Page 19 of The Bound Blood
And I swear I can still feel Raiden’s mark—frayed, faint—but present. Trying to calm me. Trying to hold the pieces of me together. Not for long.
The runes hum beneath me, dull and constant like a second heartbeat. My fingers curl into the fabric of the dress Kael gave me, now wrinkled and cold against my skin. I can’t tell how long I sit there—seconds, minutes, hours—before the door opens again.
Professor Marris steps inside.
Her heels click against the stone before she stops just outside the edge of the glowing circle. Her eyes catch on the sigils etched into the floor, and I watch the way her mouth tightens, the way her fingers flex around the stack of books and notes she’s holding.
She doesn’t approve of this.
Good.
“Lindsay,” Professor Marris says softly, voice rough with something that might be exhaustion. Or anger.
I don’t answer.
She lifts her hand, murmuring a quiet spell under her breath. A shimmer of light weaves into shape beside the wall—runes flickering as a narrow table forms out of nothing, just outside the ring of the warded space.
She sets the books down gently, her eyes never fully leaving me.
“You weren’t awake when they brought you here. You were unconscious and still recovering. They had no right to treat you like a threat.” I can hear the anger in her voice, and it soothes me slightly, like I’m a black cat hissing and back arched, and she knows how to calm me. She lifts her hand and whispers another spell under her breath, and a comfortable looking chair with blankets and pillows appears next to me. “Sit.” She nods at the chair she’s spelled for me, and my heart squeezes.
Empathy. Who knew it was so powerful. I swallow, unsure whether to thank her or cry.
“I’m not dangerous,” I manage as I sink into the plush chair and tug a soft blanket over my chilled legs.
“I know,” Professor Marris says, and this time it’s immediate. Unflinching. “They’re afraid. That doesn’t make them right.”
Something cracks inside me at that. Just a little, enough to allow me to breathe.
She steps closer, still outside the containment ring. “I wanted to be there when you woke, but they—” Her jaw tightens. “The Council insisted you needed space.”
“To be locked in a glowing cage?” I bite back. “Very generous.”
Professor Marris doesn’t flinch at the venom in my voice. “This isn’t what I wanted for you. You need guidance, not confinement. What happened that night—it wasn’t caused by you alone. Maybe your presence is waking something up, but that isn’t your fault.”
Her eyes flick to the runes again, and I can see how much she hates this—how much she wants to undo it. But she’s here anyway, shoulders straight, spine taut with the quiet strength I used to admire in class.
She exhales, the sound barely audible, but it feels like it came from her soul.
“Before we begin,” Professor Marris says, her voice steady, “I need to assess the current state of the bond.”
She doesn’t ask me to do anything. Just lifts her hand and murmurs another spell—this one older, slower, the kind meant to reveal rather than restrain. A ripple passes through the air, brushing across my skin like a soft caress.
The runes beneath me flare once—then fracture into branching light, gold, black, and silver threads spooling outward in every direction.
Not just one.
Three.
Professor Marris gasps softly.
I stare down at the strands, at the distinct tethers of magic webbing out from me, each humming with a different frequency. One pulses steady and warm—Raiden. Another flickers like unstable sunlight—Nolan. And the third coils like shadowed glass—Kael.
She crouches, not touching the threads, but studying them with a scholar’s eyes and a protector’s worry.
“This… this isn’t just a Veilbond,” she murmurs, more to herself than to me. “This is something else entirely.”
I want to explain. I want to tell her about the dreams, the echo of Kael’s touch, the way Nolan’s magic calms me. But I can’t form the words. I’m afraid if I speak, it’ll make it real.
