A Baron of Bonds (Conduit of Light #2)

78. Karus

Chapter 78

Karus

Green grass lay brilliantly through a grove as I stepped out of the portal. The dry seeds of the maple trees spun lazily to the ground in an elegant twirl.

A man leaned against the trunk of a tree, his arms crossed at his chest, his attire in the form of a Baron, but different than Revich’s, a slightly more jaunty cut, the collar of his shirt flicked open at his tanned neck.

I circled around, looking for Revich, who, once again, was not there. My face fell into my hands, and I was ready to scream.

“I do not wish to cause you distress. I only wished to see you here, before you do or do not accept Revich’s offer,” the man spoke to me, but I didn’t want to hear any more.

I wanted to go home to Revich.

The silence stayed as the light flutter of maple seeds cascaded down on my head, still buried in my hands.

I finally rose from them, masking my face in strength with a deep inhale of my lungs, pulling from some place where my sanity still held firm.

He was tall, with a square jaw, hazel, deep-set eyes, and a piercing stare. A shadow of a mustache grew above his lip. His hair was a dark brown, cut short, but longer on the top, one piece curving over his widow’s peak and curling onto his forehead.

I lifted my hands, gesturing to my body. My channeler clothing was filthy, covered in soil, blood staining the space of my knee, the hem wet and layered in a dark film.

He raised a brow, and I shrugged.

“Do you know who I am?” He kept his arms folded and pushed off the maple tree, walking my way.

“Of course, I do. How could you be anyone but him?”

“Who?”

“Adaynth. First Baron of Felgren, First Trainer of Conduits, Lover of Visalia, Betrayer of Visalia, and apparent Person Who Should Be Long Since Dead , but isn’t, and is standing in my way of getting home to the man I love.”

He smirked, his eyes brightening. “You seem to know much about me, Karus of Hyrithia. Karus of Felgren? Or was it Karus of the Northern Steppes? I’m not entirely sure.”

The maple tree he had been leaning against burst into flame. The crackle of wood lighting on fire echoed through the grove.

He turned slowly and shook his head. “You’re good at that, aren’t you? Growing trees,”—he pointed to the maple seeds falling—“setting them on fire.”

I took the flames back. My rapid exposure of wrath extinguishing with the smoke that rose from the damage I had done. “What do you want with me?”

“Truthfully? Nothing. In fact, I’d prefer you weren’t here at all.”

“Then why am I here?”

“Unfortunately, you passed the Baron trial and now will have the choice to take exactly half of Baron Revich’s power for your own.” He paused, slowing, but stepping closer until we were a mere three feet apart. “I hoped to convince you to decline.”

I scoffed, folding my own arms across my chest. “Why? Because I am a woman?”

“No,”—he shook his head, closing our gap—“because you are hers .”

I swallowed. “I am not.”

“You do not face it well, but it does not make it less true. I see in you the same power that once brought Felgren to its knees, breaking it almost beyond repair before I could heal it.”

“Was that before or after you killed your child?”

He stilled. His eyes darkened, and his irises filled with black. “Is that what she told you? That I killed our child?”

“It is what she believes.”

He nodded once, his gaze flickering above me, following another maple seed falling. “Revich is calling to you, and I do not have much time. If you take this power, you are taking more of her into you. She gave you the power you wield, and yes, Karus, you would have been a channeler regardless, but she gave you that.” He pointed to the charred tree. “She gave you that darkness, that rage that burns under the surface, and if you accept this piece of her as well…” He shook his head. “I don’t know how you could not be more hers.”

“I’m not?—”

“You will become her , Karus. She seeks to replace the child we lost. She will not give up on that pursuit. Everything she does is in that one desire.”

I began to fade, my breath catching in my lungs, my eyes closed even though I could see him, mournful before me.

“Remember that, Karus. Never forget what she wants most.”

My eyes flashed open, catching on the eyes of my love, a deep blue, brimmed in dark night, his hair falling into his face as he held my head in his hands. The moon rose high above us, almost a full, brilliant silver circle.

“ Karus . Karus!” Rev shook me and I blinked, then filled my lungs completely with Felgren.

“Dammit, Karus, say something!”

I grinned. “That was five trials, not four.”

“Fucking dam?—”

I didn’t get to hear the rest of his curse as he slammed his mouth to mine, pulling me up, pulling me to him, breathing all of me in.

I scrambled into his lap, wrapping my arms around his neck and my fingers through his hair.

I ignored the tugging on my mind as his hands pressed to my back. The insistent pull was no more in this moment than an irritant to be set aside until we were done.

I didn’t need to breathe. I didn’t need food, or water, or sleep.

I needed him. I needed this sustenance more than?—

“ Do you accept, Karus of the Blightress, the power of the Baron of Felgren? ”

The question was more of a scream than a breezy whisper, but I recognized Adaynth’s voice. I broke from our reuniting to cover my ears, pressing my head into Rev’s chest.

“It will only get worse the longer you wait to reply,” he whispered, pulling on my chin to meet his gaze. He shook his head. “It is your question to answer. I will love you and care for you either way, but I wanted to give you the choice. I wanted you to see that you are more than capable of wielding this power. I will give it to you. I will share it with you. This is your path to choose. I come with you regardless.”

His eyes were so much like his mother’s. So brilliant and loving.

“I saved her. I saved her for you.”

“Ah, Karus,” he said, kissing each of the hallows of my eyes, “that is the lesson of the Baron trial. You return to the current Baron’s most painful day outside of Felgren and you save them from that sorrow. But here, after the trial, you are reminded that time is not ours to change, even as a Baron.”

My lips trembled, and I held off another yank at my chest.

He pressed his forehead to mine. “Thank you. Thank you for saving her in there.” He paused, a small grin crossing his face. “She was beautiful, wasn’t she?”

I nodded, muttering, “Yes.”

“ DO YOU ACCEPT, KARUS OF ? — ”

“I accept on one condition.” I addressed the force, staring into the bluest eyes I had ever seen.

I smiled as tears fell down my cheeks. I traced his with my fingers, cupping his face. “I wish to be able to save this man from any more pain. Somehow, some way, I wish to be able to keep him happy, and safe, and loved.”

The earth stilled. I swore time truly did stop for just a moment. One small moment, before we both heard the last three words on the wind. “ I will try. ”

The rush of power was great.

Revich’s shoulders dropped. He leaned into me at the same time I felt I could move the stars, which shone brightly in the sky.

His breathing was heavy and mine was expansive, spreading over every treetop, every inch of the space between, through their core, down into the earth, through even the smallest droplet of water as it fell from the tip of a leaf thousands of acres away from where we sat on the ground below my first charred maple tree.

“Rev…” I breathed, the fulfillment of power through me too great in that moment.

“I know.”

“I can…”

“I know.”

I pressed my hands into his chest. “Are you alright?”

He nodded, looking back up at me. “I feel like I’ve been split in two, but otherwise fine.”

My new power begged to be used, begged to be wielded in the forest which synchronized with my every sense of being.

“It needs a release,” he continued. “Something to pull you back down from its force.” He kissed my neck lightly, moving up to the base of my jaw.

“How did you release it before?” I rasped, knowing he was right. I couldn’t keep it here like this inside of me.

“Tears. I kneeled on the steps of the Fortress and wept.”

I closed my eyes and melted into the brush of his thumb across the bottom of my lip, the stroke of his fingers as they slid across my shoulder in a light graze. I sighed, falling onto his mouth, tugging on his lower lip, mumbling, “Let me find a different release, Rev. Let me find it with you.”

I burned. I flew. I saw the entirety of the isle, spread over miles and miles of forest, and marsh, and plains, and mountain.

I held onto him with every ounce of strength I had left, for if I should let go for even one single moment, I would disperse into the wind, forever riding upon it, forever holding no place to land.

His mouth, his hands, the hard length of him inside me kept me grounded, a place in time I could stay and accept all of what I had now become.

The Blightress’s given power and the power of the Baron of Felgren fused and mixed. As I slid my body over Rev’s, each of these parts of me warred and loved, raged and embraced, like two lovers reuniting, forgetting all that had been said and done in what was the past they’d rather forget.

He wrapped an arm around my waist as I felt I could float into the night. He slid his other to the nape of my neck, convincing me to stay with him, keeping me from spreading into the sky as something entirely new, something entirely different than the woman I was.

My power sought more than release. It sought chaos and precision.

The earth underneath our merged bodies rumbled and my hips responded in ravenous pursuit of the one finality over my lover’s body that could ground me, keep me solidified.

He watched my face with love and awe, vigilance and pride.

And as my eyes filled from emerald green to the abyssal black, I knew.

His face was pain, remorse, as if he knew that by my accepting what he offered, he’d lose a little part of me in return.

But I had made a condition. I’d have the power to make him happy, make him whole.

I slammed onto him again, taking it all, closing my eyes and shoving aside all the dark, all the black, my eyes flicking open once more to watch his face as they refilled with brilliant green.

He grinned and I kissed that grin, the roots of the charred maple tree coming to the surface to wind over the earth in a knotted headboard and four sturdy legs.

I grew the grass, I released my power to form a soft mossy pillow under his head. Our bed of the forest held us up off the cold ground, our bodies bare, our bond seeping over our hands, clasped in remembrance of the day we’d bound ourselves together until the day we no longer breathed.

His blue, my green, were there again in an enchanting symphony of power.

His magic roamed, a caress over my hips, pushing down on his, a brush of pleasure over my breasts and up my neck, reaching my mouth to touch my bottom lip.

I needed to come back down. I needed to expel some of this power as it built inside of me before I was lifted from his body into an expanse of time where he could not follow.

“Stay here,” he whispered, bringing himself back up to catch me. “Stay here, with me.”

His mouth met mine, another anchor to keep me from drifting, his hands winding around me once more.

“I…I’m trying.” I saw the grove, the maple trees that spun from the earth around us in the same pattern of the place I had been before. Their seedlings fell, drifting in a dance to the ground, the tree I had burned years ago taking the same place as the one I had charred just minutes ago in another Baron’s presence.

I knew this place. I built this place, and I wondered for a moment if I had somehow gone back to it. Not in space, but in time, the first Baron the only thing missing from where I had been.

“You will stay.” He held me still and turned, laying me down on our bed of grass and roots and moss, one hand holding my leg to his waist, the other gripping mine above my head. “I need you to stay. Do not go where I cannot follow.”

The twirling seeds fell into his hair, over our bodies, as he held me to the earth, using everything he had to keep me here with him.

His body was my salvation, my only hope at surviving this transfer of power whole and mortal, and as he slammed into me again and again, I cried out, my body solidifying, my power blooming into a maple tree in my mind, its roots strong, its trunk a solid char of black, leaves a verdant green.

I found my end in his arms, my peak in his mouth on mine, my essential release underneath his hard, warm body, which met with my own in the same moment and place of grounding ecstasy.