To Bind in Blood

Chapter 37

The day the bind was to be undone, Jurion woke feeling nauseous. The feeling persisted throughout the day, lessening only a little when he put food in his stomach.

Pierrne came to fetch him that evening after dinner. "Are you sure you will go through with this, lord-cousin?" he asked as they rode to his shop, a host of guards with them.

Jurion focused on the view between his horse's ears. "It must be done."

Pierrne looked about to say something, then seemed to think better of it. They arrived to find Wrell already waiting, with Eira there as one of the original witnesses required for severing a bind. Jurion greeted her quietly, her own equally subdued. She would not meet his eye.

Pierrne took them into a different room, this one possessing a bleakness at odds with the homey atmosphere. Unlike the room where their bind had begun, this room possessed three comfortable chairs and a small table, with a fire to warm them and the wooden floors bathed in a soft yellow glow.

Pierrne gestured for them to have a seat. Jurion and Wrell sat in the two chairs facing each other, while Eira took the chair in the corner. Pierne pulled up a stool and sat, pulling the table with all his tools closer to him.

As he watched Pierrne ready his instruments, Jurion glanced up at Wrell's face. He had not seen her in a few days, and he realized he had missed her still. She had been a permanent fixture by his side for so long, calm and stubborn and brave, a friend despite her resistance to the title, and to think that this was the last time they might speak . . . A single thought was running through his mind, one he knew was selfish and useless.

I don't want her to leave.

He would set her free-he couldn't care less about losing a bloodbound servant-but that meant probably never seeing her again. Meant losing her. Whatever she was to him.

"Before I begin, I need verbal confirmation from both parties that the bind is to be severed," Pierrne said. "Do you both agree?"

"Yes." He could barely hear her response.

"Yes." Jurion forced the word from his mouth, his eyes on her though she looked down.

"Then let us begin."

The rest passed by in a blur. His hand was taken by Pierrne and cut again with a sharp blade, then covered by Pierrne's hand until blood dripped out into the bowl below. Wrell's blood. The process was painful, like Pierrne was pulling out his veins bit by bit, and his vision began to fade more than once. When he was finished with Jurion, Pierrne wrapped Jurion's hand loosely with a cloth, then did the same procedure on Wrell. When her bowl was filled, he removed the cloths and pressed their palms together, holding their hands in place.

Heat surged up his arm at the sensation of her hand in his. Was it because of this contact between them as Pierrne severed the bind? He had always been intrigued by Wrell, but whatever Pierrne was doing must be making him so keenly aware of her presence.

A sharp ache shot through Jurion's hand and traveled up his arm, to his neck and shoulder and curling around his chest. He let out a grunt of pain, as did Wrell, but neither pulled away. He could sense her move, match his breaths to hers, blood pulsing in sync like there was a connection between them that ran deeper than mere proximity. Deeper than just blood. The pain was intense, concentrated, like a knife was running up his arm and splitting his veins.

"It is severed," Pierrne said abruptly, releasing them and straightening from his position hunched over their hands. His own hands were coated in so much blood it seemed he had been through a battle, and by his wearied expression it looked as if that was true.