From Spirit and Binding Read online

“I’d like to know that, too,” Justise said from the other end of the walkway, Ridley and the others who were aware Easton had been gone with him.

  I looked over Easton’s shoulder, my eyes widening as I noticed that Luken and Teagan were holding another person between them. The man appeared to be around Easton’s age, young, but definitely a Maison.

  I couldn’t feel any magic wafting off him, so perhaps he was a Dane.

  He wore a similar expression to Easton’s—shielded, and dark.

  He had cuts and blood on him, as well. Though he still had shoes as well as his shirt.

  “Who is that?”

  “That’s the man who saved me.” There was something in Easton’s tone. Something that said that wasn’t the whole answer.

  I looked at Easton again and frowned. “Saved you from whom?”

  Easton opened his mouth, and it looked as if he were trying to say something, but no words came out. Instead, he clutched at his throat, his eyes wide, and dropped to his knees.

  I called out, kneeling before him, trying to catch him.

  “What’s wrong? What’s happening?”

  The others surrounded us then, Ridley coming closer to try and use his healing.

  “It looks like a curse is preventing him from saying the words.”

  “If you heal him, he’ll be strong enough to remember this time.”

  I looked up at the unfamiliar man, narrowing my eyes at him.

  “What do you know?”

  “I know more than I should. And I’m here to help. I just need your promise that you’ll help me.”

  I looked down at Easton as he clawed at his throat, and then I stood up, walking slowly towards the other man.

  People were dying within this realm, and I didn’t trust him.

  Easton had been taken, and there were more foes than friends these days.

  Who was this guy?

  Had he actually saved Easton?

  I guess we’d find out.

  “What do you know?” I repeated, my Wielding swirling around me. I could feel the power pulsing within me, almost too much to bear. I had to rein it in. Because if I hurt anyone here, I would never forgive myself.

  “Help me. And I’ll help you.”

  I tilted my head up to him, studying his face. He looked sweet, a little scared, and young.

  So young.

  He might be a century or four older than I was, and yet, I felt far more mature.

  He reminded me of Arwin. And that sent another shot of pain through my heart.

  Arwin had died because of me.

  I wasn’t going to let anyone else perish.

  “Help us help Easton, and then we’ll see,” I gritted out the words. He nodded.

  The others looked at me as if I were the one who was supposed to make these choices. Was I?

  I didn’t know. Easton was the king here, and even though he couldn’t speak, he should be ordering people around.

  I only had the power in my veins, and I didn’t know if I could control it.

  I looked at Easton, and then at the stranger, and I hoped we were making the right choices.

  After all, I felt as if I weren’t making many of those these days.

  Chapter Eleven

  Easton

  * * *

  I hadn’t been gone long enough for the world to miss me, or at least, that’s how it felt. I had been gone from the estate for longer periods of time in the past. I’d been on missions to help my people, times where I had hidden amongst them, so no one had known that I was the prince of the Obscurité.

  I had never been gone for this long as the king, however. And I knew that I shouldn’t have let that time pass, even if part of it had been against my will. My people needed me. And I hadn’t been here.

  No, first I had left to go with Lyric, to protect her, to figure out exactly what we needed to do to bring the realm together—because if we didn’t, it would fracture beyond measure, and we would all die.

  I would never be able to forgive myself for not being strong enough. For not being able to fight off my attackers and save who I needed to.

  I’d never be able to forgive myself for being under The Gray’s control for as long as I had been. For still being under his control.

  Because I didn’t know when or if he would take me back, or if he could do something with my memories or change things.

  Was I even myself anymore? Did I have the ability to make my own decisions, to engage in my own actions? What would happen if The Gray took me again?

  What would happen if he took me in front of my people?

  What would happen if he showed up and changed everything?

  He had already changed things, and maybe had done it before.

  Just maybe we’d be able to fix this. I knew we had to. And as I looked into Lyric’s eyes, I tried to remember why I had come back. For the kingdom. For my people. For the family I had made, and for her.

  Lyric.

  I looked into those wide eyes of hers, at the long braid that had come partially undone as it tumbled down her back, and tried to dig down deep and feel what I should. But I couldn’t feel anything.

  I looked at her and I wanted. Only something shrouded that need, buried it beneath shadow and my curse. She was my soulmate. The one who could heal me, the one who had healed me. If we each had mortal wounds, the other would have a mirror image of it on their body, and then we’d be able to heal one another.

  We had missed the signs before, yet they were there. She had been able to save herself with her power, only the magic running through her veins.

  I hadn’t been able to do anything for her.

  Just like I wasn’t able to do anything now. Because I couldn’t feel anything. I wanted to.

  I knew my curse. I knew that I would never be able to love. Never be able to have my soulmate. Part of me felt like I should be able to. Why did it feel as if I were missing something? Shouldn’t I feel the hollowness inside? None of it made any sense.

  “You need to tell us where you were,” Lyric said softly. Her words might have been soft, but there was steel beneath them. I was enjoying finding out exactly who this woman was. This girl. She was so unlike the Lyric I first met at the Fire and Earth border. She hadn’t known how to use any of the power within her then, and I knew she was still learning. She was so strong. Not just in her inherent ability or the way she learned to use it. No, there was additional strength beneath that veneer of hers, and I wanted to learn more about it. Even though I knew I shouldn’t. Because she could never be mine. I would never be able to love her. Ever. That was my curse. Maybe I should tell her. Make it easier for us both. Or perhaps that would only make things harder.

  “I don’t know if I can.” I rubbed my chest, then I looked down at my hands and shook my head.

  “You’re going to have to,” Teagan barked. “Because you just showed up out of nowhere with this guy.” He pointed at Garrik over his shoulder, then I nodded.

  “That’s Garrik. He helped save my life.” At least, I thought he had. I still didn’t trust him completely. Then again, I didn’t know if I trusted anyone anymore. It was hard to trust when everyone kept betraying you, even yourself and your own actions.

  “And how did he do that?” Wyn asked from Garrik’s side. She had used her Earth Wielding to create manacles around the guy’s ankles. It cemented him to the floor, and since Garrik was a Dane, he held no magic to get himself out. I didn’t blame Teagan or Wyn for their suspiciousness. I was just as apprehensive.

  From the look on Garrik’s face, I knew that he figured he might die. He looked defeated, and he had no power of his own. And though he had gotten me out, I still didn’t know why. What was the reason?

  Was it because I was stronger? Because I sure as hell hadn’t been when I was locked in that cage.

  I didn’t know when The Gray would come back. And I didn’t know if Durlan was still alive.

  All of it worried me. However, my worries just kept adding up these
days, so I planned to ignore them. Or at least, prioritize.

  “How did he save you?” Lyric asked, her voice soft.

  I looked at her then, aware that the others were between us. Did they know she was my soulmate?

  Because she couldn’t be. Not really. Soulmates needed a connection, love. There had to be a magical pull between them. We didn’t have that. Because of the curse.

  “I guess I need to explain. I don’t know everything.”

  “Well, you’re going to do your best to figure it out,” my uncle growled. “Because right now, you’re not even acting like yourself. I don’t even know if this is you in front of us, or just a trick orchestrated by the ones who sent you. Are you you? Or are you under their control?”

  “Justise,” Ridley whispered, but my uncle shook his head.

  “No, we need to know the answers. He’s our king. At least the boy we watched grow into a young man that was one day supposed to be our king. I don’t know who this is in front of us. I don’t know if this is really him. Or if everything’s changed. So, he’s going to explain. Or he’s going into the dungeon right next to this stranger.”

  “I am your nephew. The King of Obscurité. I don’t know how the hell I ended up here, how everything came to this, but I am. And I am going to do everything in my power to make sure I remain him.”

  “That wasn’t cryptic at all,” Rhodes mumbled, then looked over at Luken. I noticed that Luken was carrying Braelynn, the little polydactyl cat, who glared at me through slitted eyes.

  Apparently, this was going to be a large family affair.

  No one else was around, there weren’t courtiers or other Wielders or even guards in this area. Not when so many of us could take care of ourselves.

  Anything I said would be in secret. We would be safe. Or, as safe as we could be when I was the one who could be the betrayer. The one who could tell all the secrets to The Gray.

  I hoped to hell that wasn’t the case.

  “Garrik saved me from The Gray.”

  Anyone who had heard the stories as children took a step back or gasped or widened their eyes.

  Justise and Ridley looked at one another, seeming to have some kind of silent discussion or come to an understanding I wasn’t privy to. Had they known? No, however, they obviously had suspected something. It was only Lyric who looked confused. Well, Lyric and Braelynn.

  If a cat could really look confused.

  Rosamond, however, just looked at me, those wide Seer eyes unseeing.

  I didn’t know what she could See with her magic. Or was it just with those eyes of hers? When I looked closer at her, I realized she was using her gift as Seer at that exact moment. And I wanted to know what she Saw.

  “The Gray is the one who will come. The one who has always been here. He’s the one who will end us. Not the one who will survive us. It’s all so murky.”

  She shook her head, rubbing her temples as her brother came to her side and put his arm around her shoulders. She leaned into him, letting out a little sigh. It was odd to see any of the people in front of me leaning on someone else. Everyone was so strong and tended to do things on their own. The fact that Rosamond was even leaning on her brother at all, told me that whatever visions she had been trying to See, or even the ones that were coming at her without her control, were hard on her.

  And there was nothing I could do for her.

  I looked at Lyric again, her gaze uncertain. There was nothing I could do for her, either.

  “What does that mean?” Lyric asked. “Who is The Gray? Why did it just spark a prophecy or vision from Rosamond? You’re going to have to explain it better to me. I might’ve learned a lot over these past couple of months…years. But it’s not enough. You have centuries on me. And I need to know. It wasn’t in the books.” She looked at Rosamond then. “Why wasn’t it in the books? Shouldn’t it have been if all of you seem to know the name?

  “It’s a fairy tale,” Rhodes answered.

  I wanted to punch him just then. I didn’t know why. There was something inherent in me that wanted to get him away from Lyric. I made sure that Rhodes wasn’t the one explaining things. He couldn’t be the perfect one that had somehow survived thanks to the bone magic and would always be there for her. The one who had a clear future and who wasn’t perhaps working for the enemy. I didn’t want him to be.

  I hated this. I hated it all. And I hated myself.

  “A fairy tale?” Lyric asked, drawing out the words.

  Rhodes nodded. “The Gray was supposed to be of the darkness. The one who was there at the beginning of time when the Maison realm was first created. Not much is known about him other than he should be a myth. Like the boogeyman of your realm.”

  “Something you told children to scare them into going to bed early or to coax them into not breaking the rules? That The Gray would get them?” Lyric asked.

  This time, I answered. “Exactly. The Gray wasn’t supposed to be real.” I looked down at my hands, at the blood still on them, and shook my head. “He’s real.” I looked at Lyric, at her wide eyes. “Yeah. Really damn real. And he’s the one who’s been taking me. I don’t know what it means. I don’t know how many times he’s done it. I’d thought it was Lore. Apparently, it was The Gray all along. I thought it was over. I thought whatever Lore had been trying to do to me, the magic he was attempting to siphon from me, I thought it would stop. I thought all of that was over. It’s not. Instead, it’s The Gray. And he’s the one that put the curse on me.”

  “I need you to explain exactly what the curse is,” Lyric said, her voice wooden. Her tone indicated that she had heard of the curse before. Maybe the others were talking.

  That didn’t bother me. I was a king. Everybody talked about me. It had been the case when I was the prince and was even more so now. I just had to get used to it. I didn’t want her to hear things secondhand, though. I wanted her to hear the truth from my lips. That didn’t really matter, did it? Because she wasn’t mine. I needed to get that through my head.

  She couldn’t be mine if I couldn’t feel anything for her. The conflicting emotions running through me confused me and pissed me off. It was like talons digging through my flesh from the inside. One scraping for knowledge, the other pushing things away and trying to hide from it all.

  It didn’t make any sense. The fact that I couldn’t figure it out, meant I wasn’t truly myself. And that worried me. Because if I weren’t myself when it came to Lyric, who was I with anybody or anything else?

  What other powers did The Gray have?

  What other things did he control?

  That was what we needed to figure out. That and breaking the curse. Because I’d be damned if I let someone else control my destiny. I already had the world trying to control things when it came to my future. I refused to let anyone else try and do the same.

  “The Gray put a curse on me, one that has to be broken, though I don’t know how.”

  “What is the curse?” No one else spoke when Lyric did. They all knew the answer, but I needed to say it. I didn’t move forward. I didn’t reach out for her. Part of me longed to, but the other part pushed that thought away. Because, after all, she wasn’t mine. I didn’t love her.

  “I will never have a soulmate. I will forever walk in the darkness. I will never be able to love that person the way I should. So, it doesn’t matter what fate has decided for me, I’ll never love her.”

  I’ll never love you.

  I didn’t say that part. Not aloud. After all, I’d already told her that to her face. And then, The Gray took me.

  I really was an asshole.

  “Okay,” Lyric said softly. “That aside, if he put that curse on you, did he put any others?”

  She was so strong. So strong. She constantly surprised me. She’d brushed over the fact that I was never going to love her, never going to be hers, and moved on to more pressing matters. It didn’t matter what she felt for me. Didn’t matter that she had a mythical pull trying to reel me in, s
omething beyond her control. It didn’t matter that she was going to break inside when all was said and done, and I’d be left empty.

  She pushed it all aside and worried about the others. And maybe that was a good defense mechanism. I wouldn’t want to feel that either.

  Though maybe I wanted to feel something.

  I didn’t know anymore.

  “I don’t know. We need to figure it out.”

  “Yes. Yes, we do,” Justise snapped. “We’re going to break this curse, any curse he has on you. We’re going to break his hold. You know that Lore had to be either working for him or was part of this in some way. He was too close to you for so long. And none of us was able to see it. I’ll never forgive myself.”

  “I should have seen it,” Ridley whispered. “I’m the healer. I should have seen it.”

  “Don’t blame yourselves. The Gray has power. He was within the Shadow realm, and he has those who work for him.” I looked at Garrik. “There’s another, Durlan, who is his second. The Gray called me his third. I don’t believe it. I would know if I had done something for him.”

  That was a lie. One that rocked me to my soul. I ignored it. I had to.

  “Okay, we’re going to fix this,” Rhodes said, surprising me.

  “And you want to help?” I asked, a little sarcastically.

  “Of course, I do. You saw what my father did. What my uncle is doing. I refuse to let our realm continue to die because of these petty things. We are all Wielders. And we’re going to figure out exactly what The Gray wants. The Gray’s goal can’t just be what’s happened so far. There’s an endgame here. You’ve always said, and it’s something I agree with, that someone else is orchestrating all of this. Is it him?”

  “I feel like it is,” I answered.

  “Then we’ll figure it out. Just like we’re going to figure out what Lyric’s role in all of this is.”

  “We already have half the prophecy. We need to find the rest of it. Because I can’t figure it out on my own.”

  I looked over at Lyric and tried to study her face for what was on her mind, but it was blank just then. I couldn’t read it. Usually, her eyes were so expressive that I could figure out exactly what she was thinking or feeling. There was nothing. I felt nothing. Was that the curse? Or was she closing me out?