“Alright, enough history for today. Let’s get to work. Accepting and working with your magic will be difficult, so we better start now while we still can.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, my mind still muddled.
“Well, at some point, Rogue is going to strike the bargain with Evander and you’ll be headed back for Auryna, if that’s what you should choose.”
My gaze met his at the realization. I’d been on the edge of my seat waiting for the correspondence from my father but had somehow forgotten that I’d be returning permanently. I would never see Alden again. Or Thana. Or Iaso.
Or Rogue.
So many emotions hit me at once. Sadness. Guilt. Fear. But none of them mattered—my mother was still there, and she needed me. And more than that, all of Ravaryn needed this deal to work.
I blinked away the stinging in my eyes and stepped into the circle, electricity sparking at my fingertips in response.
Chapter Eighteen
Rogue
Ididn’t know what was worse—the fact that I’d claimed her before she knew what it meant or that I’d known her true identity and hadn’t told her.
You’re no better than your father,a voice whispered in the back of my mind.
I knew it was true. I had shackled her to me, just as he had my mother.
She would never outrun my reach. I would always know where she was, for the rest of her life. And not only would her absence leave a gaping hole in my chest, but I would also feel it every time she was sexually aroused, in my presence or not… My teeth gritted against the spike of jealousy that shot through me.
She vowed to never be my mate, which meant she would find another, and I would be cursed to suffer as her pleasure was served by others.
Not that I didn’t deserve it. I did. I deserved it all and more for the pain I caused her, but the thought still had bile rising in the back of my throat.
The thought of any man touching her, her skin, her lips, her… Smoke trailed behind me as I flew, my vision tinted red.
And to think this had been the plan the entire time. Bite her, strike the deal, and hand her back.
A low laugh escaped me at how overwhelmingly naive I had been. So incredibly ignorant. When the day came for the exchange—and it would—it would tear me in two to watch her leave with hatred still burning in her chest for me.
The look of betrayal in her eyes still haunted me, day and night.
I should’ve told her. Everything. I should’ve told her everything.
Regret had consumed me over the past few days as I carefully avoided her, just as she commanded.
“I will never be your mate, Rogue. You would have to kill me first.”Her words echoed through my mind constantly. I hadn’t even wanted a mate when she was thrust into my life. I hadn’t wanted a mate when she arrived at the castle or tricked me with a kiss or touched my scar.
But something shifted in me at some point. I didn’t know when it happened—when the disgust shifted to toleration. When just tolerating her shifted to… hope. But that night, she chose to be with me.
And after a lifetime of being hated, forgotten, and alone, in that moment, I had wanted it so badly. I wanted her. A life. A mate. To be chosen.
Wanted.
I wanted to be wanted.
I wantedherto want me.
And when I claimed her, it wasn’t really my claim at all. It was my surrender.
That’s the thing with the mate mark. While the urge to do it is nearly impossible to resist, it’s not an absolute between mates. It’s a choice.
My parents never marked each other, because to mark is to surrender. I didn’t claim her in ownership. I claimed her as my one. Devoted myself to one. With that mark, my body and soul were bound to her. I would never be with anyone else, emotionally or physically.