Page 29 of The Bound Blood
I don’t know what to do with that. I already feel like I’m carrying too much—magic, expectations, the weight of not falling apart when it would be so easy to just let go.
“You know this doesn’t fix everything,” I say.
“I don’t want everything fixed,” he says. “I wantyousafe. We’ll figure the rest out one day at a time.”
Something twists inside me—hope and hurt and something that might be love or might be the memory of it.
I finally sit back on the chair, curling my legs beneath me. “Then stay.”
Raiden crosses the rune line without hesitation. It buzzes louder, resisting the intrusion, and his whole body tenses like he’s fighting the magic that wants to keep him out and me in. Then silence falls the second he’s on the inside with me. He closes the distance between us and kneels in front of my chair.
“I’m here, and I’m not going anywhere.”
Electricity sparks along my skin as he envelopes my fingers with his. His fingers wrap around mine—warm and steady, anchoring me in a way that makes it harder to hold on to the numbness I’ve been surviving inside.
I study our hands, the way his thumbs brush over my knuckles like a silent promise, like maybe he’s trying to memorize the shape of this connection before it slips away again.
“I’m still angry,” I whisper.
“I know,” he says.
“And scared.”
“I know that too.”
The bond between us pulses—not the magic of the Veil-binding, but something older, deeper. Something I don’t havewords for. The connection that snapped into place when he fought with me the other night.
And I can finally breathe again.
TWELVE
NOLAN
The wallsof the lower archives don’t echo, but I can still hear the old magic buzzing inside the old books down here. I’ve always been able to hear magic. Probably one of the talents that got me my scholarship in the first place.
Tamsin lounges upside down on a velvet reading chair, legs dangling over the backrest like a question mark, while I pace the small room we are waiting in. I think I’ve carved a visible path in the floor.
It’s been three hours since Auron dropped his little political grenade and left us to figure out how to start a movement without setting the whole school on fire. And the worst part? He’s right.
Wecanget away with more than he can. Because no one’s watching us.
No one expects us to matter. Not when we’re treated like token students. We are just expected to fall in line and do everything we can to stay in their good graces.
“I’m just saying,” Tamsin muses, twirling a quill between her fingers, “if wedostart a riot—sorry, ‘movement’—can I be in charge of the rallying chants? I have slogans. Some of them rhyme. It would be fire.”
“We’re not setting things on fire,” I mutter.
“Not yet,” she sings.
I rub the heel of my hand against my temple. There’s too much static in my head and not enough information.
Lindsay’s locked away in a warded chamber because they think she’s dangerous. No—because theyneedher to be dangerous to justify what they’ve already decided to do. Professor Marris is the only one even attempting to help her, and even she’s walking a blade-thin line.
And Raiden…I know he has visited her, and the last time, there are whispers that he stayed with her.
The thought should sting. It doesn’t. Not really. He’s part of her bond. I get it. I’ve seen what that connection does to people. But that doesn’t mean I trust him to hold the line if the Council pushes.
Which means I need a strategy. Because if I can’t get inside that chamber, then I’ll damn well make enough noise out here to shake the walls.
