Rebirth (Lost Souls #1)

Chapter 15

A fter days, perhaps even weeks, I start to feel somewhat okay with the spells that I’ve created. Despite my fatigue and the exhaustion that gradually starts to set in, I decide to just go for it. The longer I wait, the bigger the chance is that he’s going to find out and stop me. I’m surprised he hasn’t already.

I find myself in front of the mirror in my bathroom again. There is a slight hesitation in my touch as I reach to pull the sheet away. Seeing my reflection is like seeing a stranger look back at me. I know that keeping the mirrors covered up doesn’t help in getting used to it, but it’s just too much, too unnerving.

My hand tightens around the knife as I look down on my healed arm that won’t be healed for much longer. Without hesitation, I plunge the blade deep in my arm and make a cut from my shoulder down to my elbow. I grind my teeth against the pain that flares from my arm to the rest of my body. It hurts like hell, and I quickly start to feel lightheaded as blood flows from the wound. But I shouldn’t heal the wound as it would take away from the sacrifice, so I bite through it.

My hand is shaking when I put the knife aside, my head not feeling all there, and I dab my fingers in the blood. It takes a second for my hand to be steady again and for my eyes to see clearly. Once they do, I carefully draw the circle on the surface of the mirror. It’s so elaborate that I have to extend it to the wall that the mirror is mounted against.

It takes me a while, but when I finally get to reciting the spell, the circle immediately activates. Blood crawls to the center, glowing ominously as the symbols start to twist and turn. There is a click , like a key turning in a lock, and dark clouds appear on the other side of the mirror, obscuring my vision. Cracks form, and the clouds seep through to my side.

Aware of the fact that I don’t have long, I use more blood to draw a protection around myself. It feels cold and heavy against my skin, like a suit of armor. With another deep breath, I step through the mirror. Once I emerge on the other side, I need to start on the third and final spell—the spell that will turn me into a mass murderer.

When I emerge on the other side, a scream is brutally ripped out of me. My gaze is unfocused as I look around, blinking rapidly, and my hands drop to my sides. I try to hold back another scream while my stomach clenches as if I’m going to be sick. I’m standing in a wasteland. The ground is dark dirt, soil littered with dark-gray rocks and stones, pieces of broken wood and shards of glass.

“No, no, no.” I spin around, wincing because it’s more of the same no matter where I look. My gaze darts around as I start to tremble, my breathing restricted, on the verge of hyperventilating. There is nothing around me but ruins. Buildings long destroyed, homes long abandoned, streets overrun and utterly deserted. Dust and dirt and rubble.

The sun draws sharp shadows on the stones, and there isn’t a single sign of life anywhere.

“How? This is supposed to be a city.”

My hands curl around my head and I sink to my knees, unable to grasp what’s going on. I had selected this city because I knew that it would be inhabited with enough people, no matter day or night. Yet here I am, most likely the only living thing around. Even if there is still someone else, it will never be enough. It won’t suffice.

My strength leaves me. My body is heavy, and my chest hitches from trying to hold back a sob. This is it, I tried and failed. All will leaves my body. I’m exhausted and drained, both physically and emotionally.

Moments later, there’s the inevitable tug that tells me that I’m out of time. I give in to it and, as it starts to take me back, my protection shatters sooner than it was supposed to. I’m instantly hit by the effects of my spell. After all, even if it wasn’t successful, there is still a debt to be paid, and I’m the only one that can pay up.

My screams of disbelief make way for screams of pain. Blood drips from my mouth, nose, and ears, even from the corners of my eyes and from under my fingernails. Red is once more all that I see as I’m catapulted back into my bathroom. The speed at which I emerge is so high that I smack against the towel rack on the opposite wall. The impact of my body against the steel breaks my back and almost snaps me in two. The mirror shatters moments after I’ve passed through it. The shards fly through the bathroom and cut my flesh as I only barely manage to raise my hands and cover my face.

Eventually, the sound of shattering glass passes, and my ragged breathing is the only sound in the bathroom. Then there are my groans as I find myself unable to move my legs. They are sprawled in a weird angle, and I frown, then notice that I don’t feel anything from the waist down. A broken piece of the towel rack sticks out of my stomach, perforating me.

I curse and clamp my shaking hands around the metal. Another curse leaves me, for I’m too weak to do anything but dangle there. Blood drips on the floor from the wound in my stomach and from the many cuts on my skin.

Breathing becomes more difficult with every passing second until my eyes roll back in my head and my body goes limp.

D arkness is all there is. It surrounds me, swallowing me whole while I float in this vast nothingness. Warmth infuses my body, and there isn’t a single trace of concern or worry in my mind. There’s a pleasant sense of dizziness, making me giddy as I enjoy the euphoric feeling of weightlessness. It’s so peaceful here; all I want is to close my eyes, drift away, and rest.

The soft sound of wings reaches me, and it confuses me. Has an angel come to take me away?

Warm hands touch my skin, and a feather brushes my cheek. Someone holds me close, and there’s a heartbeat in my ear. It puts me at ease, comforts me. More than the reassuring darkness, it’s like a passionate embrace.

Then there is pain and discomfort, cold and unease, but mostly pain. From far away I hear myself scream. The darkness is red, fear, and hatred, and I don’t want to be a part of it. But I have no choice but to go with the flow. Until, at last, I’m able to open my eyes.

I find myself back in his dimly lit bedroom, the scent of apples and nutmeg in my nose. He sits next to me once more and he seems... worried? His posture is stooped, his hands clasped together, and his eyes unseeing, staring off in the distance.

“You should have let me die.” My voice sounds like someone else’s, weak and broken.

He looks up at me. “You’re no good to me dead,” he replies coldly, and somehow exactly what I expected. Yet for a moment I spot a slow smile, indicating that perhaps he’s not as uncaring as he wants me to believe .

Nevertheless, a weak laugh escapes me. A cough catches me off guard and feels as if someone stabbed me in my stomach. Which is, in a way, what happened. My fingers gently touch the bandages wrapped around my stomach. I wince at the sharp pain the touch sends through me and drop my hand next to me.

“It’s going to take time for you to heal,” he says softly.

“Please,” I interrupt, “don’t act as if you care.” My voice cracks from the effort that goes into speaking.

“You’re mine, and I will do with you as I please.” He sounds as if I’ve insulted him. Perhaps I have. “But it also means that I will protect you.”

“You should have let me die,” I repeat, turning my head away from him. “For it would have been better to die than to be trapped here forever.”

“You were trying to escape?”

As if he had no idea what I was trying to accomplish...

I nod, and he chuckles. From the corner of my eye, I catch him shake his head. There is a moment of silence before he gets up and walks toward the door.

“Your quarters are a bloody mess, so you can rest here until they’re cleaned up.” He looks back at me, his voice flat and emotionless. “Don’t die.”

He steps out, and I slip away again, though no darkness awaits me this time. Only disturbing dreams of a scorched earth and a city destroyed. Dreams filled with chaos, pain, and fear.

A feeling of abandonment is all that I recall once I wake up. I do remember the city that inspired the dreams, and I wonder about what had happened. How has it been so completely destroyed?

“Something’s on your mind,” he notices when he comes to check up on me.

Part of me wants to ignore him, because I feel forever confined by both his words and actions. But the other part of me is curious and slightly worried.

“The city I returned to,” I say, fidgeting with the sheet while I give him a sidelong look, “was in shambles, death and destruction were everywhere. I—what happened?”

“What happened,” he says, turning to face me with a smirk, “is something that humans are so very good at. War.”

“War?”

“A global war, nation against nation. Vicious and cruel in a way that the world has never seen before. That’s what destroyed that city.”

I go quiet, unable to imagine something like that. He has a point, though. Humans are violent creatures, and we tend to leave death and destruction in our wake.

“Wait,” I suddenly say, and the bewildered tone in my voice makes him look up. “What did you mean by ‘humans’? Are you not… human?”

“Have I ever implied that I was?”

I don’t know how to react to that unexpected new piece of information. Of course I assumed he’s human.

“Then what are you?”

Sophia called him a monster. I’ve thought of him as a monster, but he can’t actually be one, can he? I recall the way he looked in the library, with the fire casting eerie shadows on his face. I gulp when I remember how I thought it made him look demonic. And then there’s that bloodred skin. But demons don’t have wings, do they?

“That would be telling,” he says with a teasing smile.

I need to know, but on the other hand, does it matter? I’m still trapped here and, if he does turn out to be a real monster, a demon, it doesn’t change my current predicament.

He looks at me, his head slightly tilted to the side, as if he can tell that I do want to ask more despite my silence. Though I don’t understand, right now I can’t bring myself to care. The feeling of emptiness that I’m cultivating inside of me starts to grow big enough that soon it will undoubtedly be able to swallow me whole.

T he moment that I’m strong enough to walk farther than to the bathroom and back, I get up and leave his quarters. I don’t feel like spending more time there than necessary, so I make my way back to my room. Most of my wounds have healed up nicely, only the hole in my stomach needs more time. It holds me back with every move that I make and, even though I used my healing spell, the process remains infuriatingly slow.

My bathroom has been patched up again, but now there is a shower next to the bathtub, an addition that I’m grateful for. The shower rack has thoughtfully been replaced by a model that runs parallel to the wall. Let’s hope I don’t manage to impale myself on this one as well.

A fter isolating myself in my room for I don’t even know how long, I find the motivation to step outside. Walking through the garden, I barely notice the moving shadows around me anymore. It’s reassuring, for it means that my sight is stabilizing, becoming my new normal.

I don’t even look up when he sits down in the grass next to me, under my favorite tree. Me in a powder-blue sleeveless dress and ice-gray corset. He wears a dark, almost black, gray dress shirt, waistcoat, and slacks. I take notice of how he’s not wearing a tie and of how the top button of his shirt is undone. It’s a small thing, but it somehow makes him seem more relaxed. Yet he looks very much out of place, sitting here in the grass with me.

We are silent for a few moments, until he turns to look at me. “I might be able to help you get back, but time will be limited.”

I look at him in disbelief, my mouth falling open. “Why?”

“There will be no consequences,” he continues, completely ignoring my question. “When the time is up, you will automatically be sent back here.”

“Why?” I repeat, my tone more demanding this time.

He looks at me from the corner of his eyes, not showing a single trace of emotion. “Because it might help you get closure.”

“Closure? Everyone that I know is probably long dead by now.” I laugh, the sound of it cold and detached.

“This is my offer. You either take it or leave it.”

I snicker at the idea. “Sure, I’ll take it. Just to return here and hate you even more, since that really is all I have left.”

He doesn’t react to my small outburst, though that’s probably for the best.

“Why limited time though? Why can’t you make it so that I can stay there?”

“Because I can’t stay there. I have my ways to be able to step out for a bit. But leaving here—staying there—is not possible. Not for me, and not for you.”

My stomach sinks at hearing his words. Words that mean my attempts to escape were futile from the start. “So, because you can’t, neither can I? What kind of idiocy is that?” My voice comes out small and weak, and I swallow.

He throws me a sideway glance that almost makes me regret my words. “This is my prison, and since I brought you here, it’s yours as well. ”

“I think that he is as much a prisoner here as we are.”

I hesitate for a moment, his eyes warning me to not press the matter. “What do you get out of it? Of me leaving, even if only temporarily?”

“Whatever I want, whenever I want it.” He flashes me a smile, baring his teeth. “Is that acceptable to you?”

It’s a horrible deal no matter how one looks at it, but it’s all that I’m going to get. Perhaps if I’m able to leave for short periods of time, I might still be able to figure out a way to make it permanent.

“It’s not as if I have much of a choice in the matter.” I shrug, trying not to show him that my mind is already trying to find a way to work around his limitations. Or about to spiral down into a panic attack. Truth be told, it could go either way.

He looks at me, dead serious, waiting for me to say it.

“Fine,” I sigh, reluctantly. “I accept.”

He leans in, and I instinctively flinch away from him. He growls, grabs the back of my neck, and pulls me back. He kisses me, and the next moment I’m standing in the middle of a crowded city square.

My magic crackles softly, confirming that it isn’t a trick. Though everything seems so alien, I’m back. I’m really back. It's enough to almost make me tear up, my chest swelling with joy while my eyes flit around to take in as much as possible to try and determine where and when I am. The voices around me tell me that at least the language hasn’t changed all that much. The city, on the other hand, has changed a lot.

The buildings are considerably taller, the architecture plainer than what I’m used to. Strange steel contraptions on wheels go up and down the streets. They look like carriages but without horses and much louder. The people have changed as well, wearing clothes that are quite different from what I’m used to. I stand out like a sore thumb in my attire. Passersby give me a few glances, but I don’t let it bother me. Even the smells are different, and I struggle to put a name to them. It smells dirty , I conclude as I hold back the urge to pinch my nose.

I start to walk and take in everything around me, sneaking a glance at a pile of newspapers being sold at a small shop. I catch the date, and I nearly gasp. It’s been a hundred years since the day that I died, or rather should have died. No wonder that this city, my hometown, seems like a different place altogether. And I’m sure that it’s my hometown going by some structures that have barely changed since the last time I was here.

Walking around, I recognize some more bits and pieces, mostly buildings that show their age. The church is still the same, with the old clock in the tower that tells me it’s late afternoon.

As my feet wander, I proceed with caution, crossing streets by the example of others that seem to follow the guidance of lights that change color. After some time, I find myself on my old street. The bakery on the corner is the only thing that seems at least a little bit familiar.

This street was once a part of the upper middle class. Now, the city has expanded so much that it’s a part of the heavily populated center. I find my old house, looking newer than when I lived in it. The stones on the outside have been thoroughly cleaned, the windows are obviously new, as is the roof, and one of those weird carriages stands out front. But most of it looks the same, and I don’t know what to make of this.

Is this the home that I’m trying to return to? Even though it hadn’t felt like home for a long time, seeing it now, like this… it just feels wrong. I wrap my arms around myself as a shudder goes through my body. I’m disoriented for a moment, now that I see, literally, that I really do have to rethink my plans for after I get out. If I even manage to leave permanently.

Looking back up at the house that was once my home, I sense something. Something oddly familiar that I can’t put my finger on. I close my blue eye and look around with only the green one. The house has its own aura, something that I didn’t think was possible. It’s dark and foreboding, as if to warn me away, unmistakably a marker of what I did here a century ago. Yet, unsettling as it is, that’s not it. Grinding my teeth, I know what to do. It’s the only way to know whether this feeling is just a feeling or not.

Nerves thrash inside of me as I bite the tip of my finger. A dollop of blood wells up, and I whisper a tracking spell. “Zacam gi gi pah torzul c noquod cocoasb.”

The dollop fizzles and expands into a translucent magic circle. If my gut feeling is correct, then this spell will give me the proof that I need. The circle hums gently as it starts to change as it feeds on my all-too-vivid memories and the proximity of the house. The circle turns into a thin red line, like a thread, and shoots away from me. Not sure what I’m hoping to find at the end of it, I start to walk, following the red thread.

It leads me through vaguely familiar streets until I reach a park that I definitely remember—my mother used to bring me here when I was a child. The memories create an excited flutter in my stomach. Seeing it almost exactly as it was back then makes me forget about the tracking for a moment. My nostalgia takes over as I enter, looking around. My posture relaxes, and a slight smile plays around my lips.

The houses surrounding the park are as classy as I remember them being and clearly well kept. Mothers are on their way home with their children, meeting each other at the entrance of the park and stopping for a little chat. How I once wanted, wished, to be a mother, to come here with my own children.

As I stand there watching, a little girl breaks away from her mother and comes running to me. She stops right in front of me with a big smile on her face, thrusting a flower out to me. Blinking rapidly, I squat down to her level and accept the flower from her.

“Thank you.” I smile, genuine happiness filling me for the first time in a long while.

She looks at me, mesmerized by my differently colored eyes. Her mother calls for her and, as she turns and runs back, she yells, “Mommy, Mommy, it’s the Snow Queen!”

I laugh at this, for I remember the story and it’s a fitting comparison.

The girl flies in her mother’s arms and enthusiastically points back at me. I wave and smile at her mother, the flower still in my hand. She looks at me weirdly, for my almost completely white hair is not exactly common. Then she shushes her daughter, and they start to leave.

Mother and daughter disappear into the distance, and I return my attention to the task at hand. The red thread still beckons me, leading me away from the park. I carefully place the flower on a wooden bench and continue on.

Night falls, and I’m led through some shadier parts of the city. Parts where the men are drunk and shamelessly try to come on to me. One of them is so persistent in his pursuit that I actually have to use my magic to chase him away. A little spell to make him bleed from his eyes makes him quickly leave me alone. Even though he was the last one to follow me around, I’m unable to shake that feeling of there being someone else. It has me looking over my shoulder multiple times. Every time I do, I only find darkness staring back at me.

I cross a bridge over a river and enter a rustic suburban part of town. It’s filled with pretty houses, all neatly lined up in rows. Behind the windows are families having supper, children playing, husbands reading, and wives working in the kitchen.

The families are living their lives to the fullest, but I notice that the wives aren’t, not really. They are living their lives for the sake of their spouses and their offspring. When their husbands aren’t looking, they seem sad and exhausted. In that moment, having partially lived that life, I don’t understand why I ever wanted more of that. It’s demeaning, the way that they have been captured in these beautiful lies. Lies in which they are never meant for more, only to take care of their families. A twinge of pain stings my heart, because it makes me realize that I do want more. Even though, right now, I’m a different kind of prisoner myself.

The red thread ends at the front door of a house with a striped kitten sitting behind the window and a family sitting in the living room. A husband reading his newspaper, a wife rocking a baby to sleep. That feeling of familiarity comes over me again, and that’s when I notice that the red thread didn’t stop at the door. It went inside the house and split off in the living room. Three split ends, each of them pointing at a member of the family. I scrunch my nose, feeling bewildered about what this might mean.

I blink, and then I’m back in the garden in the exact same spot, with him still sitting next to me.

“How long was I gone?” I ask, my mind still with that family, pondering.

“A couple of minutes, give or take.” He looks at me with a smile that I’m unable to return.

Instead, I voice the confusion that refuses to leave me. “Something is wrong.”

He just continues to look at me, his smile melting away, but his posture remains unchanged. I return his gaze, unease building inside of me.

“I need to go back,” I say, upon which he averts his eyes.

“That won’t be possible.”

“Because you can’t, or you won’t?” He smiles a cruel smile which tells me that it’s the latter. “Why?”

“This trip was a gesture, to help you get closure. If you want to go back again, then”—he leans in closer, until our faces are almost touching, then he reaches out to gently caress my cheek—“I’ll need something in return. Something that I, unfortunately, can’t take by force.”

“Whatever I want, whenever I want it.”

I gulp. “You already own me. What more could you possibly want?” I sound braver than I feel, a knot forming in my stomach.

He chuckles. “Your body might be mine, but we both know that you’re more than just that.”

His eyes light up briefly, which makes him come off as even more of a predator than usual. Yet my heart beats faster when he touches me, his eyes piercing mine.

Then, suddenly, he breaks away and gets up. “Think about it.” He smiles as he walks away, leaving me flustered.

Is he expecting me to say yes without knowing what it is that he wants? I don’t trust him, and everything he has said and done up until this point has felt like a test. Making this another test? Or is this where it has all been leading to? Giving me little bits and pieces of what I want while finding out how far he can push me, until I come to the point where I’ll just accept whatever he asks of me?

I know nothing about him, yet it feels as if he knows everything about me. He probably does.

My thoughts wander to that family I saw.

I have to go back or find another way to make sure, to confirm or deny this gut-wrenching feeling. Going back means that I give him what he wants, whatever that might be.

I bite the inside of my cheek, thinking about it. As I taste blood in my mouth, I figure that I should just go and ask him. After all, he never said that I couldn’t ask any questions.

He’s not in the library, which means that I have to go to his quarters. The last time that I was there was far from pleasant. I let out a deep sigh, knowing I don’t have much of a choice .

There is a light quiver in my stomach when I open the black doors and enter the dark hallway. I conjure a blue flame in the palm of my hand, and the hallway lights up, blue flames throwing flickering shadows against the walls. For the first time, I’m able to see the doors on both sides of the hallway.

With the exception of two, all the doors have a red, magic circle over them. Wards that I know I won’t be able to break. The unmarked door on the right-hand side is his bedroom. The unmarked one at the end of the hallway is the one that leads to the red room.

It only takes a quick look to determine that he isn’t in the bedroom or bathroom, so I carefully descend the stairs to the red room. The door downstairs is ajar, and I cautiously let myself in, my feet shuffling slightly with every step I take.

The room seems smaller than before, filled with piles upon piles of books. In the middle of it all stands a large, dark-brown leather sofa. He sits on it, his legs crossed and frustration clear on his face. He flips through a book, tosses it aside, then picks up the next one. Just as before in the library, he seems to be searching for something. He throws me an angry glare as he tosses yet another book.

“What do you want?” he snaps, and I instinctively take a step back, my body shrinking in on itself.

“I came to inquire about what it is that you would need in return.” My voice is barely more than a mutter, my mouth going dry with every word that I speak.

I’ve barely spoken the words when his whole demeanor changes. He stands up and puts the book down, a cocky smile on his lips and a twinkle in his eyes. The next moment he stands in front of me, making me flinch as I back up against the door.

He puts a hand against the wall next to me and cups my chin with the other. His fingers softly stroke my cheek, so at odds with how he has me caged in. “You’re considering it?”

“I’m not considering anything until you tell me what you want,” I say, some strength returning to my voice.

He smirks, locking his eyes on my own so that I’m unable to look away. My mismatched eyes show me both of his faces, the bloodred and warm honey blending into each other. I’m starting to get fed up with his bullshit, and this bleeding image makes me snap. Pressing my lips together, I take a deep inhale and push him off of me.

He goes willingly, taking a step back. Yet his eyes remain on me, not wavering for a second, not even stumbling from my outburst.

Refusing to look away, I cast a spell, my words and movements quick. In the split second that it takes for him to realize what the spell is, I land my fist in his face. A fist that is covered in a layer of ice-blue magic that rips away his skin upon making contact.

His head snaps to the side, and his look changes from cocky to disbelief. His glamor sputters and falls in pieces from him, shattered, revealing his red skin once more. He wipes dark blood from his mouth and laughs at the sight of it on the back of his hand. The open wound on his cheek is already knitting itself back together, disappearing within mere seconds.

“Getting feisty,” he remarks. “I like it.” He swiftly uses his hand to block a second fist from connecting.

Breaking his nose will be for another time, then.

“I guess I had it coming,” he adds unexpectedly whilst letting go of my hand. “I did promise you that I would get rid of the glamor.”

He turns around and goes back to sit on the sofa. He casually picks up the same book, looks at it briefly, then tosses it. He gestures for me to come and, feeling myself cool off, I oblige. His eyes are still glued to me as I walk over to join him.

“I have to admit that I quite like the person you’re becoming. Who knows, you might actually be able to take me on at some point.”

“The person that I’m becoming? ”

He leans forward before I’m able to fully formulate my question and starts to stroke my hair, almost petting it. For once, I don’t flinch away from him, though a feeling of unease lingers deep inside me.

“Killing them has set you free, has inevitably changed you,” he says, tangling his dark-red fingers in my silver-white hair. “It’s allowing you to become the person that you were always meant to be.”

“My hair?—”

“Is nothing to worry about,” he interrupts. “It’s just a physical marker.”

“Of what?” I ask, flexing my fingers, my magic buzzing at the tips.

He casts a look at them, takes note of the ice-blue energy that sparks right next to him. “Magic comes at a price, love. You overspent by killing them, and the resulting backlash left its mark.”

His hand moves from my hair to my lips, touching them softly, then moving on to my neck. His grip grows stronger, and my heartbeat quickens its pace. He notices and retracts his hand, the look in his eyes changing slightly.

He smiles, his fingers touching his own lips just like he touched mine, and I end up being the one that has to look away.

“About my offer...” His voice is serious once more, and I look at him again. “I can give you everything that you want, everything that you could ever want, in return for your hand in marriage.”

I find myself dumbstruck by his words, my mouth falling open. “I’m sorry. What?”

“Marriage.” He laughs, the sound deep and warm, almost genuine. “It’s the easiest way to describe it, but it’s much more than that.”

“Why? Why would you want to marry… someone like me?” A sense of vertigo sets in, and it makes my head spin. I blink at him in an attempt to regain my senses, but it doesn’t help much. It feels like a bl ack hole opened up under me, about to swallow me whole.

“As I’ve said before, you have potential. A potential that I’m going to need. But you have to offer it to me freely.”

“Then why not ask when I’ve come into this potential? Why marriage?” I don’t think I can do this; the mere idea is enough to reduce me to nothing. I already feel myself spiraling out of control.

“Because you need a little nudge to help you along the way. The kind of marriage that I’m talking about will allow you to tap into more magic than you can possibly imagine. It will give you the chance to fully develop.”

“What kind of magic?” I ask hesitantly, disbelief making way for suspicion.

“So many questions, love.” For a moment, I think he won’t answer me, his yellow eyes looking me up and down. “You would be able to channel my magic as your own. Sophia has already laid the groundwork for this by steering you toward the use of blood magic. Which is my trademark, so to say.”

“And why would I willingly agree to this?”

“Because there is only so much magic that you, as a human, can harness of your own accord. This is the only way if you want to become stronger.”

“I would be able to go as I please?” I find myself gently biting my lip in an attempt to contain my eagerness.

He nods, his eyes on my lip that I quickly let pop free. “The spell only works with my magical signature.”

“Will you let me go even if it means that I might not come back?”

He laughs again. “Oh, you will come back. Always. For you will be bound by the same limitations that have bound me for centuries,” he explains.

The time limit , I realize, my stomach dropping. It will force me.

“What is it that you need from me in return? What does this marriage give you once I’ve come into my potential ?”

“That’s something that I can’t tell you. Not yet, at least.”

I take a few moments to think about it, but there isn’t much of a choice. If I want to go back, I have to accept his offer. Despite not knowing what he will be asking for in return. He carefully regards me as I think it through, patiently waiting for me to speak.

“How do I know that you’re speaking the truth?”

“I have no reason to lie.”

“And I have to take your word for it?”

“Like I said before, you take it or leave it.” He smiles wickedly.

If it’s indeed the truth, then that means that what little bit of freedom he offers me with this is all that I’m going to get, no matter what. If I want to get anywhere, both literally and figuratively, I have no choice but to accept. Being forced to return here every time I leave is better than never being able to leave at all.

But that doesn’t mean that I have to accept right away. “Will you allow me to think about it?”

“Certainly,” he answers. “But don’t take too long. I don’t like waiting, and you don’t want the offer to expire.”

“I only have a use for your body and for what you might be able to accomplish.”

I nod to him in reply and, as I make to leave, I think of one final detail. “What”—I turn back to him—“if I ever decide that I don’t want to be married to you anymore?”

The look that crosses his face upon hearing my question makes my stomach turn. He gives me a smile that makes him look lethal. Feral. “Till death do us part.”

The way he says the words has the hairs on the back of my neck rising. I try to fight down the feeling of unease, of foreboding, that his words bring me. I turn on my heels and swiftly leave the red room and his quarters .

I carefully think through all that he told me. Offered me. And the risks I’ll be taking by accepting, not knowing what he’ll demand in return. Knowing that if I accept, I’ll have to kill him if I ever want to be free of him. I don’t know if that’s something I’ll be capable of, seeing how much stronger he is than me. Even if I’m somehow able to use his magic as my own, I have no certainty that it will be enough.

It looks like Sophia was right in the end. He made me an offer that is almost impossible to refuse. And I find myself willing to pay, even though I don’t know the full price. Even though I might end up binding myself to a monster— a demon? —without knowing if I can ever escape him.