Chapter 50
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Cool cool cool, I thought. I’ve stepped into a spell jar with furniture.
“Come, girl,” the voice called again, softer now. “Bring your sharp tongue and louder heart to the table.”
I followed the sound through a curved hallway and into a room that looked like the inside of a grimoire exploded.
A round table sat in the center, carved with intricate runes that shimmered when I stepped closer. Tea steamed in delicate glass cups that were definitely older than America, and beside each sat little saucers of honeycomb, lavender sugar, and what I hoped wasn’t dried eyeballs.
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And across from me, seated in a throne–like chair carved from silver birch and bone, was Morrigan Lairch. She was…
not what I expected.
No wrinkles. No crooked back. No broomstick. She was tall and lithe, wrapped in gossamer layers of black and green, hair the color of raven feathers streaked with frost. Her eyes were silver. Not gray. Silver. Like they’d been poured straight from the moon.
“You don’t bow to power,” she said, sipping her tea without looking at me. “Good. You were made to break it.”
I snorted, folding my arms. “You gonna tell me why you summoned me through a haunted fuckin‘ forest and made me leave my overprotective entourage at the gate?”
That earned me a slight smile. “I needed to see if you’d come alone. If you trusted yourself.” She gestured to the seat across from her. “Sit, vessel.”
I flinched. “Don’t call me that.”
“But you are.”
“I’m Elowen. Not some divine mailbox.”
Now she looked at me, really looked. And I felt it like a full–body scan from the inside out.
“You are Elowen,” she said slowly, “and you are the prophecy incarnate. A child born of two bloodlines who should never have touched. A wolf forged in moonlight. A spark of the divine… hidden for eighteen years under spells and
shadows.”
I sat. Because my knees were weak and the room was starting to spin. She waved her hand, and a soothing pulse of energy wrapped around me like warm silk.
“I didn’t summon you to frighten you,” Morrigan said gently. “I summoned you to free you.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Free me from what?”
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8:57 Thu, Sep 25
Chapter 50
She tilted her head. “From the lie that you are normal. From the spell that silenced half your soul. Your mother asked me to hide you, long ago. And I did. But now it’s time you remembered who you are. What you were made for.”
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My throat felt dry. “So you’re just gonna wave a wand and poof, all my memories come back?”
Morrigan laughed. Not cruel. Not kind. Just amused.
“Oh, child. This is no fairy tale. There is no wand. There is only choice, sacrifice… and pain. I can give you the potion that will dissolve the binding spell. But what it unleashes? That will be yours to bear.”
I stared at the tea in front of me, steam curling like serpent smoke. “And if I don’t?”
“The Aegis Protocol will find you. And next time, there will be no strike team. No Alpha King. No prophecy to save you. Only chains. And silence. And blood.”
Lyssira growled in my head. “We are not prey.”
No, we weren’t. I looked up, my spine straight and my hands steady. “Then let’s burn this fuckin‘ spell off, witch.”
Morrigan’s eyes gleamed like a midnight blade.”That’s what I like to hear.”
She stood, sweeping across the room to a tall cabinet covered in locks. With a flick of her fingers, it creaked open, revealing rows of crystal vials, each glowing faintly in different hues.
She chose one. It pulsed silver and red.
“Drink this under the moonlight, when the Moon rises. Tonight. Alone.”
I opened my mouth to argue, because of course I wasn’t doing anything alone, but she raised a hand.
“It must be you. If anyone touches you while the spell breaks, their bond to you may shatter. Fated mate or not.”
My stomach twisted.
“You have six hours. Rest. Prepare. And when the moon reaches its apex… come back.”
I took the vial, the weight of it sinking into my palm like fate.
Six hours.
Fuck.
