Page 133 of Lifebound

I cleared my throat, the thoughts in my head getting the best of me as I poked the fish on my plate. Raja must have taken the head and tail off, and the bones, and it was indeed delicious, whatever kind of fish it was, except I wasn’t all that hungry.

Or I was just getting overwhelmed with too many emotions—and quickly.

The view was beautiful, though. Raja had put white light into a vase in the middle of the table and topped it with wildflowers to give the whole thing an ethereal glow. The lake looked like a giant mirror reflecting the dark sky, and the air was still. My hair was just slightly wet from our swim, but my clothes were all dry. I had no idea how he’d done it, but Rune had taken them when I went to the bathroom, and then he’d brought them back dry five minutes later.

I suspected Raja had something to do with it because even a drying machine wouldn’t have been so fast. Definitely some kind of magic.

“So, what is it that you do here, Raja? How does a Midnight fae live in Blackwater?” I said when the awkward silence got too heavy.

She shrugged. “I work. I live. Simple.”

I resisted the urge to roll my eyes.

“Vampires have a lot of blood ceremonies throughout the seasons. Raja prepares and performs them as an unbiased third party. She’s considered…sacred among vampires,” Rune said.

Raja suddenly waved a hand as she grabbed her glass of water. “Sacredis too fancy a word. I’m their Runellianne and they’re afraid of me—that’s all.”

“What does that word mean?” I asked.

She arched a brow at me. “Keeper of Secrets.”

Holy shit, that was actually pretty cool.

I looked at Rune. “That sounds like your name.”

“It is,” he said with a nod. “Rune meanssecretin Veren, which is the first fae language.”

Secret.“It fits.” He sounded like a secret, too, which didn’t make a whole lot of sense unless you actually heard his voice. The urge to ask him why he’d be nameda secretwas strong, but I resisted. Instead, I asked, “How come you all speak English around here?” It had struck me as odd that everyone knew how to speak to me in this place.

“The modern version of Veren includes all languages of your world and ours,” Rune explained. “We are all born with Veren in our minds alongside magic and only need to develop the muscles necessary to form words.”

“So, you can speakFrench, too?”

“Yes, if I needed to,” Rune said.

“Trade played a big part in it,” Raja suddenly said. “We used to trade goods with Nerith a long time ago, before their technology advanced so much and distanced humans from us completely. Books, mostly, but fabrics and herbs and elements as well. We don’t anymore, of course, as your race has changed so much in the past few centuries, but English always was the main language Verenthians spoke during those ages. It’s much more versatile than the first Veren, so it stuck with us.”

She didn’t once look at me while she spoke, and I didn’t care about that. What I cared about was why Rune didn’t, either. He still refused to even look my way.

I mean, he couldn’t beafraidof Raja. He wasn’t, no—and unless he regretted what happened at the lake…

Maybe I’mnotjust seeing things, after all.My stomach twisted.

“Rune told me how you became Lyall’s Lifebound.” Raja’s voice filled my ears, but it took a moment to understand what she said.

“Yes,” I said absentmindedly and kept my eyes on the plate.

Had it been a mistake? Didhethink it had been a mistake?

My God, what the hell was I even doing?!

“An accident. What a coincidence,” Raja continued. “Tell me, how has it affected you, the binding?”

I looked up at her. “Affected me?”

“Yes. Those who are lifebound usually transfer traits and powers to one another.”

My cheeks heated up. My eyes remained on her, my lips parted.

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