Bloodline Alchemy: A Young Adult Urban Fantasy Academy Novel (Bloodline Academy Book 6) - Lan Chan (libby ebook reader txt) 📗

true. If Max had any idea about the mating link, nothing else would matter. The link was a gift from the old gods of their dimension. A cosmic compulsion that went beyond instinct. I shuddered at the thought.

Cordelia startled into alertness. The way she blinked at me gave little reassurance. “I’m sorry,” she bleated. “I tried to glean the true meaning of the vision, but it’s shrouded. Almost like somebody has tampered with the Sight.”

“It doesn’t matter.” The words could not have been coated with more bitterness.

“Sure it doesn’t,” Andrei said, his expression suddenly soft. It made me want to curl into a ball and weep. Andrei Popescu felt sorry for me. Could I get any more pathetic?

Ever the optimist, Eugenia cleared her throat. “You know these shifters are nothing if not co-dependent. Look at the situation in the Reserve right now. Durin is hanging by a thread and it weakens Yolanda. Alastair Thompson has given his life-force to sustain Durin and it’s draining Shayla in return.” She glanced at me and scratched under her left eye. “There’s every possibility that the reason he dies is because you die.”

“Thanks,” I muttered, my voice thick with defeat. “I had thought of that.” Karma was the biggest bitch ever and I hated her with every fibre of my being.

I hadn’t known that I’d been balling my fists until the sharp pain of nails digging into my palms made me wince. Andrei blew out a breath. “You low witches don’t do things by half-measures, do you?”

The world blurred. “Aw, c’mon cupcake.” I swiped at my cheek, but the tears kept coming. “Shit,” Andrei spat. “Forgot which human I was talking to.”

My lower lip quivered. He placed his arm around my shoulders and shook me gently.

Sniffing, I locked my rage at the unfairness away with everything else. Because if I didn’t, there was no way I would be able to put one foot in front of the other. “I…please don’t tell anyone. He can never find out.”

“How are you doing with it?” Eugenia asked.

I sniffed. “Doing with what?”

She gave me a cheeky smile. “Don’t forget that Shayla Thompson was one of ours before she defected to the Reserve.”

No, I hadn’t forgotten. Suppression was the more accurate word. “Fine.”

“Right.” She pretended to inspect her nails. “So, no insomnia or urges to peel the skin off your own bones?”

“No.”

Her gaze flicked to the ragged skin around the cuticle of my nails. “Uh huh. You’re almost as good a liar as Alessia.”

“I’m not lying.” Not at all. I didn’t feel anything so passionate. Just a soul-sucking emptiness in the very depths of my being and a continuous oppressive weight on my chest making me feel as if nothing would ever be right again. So really, I was fine.

“How are you containing it?” Cordelia wanted to know. “By now he should have an inkling too.”

I bit the nail on my left thumb and mumbled something. “What?” Andrei and Cordelia asked at the same time. I repeated myself. Andrei swiped the hand away from my mouth.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “For a second there, I thought you said a blood barrier.”

I blinked at them demurely. He practically threw my hand back at me. “What’s wrong with you? Is that why there’s a hint of necromantic magic clinging to you?” Ah, right. He was a creepy sniffer.

For once, I wasn’t content to be lectured. “You heard the portent. If we mate, he dies. I don’t think even death would stop Max from completing the mating. So there’s nothing wrong with me.”

Without warning, I got to my feet. Not bothering to thank them or to say goodbye, I lifted the hood of my jacket and barged through the tavern. A dull ache slid down my neck where my jaw was winched shut and I was grinding my teeth.

Basil had asked me the reason why I had wanted to learn how to hold back an oppressive force using the strength of my blood. The lie I’d come up with hadn’t been remotely convincing. But I was a fugitive, and he couldn’t leave Betty to protect me, so in the end he had relented. That the barrier spells had been designed for necromancers to bind undead to them hadn’t escaped my attention. In fact, I’d been counting on it.

The black, life-warping energy of the undead was a direct counterbalance to the beating life of the mating link. If anyone were to check, all they would see was an aura of evil. It was quite fitting really. The whole of supernaturaldom thought I was the spawn of a mass murderer. I was just proving their assumption.

Andrei caught up to me just outside of the tavern door. Human indignation still didn’t beat out vampiric speed.

“Hey!” he said. “Wait up.”

When I lengthened my stride, he appeared at my side and grabbed my arm. “Stop manhandling me!” I said.

“Sophie!”

I rounded on him. “Yes?” I projected rage into my expression. What he saw seemed to give him pause.

“It’s not your fault–”

My anger dissipated as a wave of euphoria hit me. It was artificial and almost sickening in its purity. The tears I had shed earlier dried so quickly I almost stopped breathing. Andrei came to a dead stop beside me. The red ring around his eyes receded to a clear crystal blue that was visible against dawn’s early light. His mouth tipped up into an uneven smile. Like he had no idea why he was happy.

Everything that had been wrong a moment ago suddenly didn’t matter. All of the pulse points in my body – neck, fingertips, the soles of my feet – throbbed. Blood surged to my face.

That was when my heart jolted. A spiral of black motes twisted up into the open air. First, one right behind Andrei’s shoulder. Then another just around the corner near the bone merchant shop. A screech ripped the night air as the wards around the taverns and this section of the fens flared to life. Beautiful Angelical words carved by Nephilim