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‘You came into Netheris for me,’ he says.
I shrug. ‘I heard you commanding me to come back. And when I did you’d decided to go vampire-fighting without me. I had to join in.’
‘Bossy even across realms. Impressive consistency.’
His forehead drops to mine. His body trembles. The great Vampire King of New York is shaking over me, and I feel the depth of what he will not say aloud because the bond has made secrets harder to hide.
He followed me into sleep. Then fought for me in the underworld.
But beyond that, he would’ve followed me anywhere.
Netheris. Death. Ruin. Some awful in-between place where Morrighan keeps dead things and bad decorating choices.
My throat tightens. This time, nothing stops the emotion. ‘Valentin. Gods, I love you.’
His arm slides beneath me, lifting me against him. ‘Never do that again.’
‘Sure. I’ll add underworld excursions to the list of things I should clear with you in advance.’
His mouth brushes my temple. ‘I am serious.’
‘I know.’ That’s the problem.
I know everything now. His every emotion is savage and stunned and so large it makes my chest ache. I know how close he came to breaking when my heart stopped, and I know the cold, bright certainty that settled in him after: if I did not come back, he would come after me.
Not someday. Immediately. That kind of devotion should frighten me.
But it also makes me turn my face into his neck and breathe him in like the world is finally made of something solid.
Footsteps pound beyond the wards.
The outer circle opens with a crack of silver light, and Rowan enters first, hair wild, face pale, one hand braced against the doorframe as if she’s been sprinting through half the Tower.
Valentin’s sireds pour in behind her.
Aaron, Gideon, Luca, Iskander, Cassian, Rook, Severin, Bastien, Nikolai and Orion. Ten lethal vampires sliding into a chamber that has just hosted sex, blood, death, underworld warfare, and possibly a minor architectural miracle. To their credit, none of them comment on the nudity.
Luca opens his mouth. Aaron elbows him hard enough to make him reconsider existence.
Rowan comes to the circle’s edge and stops.
Her gaze moves over me, over Valentin, over the glowing marks on our throats. Mine burns silver-red at the bite. His has changed completely. The black death-lines have withdrawn, replaced by a dark silver lattice that threads beneath his skin like moonlit steel.
Rowan exhales. ‘The bond took.’
Valentin does not look away from me. ‘Yes.’
Rowan’s mouth tightens. ‘I was speaking for the room, not your ego.’
His gaze flicks to her, sharp and regal and alive. ‘Continue.’
‘The poison has been burned back completely. I’ll need to examine the remnants later, but it no longer has command over the curse-pattern.’ Her attention drops to my throat. ‘Her body is altered by the bond but still mortal. Stronger. More resilient. Connected to you in ways that will alarm and annoy her.’
‘Too late,’ I mutter. ‘Already alarmed and annoyed.’
Luca’s relief escapes as a laugh.
Valentin’s eyes cut to him and the laugh dies a dignified death.
