Claimed by Shadow Page 0,86
new to me, but it had had a century to take hold of Mircea. If I felt like this, and the spell had had only a day to get its claws into me, what was he experiencing? Even if the Consul was right, and it had toned down after I returned to my own time, it had still been there, slowly maturing over decades. And judging by his reaction, when it woke up, it had done so with a vengeance.
The thought of deliberately putting him back in that hell was excruciating, but what other choice was there? I had to deal with Myra or we were both dead, and I couldn't take him with me and risk continued exposure. I looked up at him, letting my remorse show on my face. "I know.”
He closed his eyes and his arms clenched around me for a long moment. I pulled him to me, kissed him and immediately the pain receded. The geis was satisfied as long as we were in close contact, and I knew why. I could almost feel the bond between us strengthening, the energy humming happily everywhere we touched. It was contented now, but what would happen when I left? I'd felt the agony he was in when I arrived and doubted this brief meeting would relieve the craving for long. In fact, it might make it worse, like offering a starving man a single bite of bread.
Mircea slowly opened his arms and pulled back. I had been expecting it, but the pain still almost drove me to my knees. I somehow kept my feet, but only half stifled an agonized noise. Wild shudders of shock radiated from my center, shaking me violently, and my hands went ice-cold. I hunched my shoulders against the blaze of longing that shook me, and wrapped my arms around myself to keep them from dragging him against me.
Casanova had made it sound like the bond was a slow progression, growing in stages over a long period of time. But ours wasn't acting that way. Maybe because it wasn't exactly new, at least on one side, or maybe because it had accidentally been doubled. All I knew was, it was vicious.
Mircea was standing close enough to give the impression that he was still holding me. The pain had cleared my head like smelling salts, allowing me to understand why. Although he might be willing to release me, the Consul most certainly was not. I'd refused to become her puppet, had stolen valuable merchandise from her and had placed her chief negotiator under a dangerous spell. The fact that the latter, at least, had been inadvertent was irrelevant from her perspective. I wondered what she had planned for me if her mages couldn't break the spell. Based on Mircea's action, I could make a good guess. Few spells outlive the demise of the caster. And if I wasn't going to be her pet Pythia, she had no vested interest in keeping me alive.
I met Mircea's gaze. "I'll find a way to break this," I told him. I didn't bother to whisper this time. "I promise.”
He smiled slightly, but his eyes were infinitely sad. "I am sorry, dulceaţă.”
The Consul said something, but I didn't hear her. One minute, the chamber was quiet enough to hear a pin drop; the next, a howling arctic wind had filled the room, whipping my hair in stinging strands against my face. It paused for an instant, gathering strength near the high ceiling of the chamber, before exploding into the worst ice storm I've ever seen.
The slashing, brutal winds ignored me and a small space around me, and for a minute I thought my ward had finally decided to wake up, but there was no flood of golden light, no distinctive pentagram shape. Something else was protecting me, and for the moment I didn't care what-just so long as it kept it up. Everywhere outside that small island of calm, chaos raged.
Mircea stepped away and I gasped in pain as the geis realized that something had gone wrong. I would have grabbed him again, despite the consequences, but I couldn't see him in the swirling white void. "Mircea!" I screamed, but my voice was lost in the deafening winds.
Not knowing what else to do, I leapt forward and threw myself over Tomas. Thankfully, the clear spot went with me. It didn't cover him entirely, and his wounds were too extreme for me to stretch out on top of him, but frostbite