Page 100 of Claimed

Excellent. If I have to suffer, everyone else can be mildly inconvenienced.

Rowan’s mouth twitches. ‘Whatever she said, she’s right. You should listen to her.’

He ignores that. ‘What happens if the spell continues pressing against this gag?’

‘The same thing that happened tonight, with greater severity.’ Rowan’s gaze moves to my throat. ‘Her body will punish the attempted confession. The spell may tear blood from the vessels, seize the tongue, close the airway. If the truth is… seismic enough – and it looks like it is – it may rupture more than her throat.’

This time he can’t suppress his emotion. A growl tears from Valentin, so violent, the air around him chills. Then blasts the room with hot striations.

‘And you…’ she continues.

‘What about me?’ he snarls, and it’s clear he’s nowhere near as interested in what’s happening to him as he is in my predicament.

‘The mark will keep trying to complete its intention through her blood. Each failure feeds the poison and accelerates deterioration.’ She looks at me. ‘The more he wants the truth from you, the more you attempt to give it, the harder Selphine’s work bites down.’

Can you think it to me, little hunter? Valentin demands grimly in my mind.

The question slips under every piece of armour I have left. Because I did try. Foolish or not, I wanted him to know before all of this broke us open.

I tried, I send back, and my voice shakes in my own mind. When you collapsed. When you were bleeding and unconscious and I thought the truth might save you. I tried, Valentin.

Shock fills his eyes, then regret. Then, as pain claws up my throat, panic flares in his eyes. ‘Stop! Enough, Eira.’

Fuck.

So Selphine didn’t merely protect me. She put intention in a cage.

She kept me from confessing until the moment suited whatever plan she refused to share. Protected me, yes, maybe. Also controlled me. Used my fear of Valentin as the lock and my gratitude as the key I never realised I kept handing back to her.

Anger flares through the weakness.

Valentin can feel that too, because his gaze returns to my face.

I can’t speak. I don’t even know what words would survive my throat. So I let the anger sit in the bond, hot and sharp.

His expression changes. ‘You believe Selphine designed this to control when you could speak.’

I nod once, and even that hurts like pokers forged in Netheris.

Rowan’s gaze sharpens. ‘That is likely.’

Valentin’s power lashes outward before he reins it in. The Glass shrieks, a high, thin sound that makes my healing throat convulse. I cough, and Valentin is beside me in less than a breath, one hand under my jaw, the other braced beside my head.

‘Enough,’ Rowan snaps. ‘Your temper is shaking the very artefact already trying to count down your death.’

His jaw flexes, and for a moment, I think he might actually obey someone without threatening them.

Miracles exist.

‘We find Selphine,’ he says.

‘Yes,’ Rowan replies. ‘And I work on separating the poison from the curse-pattern.’

‘Before the hunter heals?’

Rowan steps away from the Glass. ‘She needs strength before I touch any layer of spellwork. The gag already punished her once tonight. If I press now, I could trigger another bleed.’

Valentin’s hand cups the side of my face, possessive and careful in a way that makes my heart ache. ‘Can she take more of my blood?’