen to a damn thing I told you, you’d know my sister would rather die than to let me work for the likes of you.”

He licks his lips and shuffles so he sits up a little straighter, resting his hands over his knees. Iron shackles connect his wrists with only about six inches of space between them, and an identical set binds his ankles. “Or maybe I listened to you so well, sweetheart, I knew you’d do anything for that gorgeous sister of yours. Even if it means marching that sweet ass of yours into hellfire.”

I slam my hands against the cell, magic pooling into my fingertips and begging to be released. “You listen to me, you ignorant prick. I will never make a deal with Legion, but Iwillfight alongside the kingdom to destroy your entire godsdamned army if you don’t tell me where she is. Where is Cosmina?!”

His laughter quickly turns into a deep coughing fit as Cathal hacks into the side of his closed fist. When he finishes retching up one of his lungs, he looks at me with a half amused, half delirious glint in his eyes. “I never thought I’d see the day where Wren, the ever-self-righteous queen of godsdamned placation, has threatened me. I think we both know you haven’t got thegall.”

I lower onto one knee and curl my fingers towards myself, admiring my fingernails as if I just buffed them with a pumice stone. In a voice that sounds almost bored, I say, “I will rip the hearts out of every single one of your men andfeaston them. My only regret will be if I kill them too quickly and deprive myself the pleasure of hearing them beg for their lives before I do. I bet they’ll sing real fucking pretty with my blade at their cocks, don’t you?”

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