Sevraya's POV
He wasn't joking when he said he wanted me docile, and that he had one more thing dear to me. He had shown me, through a rectangular-shaped box which didn't seem like magic at all, how Orias was kept in the dungeons—unconscious, his body bruised, unhealing… A witch heals by magic, and they know that, but they let him suffer. Now, I am laying myself down as the 'submissive partner.'
I stared into the mirror as these pesky human maids seemed wary to touch me… dresses and accessories slipping from their hands like I still had what could hurt them. "The fear of the snake remains even after it's dead." I watched as I got transformed into what a 'submissive partner' would look like, golden shackles, flowery scent, and a face like a baker's tray.
"Good day, my lady. My name is Eloise. Alpha Luceran asked for me to be your companion." I saw the redhead female from the mirror, a smile etched on her face—the only sincere one in my stay here. But am I moved by sincerity? No. "May I know your name, my lady?"
"Blight." I saw the look of confusion on her face. "That's what your alpha calls me… same goes for you." Sevraya was gone, and Blight had been born—cursed with emotions, bedridden with grief, a submissive partner... reeking of toxicity.
"Uhh…"
"Your attention is needed… the ritual only starts when you are there." A guard's voice cut through the room. The ritual, he said, was like we were getting married, but in the most trickish way—where I could take the fall for anything that happens to him. If I decided to hurt him in any way, we would both share the pain, but I would be the one hurting in the most tragic way… The ritual was called the Union of Undoing or The Chain Oath.
The cursed Lycan's second-chance mate gets to be the one who kills or saves him—and he lacks the trust that I would save him. Yes, I would not, and now he uses this way.
His guards and the 'companion' escorted me to a cave, me in my mocking white dress. And there he was, standing with a half smile on his face, thinking he had found the perfect prey. And I smiled back, forced and bitter, joining him on the altar.
The white witch walked forward, and I couldn't keep my mouth shut. "How often do you wash your hands after every curse? Don't tell me the light forgives you?" She looked away like I wasn't talking to her. I didn't fail to notice the way her jaw ticked.
"How holy of you…" I muttered with a scoff, staring at the man I am about to share an unwilling oath with. "We would stick to both sides of the deal. What you want you'd get, and what I want you'd do. You would let Orias heal on his stay in your dungeons since you won't let him out… and no more chains, no more ashthorns."
"Do this for your head mainly, Blight."
"Do you think this bond would stop me from killing you if you hurt him? Everyone wants you dead already." The sound of metals filled the room just like the day I was brought to that expensive looking large room filled with people. "Who wants a feral cursed king? No one. They are scared knowing how you could end them if they speak the truth. I love evil, dear partner, and yours is the kind I had always dreamt to hold… knowing I am a living disaster who had lived for thousands of years but still power drunk and hate death."
"You sure have a lot to say… we could have this conversation once this is done, Blight." He leaned closely to my ear, letting his breath fan my neck a little. "This closeness makes me sick." And it does make me sick in the stomach.
"It's just a peaceful mating, lower your weapons." He said to his guards, and the white witch walked forward, taking his hands first as she ran a blade across it and then taking mine too, doing the same, the color of my blood not promising like it used to before as I watched it drip to the floor. "Merge palms," she said, and he had grabbed mine without warning, his gaze not leaving mine as the white witch began chanting, walking around us in circles.
And then my hand became itchy, the itch becoming fiercer by seconds.
The man in front of me behaved as if nothing was happening until the itch spread across my body, and I tried to pull my hands away, but his hold was strong. "Let me go!"
"Stay still." He commanded, pulling me into his arms with our palms still merged… I couldn't struggle in his arms again, all I could do was breathe like a wounded animal. "It's done, your majesty."
Even though the itch stopped, I was still leaning into him, my body weak… "We should have it checked."
He held me up straight, taking my wrist as he forced the hilt of a knife to my hold and he the sharp edges on his wrist, but I was the one who screamed in pain instead, my left wrist, just the part he had cut of himself, burning like it was more than the cut of a knife. "So you'd see a bit of kindness in me too…" He took the knife from me and without a word he slashed a straight line in my arms, but it didn't hurt, only bleeding. "We are even… you get hurt, I feel the pain, I get hurt you feel it too."