The Bound (Ascension #2)(109)

Cyrene looked down and swallowed. “Um…yes. But it’s been diminishing since I started using my powers.”

Matilde and Vera looked at each other and seemed to come to a resigned conclusion.

“Sit,” Matilde ordered. “We’ll tell you a story.”

“Once upon a time,” Vera said with a sad smile, “we were much like you. Young and ambitious. We traveled all the way from Eleysia to Byern to join the Doma. Matilde’s powers manifested when she was extremely young, and mine showed up just before I turned seventeen.”

“We passed the ritual like your Presenting and were temporarily placed with a Doma because we had shown…exceptional skills,” Matilde continued. “We were shipped out of Byern and went deep into the frozen tundra in the Haevan Mountains. We had never been in cold before. It was devastating.”

Vera cleared her throat. “Details, sister. We were to be trained with a select group of Doma and Leifs. It was tough work. Harder than we’d ever thought possible, and at the end of it…we were Bound.”

Avoca leaned forward with her mouth agape. “You’re not saying…”

Vera smiled. “I think Avoca knows of what we speak. We were part of an ancient group called The Society. Some called us Dragon Bound.”

Cyrene’s mouth dropped. “Dragons?”

“Yes,” Matilde confirmed. “Dragons have exceptionally long life spans. Longer even than most Leifs. And, after the fall of the Doma, our dragons were not welcome anymore in Emporia. They fled our world, but as long as they live…so do we, which is how we have survived these last two thousand years.”

“Why didn’t you leave with them?” Avoca asked.

“The curse,” Vera said.

“Curse?” Cyrene asked.

Vera nodded. “Magic has been contained within Emporia for all these years. In an attempt to rid the world of our kind, we were trapped at the end of the War of the Light, so Viktor Dremylon and his army could hunt us down and kill us. Rid the world of magic. There were so few Doma left, and where the most magical blood still existed—Byern—any potential Doma were killed before they could reach safety.”

Cyrene shook her head in horror. “How am I alive?”

“We have to assume, the strength of your powers,” Matilde said. “And your determination to get away. I cannot think your desire for adventure is a coincidence.”

“So, as you see”—Vera revealed her wrist, and Matilde stretched hers out as well. As with Cyrene and Avoca, they had shimmery gold tattoos that appeared bright as they ran their fingers over them—“our bond has diminished with distance and time from our Bound mate, but it is still there. It is entirely possible that the connection you feel to Byern and anything in Byern is drawing from your strength as it tries to pull you back.”

“That’s…horrible. And I did it unwillingly.”

“No,” Matilde corrected. “No one can be Bound unwillingly. You might have done it without knowledge of the consequences, but it had to be done willingly.”

How naive she had been to think that all she could ever want in life was to be an Affiliate, to be tied to her homeland. She certainly hadn’t been able to grasp the full realm of what that ceremony meant at the time, and now, somehow, she was Bound for life.

“Can I…remove it?” Cyrene asked hopefully.

Matilde and Vera sighed and exchanged worried glances.

“I’m afraid that is outside our area of expertise,” Vera said. “If there’s a way to break a binding, we haven’t found one.”

Matilde gave her a long level look. “And, believe us…we’ve tried.”





Winter came and went without a single snowflake.

And, as the time passed, Cyrene’s powers grew, her control improved, and she was lost more and more to this boy.

“Just one more,” Dean said, wrapping his arms around her waist and trying to hold her to him.

“I have to go. You always make me late,” Cyrene chided.

He dropped his lips down on hers again, and she sighed into him. Creator, I could do this all day! He swung her around in his room and backed her legs up against the footboard of his bed.

“Skip training for one day,” he encouraged.

“And would you skip a day of your military training?”

“For you, I would do anything.”

He planted a kiss on her lips and then across her cheek before moving down the curve of her neck. She felt breathless.

She had to fight not to give in and skip training for the day. Matilde, Vera, and Avoca would kill her. But it was getting harder and harder to pull away from Dean. Harder and harder to remind herself to stop and not to give herself away. Many people back home had thought that Cyrene was Edric’s mistress, and despite the fact that it wasn’t true, Cyrene did not want the same rumors to fly about her and Dean. He wasn’t married, but it simply wasn’t proper to move forward. But curse her body for wanting to.

“I have to go,” she reminded him.

“You said that once.”

“You will be the death of me, Dean Ellison.”

She tugged away from him, but he grabbed her hand and gently kissed it.

“You are the life of me, Cyrene Strohm.”