One moment, I’d been indulging my mate in a flirtatious mental promise. And the next, I took off at a dead sprint toward where Aflora slept.
Constantine was here. I felt him in every breath, his Elite Blood aura tainting the paradigm with his malevolent presence.
I dove into the source, searching for his magical core. It throbbed brightly at the center, his powers fully engaged and suffocating everyone and everything around him.
What is he doing?I wondered, stopping cold in my tracks as I watched a volt of magic enter another soul. Oh, shit! Aflora!
I took off again toward where she slept, her aura screaming in agony at the unexpected intrusion of the dark enchantment.
Too much power, I thought. That’s too much power.
I tried to grab hold of it in my mind, to rip it away from my mate, but the source had already anchored itself inside her, pouring wave after wave of energy into the core of her being.
“Fuck!” I shouted, bursting into the cabin covered in wilting flowers.
Her Earth magic was weeping at the intrusion, her soul fracturing beneath the wrongness of Constantine’s actions.
“He’s forcing her ascension,” I said, talking to no one and everyone at the same time. “He’s redirecting the source into her.” It came out on a growl, my fury palpable and violent.
I fell to my knees beside her, the inky lines spreading from her heart to her limbs, decorating her as the source’s choice.
“That’s impossible,” Kolstov breathed. “That’s not how this works.”
I shook my head. Because he was wrong. “It’s entirely possible,” I replied, furious at myself for not seeing it before. “She’s mated to two royal lines and the Source Architect.” That provided Constantine the access he needed to the core of her essence. It allowed him to breathe the enchantment used to call upon new rulers, and redirect it to the rightful heir.
The fallen Midnight Fae Prince’s mate.
The Source Architect’s chosen other half.
The Death Blood Prince’s soulmate.
An Elemental Fae Royal.
All markers that would note her as a potential candidate.
“Shit.” I cradled Aflora’s face between my hands and attempted to redirect the heart of our power away from her, to rewrite the path and send it back to Constantine, but the source had already chosen.
Worthy,it whispered darkly. Fresh. Young. Honorable conduit.
The words weren’t real, just sensations that prickled my spirit and told me there wasn’t a damn thing I could do to stop this.
Instead, I reached for Aflora and tried to guide her, to ease her pain, to shift her into the ascension with a softness the source lacked.
Her screams echoed in my head, her confusion piercing my heart. She didn’t understand what was happening, had lost herself to the fog of the obsidian essence mounting inside her.
“Zakkai!” someone snapped. A deep voice. Harsh. Furious.
I lifted my eyelids to meet a pair of fuming green irises. “What?” I demanded, irritated by the interruption.
The Warrior Blood—Zephyrus—appeared ready to kill me. “Tell us what you’re doing.”
“Helping her ascend,” I replied shortly.
“Do we need to bite her? That’s what we did last time she exploded with power.”
I shook my head, gritting my teeth. “No. That was from my ascension.” The night I became the Source Architect. There hadn’t been an outlet for my power exchange, so everyone had felt it. Including the Nacht family. It had caused Kolstov to unleash his power in a rampage that had destroyed Aflora’s room. And then she’d come undone in the LethaForest.
I hadn’t witnessed it. But I’d sensed it. And I’d later learned about it from Shade.