Her scream stopped, but not her shaking or her tears. Another few minutes passed before Silny released Kitty. The glowing ended and both collapsed.
Silny continued shaking her head and sobbing. “No. Please no.”
The white film over Kitty’s eyes faded. She whispered, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” Over and over she apologized. Her words stopped when she had to swallow to wet her throat. When she spoke again, accusation filled her tone. “I left. You should have let me stay gone. Why did you bring me back? Why?”
Chigaru didn’t understand. “Kitty?”
She ignored him and yelled at Silny, “Why?”
Silny pushed to her hands and knees, shaking with the effort. “I did it to myself. I should have never…I wanted it gone. This pain.”
“I told you to let it be, my love,” said a male hidden by the trees.
Chigaru faced the newcomer.
A human entered the clearing and walked to Silny’s side. He draped his arm around her shoulders. “Why must you be so stubborn?”
Silny leaned against the man with a pained sob.
“I know you’re hurting. I remember this well. But you have to overcome and finish what you started. You owe her that.”
“I owe her nothing,” Silny snapped.
Chigaru asked, “Are you speaking of Kitty? She has given you what you wanted. Heal her. Now.”
The man said, “Do it, Silny. This child doesn’t deserve death. And her death will solve nothing.”
Silny didn’t move.
“Or shall I heal her?” He dropped his arm from her shoulders and started to stand.
“Don’t. Don’t you dare give her such a gift.” Silny caught his hand.
The man pulled from her grasp and shoved her roughly toward Kitty. “Then be done with it. I told you to leave well enough alone and you refused. This pain is your punishment. You will not extend that punishment to an innocent. What she was is not who she is now.”
Kitty laughed as she let herself fall. “Don’t bother. Let me die.”
“No,” Chigaru yelled.
“Oh shut up. You don’t want me, remember? No one wants me. Always someone else. Always.” She turned her gaze to Serenity. “Fate is punishing me to submit me to this cruelty again. Do nothing, Silny. Let me die rather than relive this.”
Silny crawled over to Kitty and said in a harsh tone, “If it would pain you, then letting you live is exactly what I want.” She looked over her shoulder. “Come, Hell Hound. Let us heal your mate.”
Kitty bit out, “Bitch.”
“If I must suffer with my past, then you must suffer with your present.” She pulled a dagger from her waist.
Chigaru caught her wrist before Silny could lower it to Kitty’s throat. He didn’t know what Silny intended, but he knew deadly intent when he saw it.
Silny said, “You will perform a binding. The blade must touch her blood.”
“I am the one who must touch the blade to her blood, not you.” He snatched the dagger from her and then knelt at Kitty’s side. With slow gentle movements, he placed the blade to Kitty’s wound.
Kitty said, “Don’t.”
Silny smacked her palm against Kitty’s forehead. “Be silent.”
Chigaru watched in confusion as Kitty’s eyes shifted from dark brown to light brown, their normal color. He hadn’t noticed they had changed. What had Silny done?
Kitty looked at him in confusion. “Chigaru?”
Silny said, “Finish, Hell Hound. You know the ritual, correct?”
He nodded. “Yes.” He placed the dagger in Kitty’s hand, which he raised to his chest. Guiding her movements, he applied the pressure needed for the blade to cut his skin above his heart.
“What are you doing, Chi? Stop.” Kitty pulled away, dropping the dagger.
Chigaru caught her hand in his. “Pick it up. We must do this.”
She swallowed and nodded slowly. He released her so she could retrieve the dagger and held out his palm. “Cut my hand.”
“Why?”
“Do it.”
Kitty hesitated before laying the blade against his palm. He closed his fingers around it, digging it into his skin so he bled. Kitty jerked back again and Chigaru let her. With a light toss, he flipped the dagger. “Your hand.”
She held it out to him.
He made a short, neat cut in the middle of her palm and then pulled her to a sitting position before pressing her hand to the wound on his chest. “Do not move,” he whispered.
She nodded, looking scared and confused.
He placed his hand over her wounded shoulder then said in a soft voice, “Our lives be bound. Our hearts beat as one. So long as one lives the other shall live. I will keep you at my side for you are my true mate, my love.”
“Love?”
He smiled at her. “Yes.”
A soft glow surrounded them as Chigaru lowered his lips to Kitty’s. Some of the tension left him when she returned his kiss. Everything would be better after this. He had time to apologize properly and gain her forgiveness for his denials of her.
Something poked his hand. He pulled back from the kiss and lifted his hand from Kitty’s wound. The bullet pushed free before the wound knit together. Kitty now shared Chigaru’s life. She would live as long as he lived, which meant her wounds would heal at the same rate as a bhresya’s.
Silny said, “It’s done.”
Chigaru picked up the bullet. “What of the flesh?” He looked at the wound. Nothing but the bullet had exited.
Silny turned Kitty’s face so their gazes met. After a few tense moments, Silny said, “The flesh remains but is dormant. It should have exited with the bullet. I cannot retrieve it now without causing a new wound.”
Kitty asked, “Will the flesh hurt me?”
“Not with your life now tied to Hell Hound Chigaru’s.”
“Then let well enough alone.” She pulled her head out of Silny’s grip and closed her shirt.
Melchior stepped forward. “Silny, you have committed treason against my crown. How do you plead?”
Silny rose to her full height and faced Melchior with an air of calm surrounding her. “I am guilty of forcing you to acknowledge the love you have for your wife, which allowed you to find and save her after her brother kidnapped her.” She smiled when Melchior startled. “I taught Joah erasure magic, but such magic cannot keep true mates apart. I did not tell him that.”
Serenity asked in a low voice, “Why did you do it? What could possibly justify the pain you caused me? The loss of Chigaru’s arm? The loss of…of…” Her words shuddered to a halt and she hugged her arms.
“After regaining my memories, I can say it was not worth the cost. However, you cannot say the same.”
“What do you mean?”
“Tell me, Queen Serenity, would you be true bhresya queen if I had not acted the way I had?”
Serenity jerked her gaze up to Melchior’s. She appeared uncertain and Melchior shared her expression.
Silny asked, “Would you have Nilam if I had not acted the way I had?”
Neither Melchior nor Serenity answered.
“Melchior acknowledged the bond between you two because of my actions. That is why I gave Joah erasure magic.”
Melchior said, “We have never met. What concern is it of yours if I acknowledged the bond or not?”
“She wanted me,” Chigaru said with a slow nod. He met Kitty’s gaze. “Silny needed Kitty to regain her past. Kitty resided in an alternate version of Gezane, a place Silny could not reach. As Kitty’s true mate, the path was open to me.”
Silny said, “Hell Hound Chigaru would have never left Queen Serenity’s side so long as the possibility remained she would one day turn to him. The red cord of love binds them. Even now I see it between them.”
Serenity gasped at the same time Kitty sucked her teeth and looked away from Chigaru.
“However, the silver cord of true mates is wrapped in a red cord of love as well. Between Queen Serenity
and King Melchior the cord is thick and the red surrounding it as bright as the red between Queen Serenity and Hell Hound Chigaru. Between Hell Hound Chigaru and Kitty, the silver cord is present and thick between them—made so because of their binding—but the red cord of love is faint.”
Kitty snorted. “Why am I not surprised?”
“Your denial is the reason it is faint, Kitty.”
“Me?” Kitty yelled jabbing her finger into her chest. “Why the hell is this my fault? He denied me. He was going to leave me so he could return to her.”
Chigaru reached for her but she smacked his hand away. “Kitty, I told you the reasons why I did not want to bring you here.”
“Yeah but I didn’t know you were talking about me at the time. And those were excuses, not reasons. The first day we met, you knew I was your soul mate. You fucking knew and you were going to leave without saying a word. If you hadn’t lost that stupid scroll, you would have returned home so you could continue mooning over another man’s wife.”
“Kitty—”
“Tell me I’m wrong. Go on, Mr. I-can’t-lie. Tell me.”
Chigaru closed his mouth because he couldn’t speak the words she wanted to hear. Kitty wasn’t wrong. Without giving her a chance or trying to know her, he had determined to leave her.
“Ha! I knew it.” Kitty pushed to her feet and faced Silny. “Can you send me home?”
“Kitty!” Chigaru jumped to his feet and grabbed her arm. She tried to pull away from him, but he held her.
She stopped fighting him but didn’t look at him. To Silny she asked, “Can you?”
Silny spared Chigaru a glance before she said, “The magic that retrieved you could send you back.”
“Good. Let’s get this party started.”
At the same time, Chigaru yelled, “No.”
Silny said, “I said the magic could send you back. It could if you hadn’t performed the bonding.”
“What?” Kitty and Chigaru asked in unison.
“You are bound to him, Kitty. Your souls are mingled. No magic will part you now. There is no magic stronger than the silver cord between true mates. Mates not yet bound can surmount most magic, as King Melchior found out.”
Chigaru relaxed though he didn’t release Kitty. She wouldn’t be able to leave him. That gave him time to make up for his shortsightedness upon their first meeting.
Melchior said, “You gambled much on the possibility I would acknowledge Serenity and thus be able to track her.”
Silny nodded. “I did. Though I regret the return of my memories, I still would have done it. You lost much but look at all you gained—a half-breed daughter who is heir to the Nexeu throne, humans living as equals in Nexeu, bhresyas traveling freely and unmolested to most human kingdoms. Would any of that have been accomplished if Queen Serenity had remained your trophy?”
“No,” Serenity said in a soft voice. She placed her hand in Melchior’s and smiled up at him. “Much was gained after we were bound as true mates.” She turned her gaze to Chigaru. “And though they are at odds, Chigaru has gained his mate. That is cause for happiness.”
Kitty grumbled under her breath, “Says you.”
The human male said, “Silny has wronged you and admits to it, King Melchior. Pronounce your sentence.”
Melchior turned to Serenity. She shook her head. With a soft sigh, Melchior said, “Your actions caused pain, but also joy, Silny. The joy is the reason I pardon you of your crimes.”
Silny bowed. “Thank you, your majesties.”
“Do not think to work your magic against us again. I will not show leniency a second time.”
The male said, “As to that, King Melchior, you would have to come get her to punish her and I protect what’s mine.”
From the woods, several large wolves entered the clearing, surrounding the group. Chigaru looked at them all in turn. He couldn’t believe he hadn’t sensed their presences. The drama of earlier had distracted him, but not so much that he wouldn’t have noticed this threat. “Vampires.”
The male smiled, showing fanged teeth. “Lycanthropes to be exact. I’m the vampire.”
Chigaru asked, “Who are you?”
“I am Trent, second-in-command to King Ganon and Silny’s husband. I came to ensure my wife survived this meeting.”
Melchior said, “If you had attacked us, it would have meant war between our two peoples.”
“And so it would have. I’m sure King Ganon would have enjoyed the exercise. He’s been suffering with a bout of ennui these last few centuries.”
“War is not a game to be used as a way to alleviate boredom.”
“Ah but it is to us. You bhresya do not fear true war with the humans because of your secret. Know that the vampires have a secret of our own and it could level this entire planet if we chose to use it.” Trent pulled Silny to his side with his arm wrapped around her waist. “Think on that, King Melchior, the next time you look at a map and contemplate Night Creature Forest.”
“Take her and go.”
“I plan to without your permission.” Trent reached into his cloak and withdrew a small orb. He tossed it toward Chigaru and Kitty. “For you, my dear.”
Chigaru released Kitty to catch it, but the orb dodged his hand and landed on Kitty’s. She stared at it in confusion.
Trent said, “Should you need her, Silny can be reached using that orb. Remember, Night Creature Forest will always be open to you, Kitty. Only to you. All others must seek permission to enter our land or risk being attacked.” He leveled his gaze at Chigaru as he said the last.
Kitty nodded and mumbled a thanks.
Silny said, “I would appreciate you not contacting me, no matter what Trent says.”
“Come now, my dear one.” Trent squeezed Silny’s waist. “Your magic brought her here. That makes you responsible for her.”
“I do not—”
“And you now know that isn’t the only reason you are responsible for her,” he said with an edge of menace.
Silny sighed with a small nod.
Trent’s earlier good cheer returned. He swept his free arm in front of him and gave a half bow. “Good day to you all.” In a soft flash of light, he, Silny, and the wolves disappeared.
Melchior said, “Let us return to the palace.”
Everyone nodded.
Chigaru yearned for the comfort of his bed and a long rest. He looked at Kitty and knew rest would be a long time coming.
Serenity said, “I will ride with Melchior. Chigaru, you and Kitty can ride Ines.”
Chigaru started to thank her but Kitty said, “No thanks.” She walked over to Erezion. “Hi, handsome, mind if I ride with you?”
Erezion turned a worried gaze to Chigaru, who couldn’t be angry with the male. It wasn’t Erezion’s fault. Chigaru waved Erezion forward, unable to do anything else. At least Kitty was returning to the palace. Everything else would have to sort itself out in time.
Everyone mounted their lysidis and started the journey back. Nym pulled her mount alongside Chigaru’s and said, “I do not like her.”
Chigaru stared at Erezion’s back, trying to see Kitty and failing. “Do not let this first meeting color your impression of her. You two have much in common, Nym.”
Haige edged his mount closer to Chigaru’s other side. “We already know they are matched in a fight. Perhaps that is from where Nym’s dislike stems.”
Nym growled at the male.
Chigaru looked from one to the other in question.
Haige said, “Your Kitty bested Nym earlier this day.”
“She caught me unawares,” Nym snapped. “I did not sense her attack coming and couldn’t defend against it.”
“Many of your opponents say the same about you, Nym.”
“Do not compare me to that human.”
Chigaru asked, “She attacked you? Why?”
Haige said, “Nym became angry at the scent of your blood covering the girl and acted. Your Kitty simply defended herself while
demanding someone save you. She was very fierce.” He turned his attention to Erezion. “Her current anger does not compare to the determination she showed earlier. I think her actions now are from hurt.” He met Chigaru’s gaze. “Did you truly intend to return without her?”
“Yes,” he whispered. “I, like Nym, judged her harshly after a brief first meeting.”
“You compared her to Serenity and found her too dissimilar to hold your interest.”
“Yes.” Chigaru hated admitting it. The pain of that one word eclipsed any other he’d felt that day. He understood Kitty’s ire and couldn’t think of a way to alleviate it.
Chigaru couldn’t make his feelings for Serenity disappear. Silny had declared for all to hear the red cord of love still existed between Chigaru and Serenity. Kitty wouldn’t forgive that.
Haige patted Chigaru’s shoulder. “Do not feel too badly, my friend. We are all guilty of the same. Serenity has become the mark against which we measure all human females. I have heard Alexa and Theyn arguing on more than one occasion about the attention he pays Serenity.”
Nym said, “I have heard those arguments as well. We all love Serenity. I would not be surprised if a red cord binds all of us to her.”
“Maybe not a deep a red as the one between her and Chigaru, but still there. We are her Hell Hounds, after all.”
Chigaru nodded.
“Ancraf and Lidan have started having issues with their females after joining the Hell Hound ranks.” Haige gave Chigaru’s shoulder one final pat before returning his hand to the reins. “I say all this so you know you are not alone in this issue.”
“I appreciate the sentiment, but Kitty will not care if every male on Gezane is enamored of Serenity. She only cares that I am.” Chigaru sighed.
The true reason he didn’t want to bring Kitty to Gezane had revealed itself. Chigaru couldn’t change the way he felt. He knew his love for Serenity would hurt Kitty. And yet now Kitty was here and bound to him, and Chigaru couldn’t imagine ever having wanting to leave her.
Not feeling the heat of her pressed against him on this short ride to the palace made his chest ache. Jealous anger toward Erezion rose up inside him and Chigaru knew for the first time how Melchior must feel. The jealousy Chigaru had felt for Melchior didn’t compare to the gnawing anger and growing urge to harm his fellow Hell Hound for touching his mate.
Kristar (Bookstrand Publishing Romance) Page 13