Page 286 of Scarlet Wars
James shook his head; weapon still trained on the man he used to call a friend. “You release himnow, or I cut you from ear to ear.”
Maurice raised a single brow before the knife vanished from James’s hand, translated clean out of existence.
Well.
That was…sort of anticlimactic.
But my ‘father’ wasn’t the only one with powers here.
My gaze snapped to the open portal, still pulsing faintly, still holding Stephen suspended on the other side.
Time to get some real answers.
“Emma,” Maurice warned, his eyes following my gaze. “Stephen Stone is not your ally.”
I shared a quick look with Caden, who only shrugged, the barest roll of a shoulder, as if to sayyour call.
So I called it.
With a flick of my wrist, I pulled Stephen through the portal, guiding his half-collapsed weight as he stumbled forward. He barely stayed upright before I maneuvered him into a solid chair, my grip firm, controlled.
A quick twist of my fingers, and invisible bindings snapped into place, tight enough to hold him, gentle enough not to hurt.
Then I let the golden haze loose.
It poured over him in a slow, luminous sweep, knitting torn skin, sealing bruises, coaxing breath back into strained lungs. Cuts faded. Blood vanished. But without the missing limbs, I couldn’t reattach them. Though I did manage to take away most of his pain.
His body stilled beneath the magic.
When Stephen finally came to, his eyes flew open in shock.
His gaze jumped; from me, to Caden, to James…
And then landed on Maurice, eyes blazing. “I thought you were my friend.”
Maurice’s jaw tightened, the smile finally gone. “I was,” he said harshly. “Until you nearly got my daughter killed ina fucking car accident, just so you could play hero and save magikind from your little nightmare visions of the Trackers.”
“You were the one who sent me to Boston in the first place!” Stephen shot back, straining against the bindings.
“I sent you to the Human World to retrieve her,” Maurice snapped, anger cracking through his accusation. “Like we’ve done with every Humanborn for cycles. Not to have her hit by a godsdamn human car so she’d translate, you asshole. Not to have her experimented on by your Crown goons. Not to have her bloody arm mutilated on your godsdamn command!”
Maurice was breathing hard, his nostrils flaring.
Stephen shook his head slowly, then lifted his gaze to mine, eyes burning with something caught between guilt and defiance. “You were never supposed to get hurt…”
Before I could reply, Maurice snarled, “Really? Is that why you went to the Chiefs about her?”
“He didwhat?” Caden’s question was a low, threatening hiss, his eyes full of fire aimed at the silver haired man.
Maurice’s spoke mainly to me. “One of my sources told me he’d gone to the High Chief. Told me he spoke to them about the role you three will play in our future. I didn’t know exactly what he told them, only that as a result, the United Chiefs decided you and James should be forced into a True Bond.”
“When was this?” I breathed.
“I found out right after the Great Exposure.”
I let that sink in.
“Let me get this straight,” James reiterated. “You learned Stephen went to the United Chiefs about Emma, and your response was to bubble in an entire country just to flush him out?”
