Page 65 of The Blood that Binds Us

Cathal’s cracked lips twist into a hideous smirk. “Still thinking about their cocks, sweetheart?”

The cell door groans as it slides open between us. I jump back, startled.Goddess above, how did that—

Sin steps up beside me, rain dripping from the tips of his raven hair and down his long-sleeved black leather surcoat. The Black Art hovers above his prisoner, staring down at Cathal with a look that is downright frightening, casting him in shadow.

“Here to ruin our fun, Sire? Wren here was just telling me how she couldn’t stop thinking about our c—"

Chaos explodes next to me.

Sin grabs a fistful of Cathal’s weathered tunic and yanks him to his feet. Cathal gets one protest out of his foul mouth before Sin slams his back against the wall and drives his knee into his stomach. Once. Twice. A third time.

Cathal rolls his head back to look at Sin, coughing as his lungs are compressed with the impact of the blows. “All this over a fucking bloodwitch. I should have just killed her when I had the chance, and now you’re too much of a fucking pussy to d—”

Sin’s fist connects with his jaw before Cathal can rattle off the rest of his sentence. Again. And again. Blood spurts from his nose, his mouth, dripping onto his tattered tunic. His scent pets my tongue with a honeyed sweetness reminiscent of freshly dried figs, but my mouth doesn’t water at the smell of the Legion commander’s spilled blood. A wine connoisseur has no interest in a bottle that has been brewed with rotten grapes.

I startle when Sin slams his palms against Cathal’s chest, golden magic seeping out from his hands.

Cathal’s hollers of pain nearly split the dungeon in two.

I watch in horror as Sin heals him. Healing him so he may continue to break him.

Cathal twists and cries out as his ribs are poorly mended, and his jaw and nose snap back into alignment. As soon as the magic vanishes from his palms, Sin grabs a fistful of the fabric at Cathal’s chest and throws him to the ground. He steps over him, and with a sound that can only be described as pure, masculine rage, the Black Art pounds his fist into Cathal’s face, now leaking blood from all orifices, losing all sense of self to blinding fury.

The caster’s high.

Sin would have had to use a tremendous amount of magic to force a transcendent to shift under iron. Mages are vulnerable to emotion after expelling great amounts of magic—commonly lust—but in more extreme circumstances, it can invoke bouts of serious wrath. With Sin’s power influenced with that of the goddess, it surely takes a lot more casting to invoke the caster’s high, like how a drunkard needs to ingest more brandy to fall into a stupor. Flooding Thatcher with enough power to break the magical binding of a purifying element has broken the seal on the Black Art’s control.

In different circumstances, I could watch him gut Cathal and not blink an eye. But the Legion commander may be the only connection I have to finding my sister. I need him. And judging by the increasing speed of Sin’s punches, I don’t think he’s stopping to heal him again.

No one else is dying today.

“Stop,” I say, my voice quiet but firm.

Sin’s fist halts inches above Cathal’s broken jaw as if frozen in place. He stays there for an extended beat, as if he had forgotten I was present at all, before uncurling his bloodied fingers from his tunic, and Cathal’s limp body falls to the ground with a thud. Unconscious, but alive.

Probablyalive.

Sin turns his head just enough for me to glimpse most of his profile and note the muscles feathering in his jaw. “You havesecondsto tell me why you’re down here.” He moves to face me fully now, his head dipped slightly as he approaches, making him look all the more predatory.

But I am not prey.

“I asked him where Cosmina is.” I will my voice to hold steady as I stare into his eyes now glowing yellow-green from the use of magic.

He stops approaching when there’s only a few feet of distance remaining between us. “And what did he tell you?”

He is an ocean caught in its own storm, waves of anger rolling off him and threatening to knock me back with their wake.

I lift my chin a little higher. “He wouldn’t,” I admit.

“Coming down here to get answers on your own—trying to get out of our arrangement, little witch? I offered you a deal. Sneak behind my back again, and I’ll easily find a different purpose for you,” he drawls, his voice sharp as the athame strapped beneath my dress. Sin’s stare strips me bare as he scans my face, looking more beast than man. He takes another step forward—a challenge. “Never come down here again,” he whispers, his words weighted and heavy.

“And what if I do? Will you kill me too,Your Grace?Since that seems to be the only way you’re capable of solving problems.”

He erases the remaining distance between us in one step, his hand forming a collar around my throat. My shoulders slam into the wall behind me as he pins me between it and his body. My pulse thrums wildly in my neck as my veins swell with the rush of magic. I prepare to scald that hand the second his grip tightens any farther.

“Let go of me,” I warn through clenched teeth.

Air huffs from his nose, and I swear my flesh burns away to bone as he slowly drags his eyes up my body before settling on mine. My heart flutters like a hummingbird’s wings, and I only hope he can’t hear it. Though if his boosted magic has enhanced his sense of smell as hesuggested,I can only imagine what it’s done for his hearing as well.

---