A Baron of Bonds (Conduit of Light #2)

46. Karus

Chapter 46

Karus

We raced down the corridor, leaving a bemused Talon and Ilyenna in the doorway. Revich pulled me through the foyer and down the hall that would eventually, after many turns, lead to the doors of Viridis. But we stopped short at a door halfway there, both of us out of breath, myself confused with a creeping sense of dread.

I bent forward, hands on my knees, looking up at him as he braced his palms on the black door. “What is this place?” I asked, heaving and pulling my hair back from my face. “What haven’t you told me?”

“I was going to show you,” he puffed, “the day you left Felgren. I was going to show you that night.”

I glanced at the door, swallowing. “Show me what?”

He placed a hand on the latch, but paused. “Karus, I don’t now what we’ll find in here, but if it’s what I suspect, I need you ready. Simulair Solum . Can you start it for me?”

My jaw dropped. “The Blight is in there?”

He nodded. “Parts of it. This is my laboratorium. I’ve been studying the Blight here for years, bringing different specimens together to record reactions. I’m no agricola conduit, but I knew I needed to do something in the time your memories were gone.”

“And you just kept this from me?” I scolded.

“You’ve only just returned to us for a few months. I’ve been…slowly telling you things. Like I said, I intended to bring you here the same night you left.”

“And what about in Hyrithia? You could have said something then!”

“We were busy.”

I scoffed, reluctant to admit how simple that truth was. I folded my arms. “Alright. What do you think is in there, then? Why did you react that way when Pompeii mentioned this place?”

“The last specimen I brought was bark from the trees you grew in Viridis.”

“What!”

“And a pit from the fruit.”

I could hardly wrap my head around it. He’d been studying the Blight for years?

I bit my bottom lip, and he let me think. “You should have told me sooner.”

“I should have.”

“ Simulair Solum. ” I spoke the words to the spell over my cupped hands, a brilliant light illuminating the corridor in mimicry of the sun. I held the swirling mass of sunlight above me, keeping it small in the moment, no bigger than a bowl, but ready to expand its surface if need be.

Pride hit me in full force, coming from the tether between us. I looked up to see his eyes prickling with blue once again. I filled my lungs and nodded at the door.

He took my elbow in one of his hands, Cosensian Magic tumbling over the ball of light in brilliant blue for just a moment as he used his power to enhance mine. With his other hand, he slowly turned the knob of the door, pushing on it slightly, and to my reasonable dread, it caught on something behind the wood surface.

I’d seen this happen before on the day Heimlen took me through the small door that led from Viridis to Felgren. I had witnessed the Blight for the first time that day, and now, I had more reason to be afraid.

Rev pushed harder, my sun growing larger as both green and blue power wrapped over its surface, its glow streaming through what little space we could see.

I don’t think I could ever forget that sound.

The raging hiss of pain.

The sibilant stream of recession coming from the Blight as it withered from the door and from the sun I held in my hands.

He pushed harder still, forcing his shoulder into the dark wooden door, gripping my arm, never letting go.

I felt alive.

I felt incredible power sifting through my blood. The scent of death poured from the room, and I pushed myself through the space Revich had made.

The room was brilliantly lit now that the sun itself radiated through the stone space, and I watched as thick, black vines recoiled from the floor, a long table, and chairs. It had been growing along the fucking wall even, and nothing pleased me more in that moment than to see it wither and shrink back to a shelf near the door.

This Blight was different from the one grown in Felgren. The wood was slick and pustules of black liquid popped sporadically as it diminished, flecks of the substance spotting my dress, flying to my face and hair, some landing on the sun and sizzling into a smoky black steam.

It took only a few minutes for the Blight to recess completely. A husk of the source lay dry and dead on a bed of broken glass.

I turned to Rev and he nodded solemnly.

He let go of my arm, moving closer to inspect what had caused all this in the first place. I tried to bring the sun back to a smaller size—bring it down to a pebble and release the spell.

My hands shook as I felt my power only grow once more, and the bowl-sized sun expanded instead to the size of a carriage wheel.

“Rev,” I pleaded, my thoughts a swirling mist of panic. I’d lost control of my power once before and flashes of that fateful night began to flicker through my mind like pages of a book. It felt as if I was witnessing each second of holding that massive sun over Felgren in tandem with each second that passed in the room we stood.

His soothing voice echoed in the room as he faced me, gripping both of my arms. “Karus, bring it back in. You need to end the spell.”

“I don’t know how!” I shouted, a cold sweat brimming at my brow. My breath came in short bursts as the sun continued to grow, and Rev had to let go or be burned.

“Karus!”

I heard his fear and could do nothing for it.

The simulated sun was heavy, and I remembered that, too.

I fell to my knees as it grew to the size of the door and began to pulse.

“Rev,” I whispered, terror gripping me to a standstill on my knees, memories of that night still flashing before my eyes.

And then…darkness.

I blinked on my back, wondering if I had fainted.

The sun was gone, but the heaviness remained, pumping through my blood rapidly and pressing on my chest in the dim room with only a sliver of light seeping in from the hallway.

No, that wasn’t the sun’s residual weight.

That was Rev.

“Are you alright?” he breathed above my face, smoothing hair back from my head and murmuring, “ Incendo. ”

I squinted in the sudden flare of light as the sconces along the walls flickered to life. I nodded, my eyes darting all over the room, my pulse still reflecting my panic.

“Karus.” He cupped my cheek, easing off my chest. “I breathe, you breathe. Ready?”

I kept my eyes on his and inhaled long and deep through my nose, exhaling out of my mouth in the same beats as he did. I followed his lead four times before I felt my heart settle, and I sat up, taking his hand to rise off the floor.

A muscle ticked in his jaw as he looked over my appearance.

“That bad?” I asked, holding my arms out in front of me to see specks of black remnants of the Blight.

“Your hair. It has more streaks of white.”

I touched my head, pulling strands in front of my face. There were certainly more of them, but I sighed in relief to find that the color still mostly held a chestnut hue.

“Is it hideous?”

“No.”

“Are you…are you upset with me?”

He laughed sardonically and pulled me close to his chest. “Absolutely not. You were glorious.”

“Why can’t I break that spell?” I questioned, my cheek pressed to his neck, flecked with the same black spots of liquid that splattered mine. I traced a small burn there, whispering a spell to mend his skin.

“I wish I knew.”

“You can’t just knock me over every time I use it…though that seems to be the only thing that works.”

“What makes you think you’ll ever be using it again?”

I pulled back from his neck. “How else are we going to rid Felgren of the rest of the Blight? And Viridis? How will we return Viridis to what it once was?”

“Certainly not by that spell, or at least certainly not from you using it.”

I scoffed. “I’m fine . It’s the only thing we’ve found to work, and I can hold the spell longest. Unless you want to train for it.”

“I think I will.”

I huffed, folding my arms at my chest. “You know I have the power to do it. You know that with Cosensian Magic and some more training, we can clear the Blight completely.”

He turned to the door and shut it, leaning back against its frame, his own arms crossed at his chest. “What I know is that both times you’ve used that spell, your hair has lost its color. What I know is that both times you’ve used that spell, you couldn’t let go of it even as it grew beyond a weight you could carry.”

“I can do this, Rev. I was brought to Felgren to do this.”

“You were brought here to die .”

The last word seemed to resonate through the room like a promise never fulfilled by the man who still continued to haunt our lives.

“I’m sorry, Karus, I?—”

I held up a hand. “No, you’re right. What you said is true. But I refuse to believe that’s the only way. It can’t be the only outcome to destroying all of the Blight. I won’t let it be.”

He rubbed his face with his hands, pulling them through his black waves. “Let’s go. We both are badly in need of a bath. I’ll explain this”—he gestured to the laboratorium, destroyed as it was—“after we’ve cleaned ourselves up.”

I nodded, my arms still crossed as he opened the door. I stepped out into the hall, breathing cool air, and he followed, locking it behind him.

“You didn’t lock it before you left the last time?” I asked, headed down the hall.

“No one comes down here except Pompeii to—” He frowned and looked back at the door.

“What is it?”

He opened the lock and barreled inside. I followed, peeking around the door to see him pulling open a basket on a small table near the shelves.

Sighing he replaced the lid, finding the contents empty. “The towels. Pompeii must have come here to clean the towels I used with the last pieces of Blight. The one that evolved into that…thing.” He pinched the bridge of his nose.

“Then you think…” I started.

“Yes,” he continued for me, “Pompeii’s sickness comes from the Blight.”

My bare feet padded across the cold stone floor. I paced back and forth before the fire in our rooms, hardly able to even appreciate being back in them.

Our bath was hot and waiting, just how Rev liked it.

I had stripped down to my undergarments, having thrown my dress into the massive fireplace, watching the ruined fabric flare and burn down to nothing.

If what we guessed was true, we couldn’t risk others becoming infected. We’d chosen to isolate ourselves here after Rev retrieved the towels from Pompeii’s room.

I rubbed my temples, thinking of all that could go wrong. Rev had been exposed for weeks now, so it was unlikely he would be affected. But Talon and Ilyenna had been in Pompeii’s rooms.

What if they caught this blight infection as well?

What if it killed its host?

Maybe we were wrong. Maybe he fell ill from something else, but just as Rev had confirmed himself, I’d never seen Pompeii sick in the time I knew him. And the bruising at his chest looked eerily similar to the black hands of those inflicted with the Black Fever.

Rev stepped through the doorway, and I stopped my pacing. He held a bag in his arms, shirtless and with ill-fitting trousers that were far too small and emerald green, like Pompeii’s livery. I concluded he had shed his clothing, stuffing it into a bag to reduce exposure as he walked through the Fortress.

Closing the door, he strode quickly to the fireplace, tossing the bag into the fire where it burst into flames, and smoke began to enter the room. He erected a wall of blue power around the fireplace to keep us from the fumes and turned to me. “Pompeii is still sleeping. He should be out for another few hours. I’ve informed the staff and the channelers. Talon and Ilyenna are isolating in Ilyenna’s room as well.” He exhaled heavily. “I just hope we’re overreacting. Maybe it’s nothing.”

I shook my head. “You heard his rasp. You saw the dark bruise on his chest—Rev, what if this is something new? What if what I grew in Viridis can infect us all?”

“Then we’ll find a way to stop it. We won’t let it take him or anyone.”

Tears welled in my eyes.

This was supposed to be a happy time.

We were finally supposed to have a moment to breathe back home and instead, our friend was growing weaker by the minute.

“How did Heimlen cure the Black Fever? His journals said you helped.”

“I tried it just now. He pretended, Karus. He pretended to find a spell enhancement that would work and then left for Hyrithia immediately after.” He shook his head. “It didn’t work on Pompeii. I don’t even know if it’s a real spell.”

“We have to search Heimlen’s study then. There must be clues about how he really did it. Since he used the Blight to create the Black Fever, there must be a clue on how to cure this, too.”

“I think that’s a brilliant step forward.” He began to unlace my shift, letting the thin strings fall at my chest before slipping them down my arms. It fell in a soft sigh at my feet, leaving me bare, my skin still flecked in places with spots of black. I stepped out of the shift completely and brought it to the fireplace.

He unbuttoned his too-tight, too-short pants and threw them in as well, letting the wall of magic disperse for just a moment to do so. I tossed in my undergarments, and we watched the flames flicker over what we couldn’t risk getting onto anyone else’s skin.

“Won’t Pompeii be angry with you for burning his trousers?”

“After this, I’ll commission a new wardrobe of whatever he wants.”

I took his hand and we entered the washing room, the steam a welcome sense of normalcy. We stepped into the enormous tub, and I picked up a rag and bar of rose hip soap. I began scrubbing his neck, healing small burns on his chin as I went, kissing them away after using magic to return the skin to its usual sandy hue.

A bit of black stubble was beginning to show, and I brushed my fingers along the sharp line of his jaw, each prickle of rough hair catching on my skin.

He watched me touch him in a mixture of love, worry, and admiration he always seemed to project to me. I knew his concern was about more than this new illness. This was also about how the Simulair Solum spell affected me, and how he knew I was not going to back down from insisting I could use it again.

We would meet this impasse continuously, I was sure of it, and the best thing I could do right then was to show him that I was alright. I could show him that the spell had its setbacks for me, but that I’d made it through this time relatively unharmed, and I could do it again.

I took those moments in the steaming water to show him exactly how fine I was. I slowly, softly brushed the pads of my fingers down the hollow of his neck. They slid down his chest, following the lines of his ribs and over the plains of muscle that had shown more definition again over the past few weeks.

My palm slid over the hard length of him, and he inhaled slowly, his lips parting as I leaned forward to kiss him gently. My lips met his with each slow stroke of my palm.

He lifted his hands from the soapy water and slid them around my neck, taking the kiss deeper, pulling me to him. “I know what you’re trying to do, Karus,” he whispered low on my lips.

I slid my legs over his, pushing myself against him, my breasts pressed to his chest, his arousal pressed to my stomach. “I would hope so, Baron Revich.” I wrapped my arms around his shoulders, kissing him deeply again.

He pulled away and lifted my chin, catching me off guard. “I know you want to convince me you’re unharmed.”

“I am unharmed.”

“Then prove it. Show me, Karus. Show me you can take care of yourself.” He took my hand and guided it between my legs, pressing my fingers to the center he wanted me to touch, holding my fingers and moving them in circles to show me what kind of taking care of myself he meant.

I did so.

Gladly.

He leaned forward, grabbing the rag and soap from the water to wash the Blight from my skin. I closed my eyes and released myself to his touch and mine, pausing a moment to dip my hair back into the tub.

“Don’t stop,” he ordered, bringing my hand back down to what was now slick between my legs. “You don’t stop. You keep going. Keep touching yourself, and don’t stop until you’re ready to beg for me to slip inside you.”

I gulped, a flood of excitement racing through me as my body ached to feel full and completed by him alone.

He slid the soap down my breasts, moving to my neck to kiss the dip into my shoulders. “I want to hear you beg for me, Karus,” he whispered. “I want you push yourself to the edge until you can’t live another moment without me…fucking you.”

I wanted him now.

I was demanding in bed, and I knew that. I always wanted all of him all at once, quickly, greedily filling me, making me whole again while he pounded inside of me.

His thumb brushed my nipple before his mouth, hot and soft, covered it whole, and I groaned, my fingers moving faster in the water.

He scraped his teeth gently over the peak, and I grabbed the back of his neck to bring him in closer, to love me harder.

Gently, he took my hand from his neck, backing away from my breasts and kissed my palm, then the inside of my wrist, sending the trail of his lips down my arm.

My breath was short, my need for him screaming, urging to beg him to take me. He caught my eye with a small upturn of his lips as he watched the turmoil on my face.

To my horror, he rose from the water, stepping out of the tub and wrapping himself in a towel, leaving me there to please myself alone without the presence of him right beside me. Without his hard body over mine to complete the space I held in this world as my other half, the piece of me contained within him.

I gripped the sides of the tub to stand and he was there, guiding my hand back down between my legs and wrapping a towel around my shoulders. “Don’t stop,” he instructed again, but gently, as if he expected me to forget his command.

Just as I was about to break, just as I opened my mouth to beg for him to take me, he pressed his lips to mine, stopping the sound before it could register, urging me to keep going.

I gave a small cry on his lips in frustration, and he returned with the slide of his tongue over mine, rendering me incapable of speech, rendering me breathless as he bent to pull me up onto his hips. My legs wrapped around his waist, and my hand continued my pleasure, brushing over him in turn.

Dripping wet, he carried us to our bed, his mouth still over mine, one hand holding the back of my head as he laid me down, so heartbreakingly gently I wanted to cry, to explode, to plead for him to release me from this build that still rose within me.

He left my lips, pressing himself to my thigh to give me room to continue his bidding. He turned my cheek so it lay flush with the quilt below us. His breath traveled hot on the underside of my jaw as his lips skimmed over my skin, sending flares of pleasure throughout my body, enhancing each swirl of my fingers, now picking up a steady, continuous pace.

“Rev—” I began to plead.

“Don’t,” he growled, pressing his thumb to my lips. “Stop.”

Fuck .

I was going to shatter and he wasn’t even inside me. He wasn’t even kissing me where I wanted him to, where my fingers now circled furiously.

I couldn’t open my legs any wider, and unable to stop my impending release, the stretch of slight pain from trying to was hardly registered as my body rocked and I exploded with pleasure. My hips rose in an urge to find more, more, more .

I cried out, my blood rushing through my veins, the pain in my open thighs tight as I slowly released myself from the stretch of them.

“Beg,” he ordered, fitting himself between my shaking legs, pulling my hands up above my head, and hovering over my body in a promise of the more I wanted.

“ Please, ” I rasped, my plea halfway out of my mouth before he thrust inside of me.

A deep moan escaped me, my body open and welcome to what it wanted, what I was absolutely willing to beg for on that bed, in that room, in that space of the joining of our bodies—the ultimate completion of who we were and what we deserved from each other.

He gave me what I wanted finally as he drove in and out with a wild inhibition, himself consumed by what would always be the truth between us.

My nails dug into the skin of his hand, which pressed mine to the bed leaving marks I knew would stay for hours.

“ Rev ,” I pleaded again, breathless, the second release stronger than the first as he slammed into me impossibly fast, and I lost myself to the time it took for him to give me what was promised.

He collapsed onto my chest, both of our lungs heaving. I gulped, my breath leaving in small moans, his face buried in my wet hair.

“We’re terrible at this,” I puffed.

“I’d argue otherwise.”

“I mean the tea.”

“Fuck.”

I rubbed my face in frustration.

He slid out from me and pulled my leg over his hip as I crashed into his chest. “It’ll be alright. We won’t do it again.”

“That’s what we said last time,” I mumbled.

“We can’t seem to keep our word.”

“Because we’ve gone so long without needing it.” I huffed, pressing my cheek against his chest to listen to his pounding heart. “We just need to get into a pattern, that’s all.”

“What if I drink it all throughout the day, so we don’t have to stop and worry about it ever again.”

I shook my head. “Clairannia said that isn’t good enough. It’s not potent enough to ensure there’s no child if only one of us takes it, and it’s pretty reliable if both of us do.”

He lifted my chin to look him in the eye. “From now on, we don’t risk it. We keep each other accountable. We won’t forget again, Karus, I promise you.”

I believed him.