Page 41 of The Madness Within

For her.

I laid her on the bed, black sheets cool against her skin. She didn’t stir. My spellwork held. But it wouldn't last forever.

Soon, she’d wake. And then I’d have to decide what to do with her.

Erase her memory?

Bind her?

Break her open and pour the truth in until she begged to forget?

My hand hovered above her cheek, just shy of contact. I could feel her warmth from here. Her pulse. Still alive. Still mine to protect. Still mine to ruin.

Cassian’s words rang in my mind.

Ember Carr.

The girl Kreed tried to kill. The girl whose mother was carved open like a sacrament. The girl who walked through fire and didn’t burn.

He missed her once. He wouldn’t miss again.

And the thought of losing her to him, losing this, it made something inside me fracture.

Not fear.

Not guilt.

Possession.

I whispered another spell under my breath. Shadows seeped into the corners of the room, curling like serpents. Watching. Waiting.

If Kreed came for her again, he wouldn’t find a girl. He’d find a cage with teeth.

I moved to the far wall, placing my palm flat against the stone. Runes ignited, casting pale blue light that danced across her sleeping face.

“Mine now,” I murmured, voice low. Final.

Because this wasn’t just protection. This was war.

And I didn’t lose wars. Not when she was on the line.

Chapter Sixteen

??The Devil’s Houseguest

Ember

The first thing I registered when I woke wasn’t pain or panic. It was beauty.

That pissed me off more than anything else. This place wasn’t a dungeon. It was curated.

Stone walls framed in black trim. Velvet curtains. A roaring fire in a hearth so elegant it could’ve been lifted from a gothic painting.

A clawfoot tub gleamed from the corner, the kind of thing you see in movies where women sip champagne while plotting murder. The bed, massive, wrapped in black silk sheets, looked like it could swallow me whole.

The door?

Reinforced steel.

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