Carnival of Souls

“What happens if I shed your blood in her circle?” Belias pressed the blade tighter to her throat, but not actually cutting her. “You’re her blood. Could I use it to break this?”

“I don’t know, but she won’t let you leave here alive unless you are my familiar.” Aya turned to look over her shoulder at him, pressing her skin tighter to the knife in the process.

Reflexively, he lowered the knife.

Aya stayed against him, her back to his chest.

He shoved her away.

“Tell me what will make this bearable for you.” She turned to face him. “It isn’t what I want either, but I can’t kill you. I can’t let her kill you. I left you the knife, but…”

“You know me better than that,” he said.

Mutely, she nodded.

He caught her gaze. “Tell me you won’t compel me to obey you unless it’s a matter of life or death. You don’t have to keep me under compulsion. You have my vow not to strike you with intent to injure or kill.”

“And not expose what I am,” she added.

“And not expose that you are a witch,” he echoed.

“Your vow is accepted,” she said, unnecessarily. He’d said the words within the witch’s circle; he knew they were binding. By his own vow, he’d bound himself to a witch.

“And you?” he prompted.

“I give you my vow in this binding circle that I shall not strike you with intent to injure or kill, and I vow that I will not compel you unless it’s a matter of your life or death. By this vow, I am bound to you and you to me.” Her voice was shaky as she added, “You understand now why I can’t breed.”

“My family thinks I’m dead. You’ve stolen my family’s ability to continue my father’s line.” Belias tried to keep the swell of bitterness out of his voice and failed. “I get it, Aya. I only wish you would have told me before we reached this place. Maybe we could’ve avoided all of this.”

Aya smiled in a way that was anything but happy and then asked, “Do you think you would’ve accepted me? Or do you say that because of where we are? You’re in a witch’s circle, Bel. Go ahead and answer.”

The words he thought to say wouldn’t come to his lips. He opened his mouth, but he was afraid to try to reply. He wasn’t sure, and he wasn’t certain either of them wanted to know the truth. She was a witch. Even after everything they’d been, he wasn’t sure he could’ve forgiven it then, and he certainly wasn’t feeling very forgiving now. He said nothing.

“Let’s get this done.” Evelyn’s voice cut through the room, making clear that even though he hadn’t seen her, she had witnessed their vows and his inability to answer.

“Step out of its circle,” Evelyn added.

After Aya crossed the circle, Evelyn drew a second circle, containing Aya between the two circles. She directed Aya to sketch the sigils for her name and his in the second circle. Then she held out a silver blade. “Crosswise on both palms.”

As Aya took the knife and did so, Evelyn spared him a glance. “And you.”

Trapped in her circle, he couldn’t have disobeyed if he wanted to, but he saw no reason to attempt to. Being bound to Aya was a lot better fate than death; it would get him out of here until he could find a way to convince her to let him have his real life back.

He cut his palms as directed.

Aya walked to the edge of the circle and held both hands up toward him. Inside the circle, he mirrored her, and together they walked the perimeter. The act of walking this circle was unpleasantly reminiscent of the last circle he’d drawn, before the fight in which Aya had stabbed him: then he’d had no idea that he was encircled with a witch, yet he had tied his fate to hers, believing that she wouldn’t kill him. This time he realized that he was facing a witch, and he was still tying his life to hers.

As their commingled blood dripped to the floor and altered the circle, he felt the power of something stronger than anything he’d ever felt in The City. Aya’s power. It washed over him, and he understood how strong she truly was. Strong enough to have found another solution. Instead, she’d lied to him and stood as a daimon in the ring. She’d been stabbed, beaten, bludgeoned, and burned. Claws and teeth had shredded her skin, yet she’d fought as a daimon, using her talons rather than magic. He lifted his gaze to hers in shock.

Talons. Witches don’t have talons.

“Belias, thou hast now appeared unto me to answer unto such things as I have desired of thee. Now I do in the name, and by the power and dignity, of the omnipresent and immortal gods bind thee to Aya,” Evelyn intoned.

Aya has talons. She is not only a witch.

Outside the circles, Evelyn nodded to Aya, who stared at Belias as she said, “I conjure thee, O fire, by him who made thee and all other creatures for good in the world, that thou torment, burn, and consume this daimon, Belias, for everlasting if he is disobedient and obeyest not my commandment.”

She looked small and afraid, and he wasn’t sure if it was because he didn’t understand magic or because he was used to seeing her stride fearlessly into fights, but he was afraid for her then.

Evelyn waited as the fire Aya had called flared along the lines of the circle. Once the flames burned as blue as witch eyes, Evelyn continued, “And in these names, and all things that are the names of the God of Secret Truth who liveth forever, the All-Powerful, I bind thee, Belias, to this witch, Aya. Therefore obey her in all things, Belias; obey my power, speaking the secrets of Truth in voice and in understanding; therefore, I say obey the law which I have made, without terror to the sons of men, witches, creatures, all things upon the surface of the earth.”

As the last words left the older witch’s lips, she made a sweeping gesture with both hands, pushing one toward him and one toward Aya. As she did so, the flames of the circle between them shifted. The flickering tongues of flame became a chain that wrapped around Belias’ wrists, ankles, and throat. It pierced his flesh, searing him and drawing screams of pain from his lips. The flame ripped through his body as if he were an empty shell, and then burst through the cuts in his hands. Once visible again, the flame-formed chain stretched out to Aya.

She held her hands out, palms up, and the fire poured into her bleeding hands. The look of pain on her face made clear that it hurt her too, perhaps not as intensely as it hurt him, but she was suffering as well. Once the last flicker of flame entered her, the cuts on her hands sealed over with scars.

Belias glanced at his still-bleeding and freshly burned hands.

“You are free to take your familiar, Aya.” Evelyn’s voice drew his gaze. “It cannot enter the building without you, but if it is out wandering with you, it can enter freely with you. The tie between you makes wards recognize it as an extension of the witch who owns it.”

The temptation to tell the older witch exactly what he thought of her classifying him as property vied with the realization that he was Aya’s property now.

CHAPTER 28

ALMOST A FULL DAY later, Kaleb stood outside Mallory’s house. It was so late in the day that he should be able to meet with Adam. By daimon law — and by witch law — Mallory was Kaleb’s now to do with as he wanted. The witches couldn’t support Adam without going against their own laws. Adam, of course, could kill him, but that would kill or injure Mallory. There were ways to dissolve the matrimonial bond, but not easily and not without risk. Kaleb hoped that they could avoid conflict; he didn’t relish the thought of quarreling with Mallory’s stepfather. A more likely scenario was that Adam would take Mallory and run, but since Kaleb was married to her and because she was pack, he’d be able to find her anywhere. Adam had no legal way to deny Kaleb’s rights. If she were a witch or a human, it would be different, but she was a daimon. Mallory was Kaleb’s to command.

He knocked on the door of Mallory’s house. This time the wards pulsed against him. The sensation of insects biting him from head to toe was only a warning, a discomfort to remind him that this was a protected house. For