I tried to look away.

I tried.

But I couldn’t.

Our gazes locked; I groaned under my breath as the connection between us only strengthened. The diamond collar around her neck sparkled even as the clouds above us blotted out the sunshine and gathered dark grey.

Nila stopped shivering, almost as if she found sanctuary in my gaze.

I stopped fighting, almost as if she tamed the insanity inside me.

What was this…this tether? How had she captured me so completely, and how the fuck did I sever it?

The deeper I fell into her, the worst it got.

Her panic siphoned into my soul, twisting my gut until I wanted to vomit. Her flesh turned white as the moon and just as ethereal.

In the starkness of what was about to happen, she’d never been so beautiful, so bewitching, so intense.

My knees wobbled, itching to kneel before her and place my head in her lap. To just rest…and pretend none of this existed. To have her comfort me.

Cut growled under his breath, smashing through our moment, rendering it dead.

Nila sniffed, tears glossing her eyes.

The link between us had been so bright, but now it was back to darkness.

You’re running out of time.

Gritting my teeth, I forced myself to work faster. My fingers moved swiftly, securing the buckle around her left ankle.

I looked up one last time. Needing her to know that I’d come to her full of nothing, but now she’d filled me with everything.

She looked into my eyes, then glanced away.

I wanted to tell her I was sorry. I wanted her to see in my gaze what I could never say aloud.

Forgive me.

With a soft moan, she closed her eyes, cutting me off completely.

Her dismissal butchered my heart, dug it out with a dirty blade, and sent it splashing into the pond. The hole left behind filled with algae, water, and bracken. I was a fucking bastard. I should stop this.

But I won’t.

I wanted what I’d inherit on my thirtieth birthday. I was selfish, greedy, and vain. I wanted Nila, too. I believed I could have both.

If only I had more time.

You don’t have more time. Not today.

Securing her other ankle, I stood.

I waited for her to look at me—to give me some sign she understood that we were in this together. That despite what I did, the tattoos overrode my loyalty to my family and bound me to her.

My Weaver.

Her Hawk.

I waited another second, and another.

But she never opened her eyes. Her forehead furrowed harder, her fists curled tighter, and she withdrew from me until there was no emotion left—just a tiny dying star that once had shone so bright.

Leaving me heartless and bleeding, she gave me nothing else to do.

I slipped into my role as torturer and began.

PLEASE, GRANT ME strength.

Please, grant me power.

Please don’t let me scream.

Fettered to the chair, I kept my eyes squeezed as tight as possible—so tight—no light entered, no swirling colours from behind my eyelids. Just pitch black darkness.

When Jethro looked at me with agony in his gaze, I’d pitied him. He held so many secrets in his golden depths. So many rights. So many wrongs.

I could have a lifetime with him and never understand.

But in that moment, I did understand, and I both despised and bled for him. He was supposed to give me strength by making me hate him. I wanted to rue him as much as I did the day I found my ancestor’s graves. Hate would’ve kept me warm and alive.

But he’d stolen that by looking destroyed, crippled with conflicting loyalties.

It made me fall harder.

It made me slam to the bottom of my feelings for him.

I wanted to praise him for letting me into his heart. I wanted to tell him I had the capacity to love him in return.

But I didn’t.

I couldn’t.

He didn’t deserve it.

And then, I found my hate again.

I hated him for being too weak and not going against his family.

I cursed him for not having the courage to choose.

Why should he choose me?

He barely even knew me.

But souls were wise things. They always knew before the brain or the heart. There was no discriminating—if you saw your perfect other…you knew—instantly.

There was something there from the beginning.

Just like there had been for us.

And it would remain there until Jethro successfully tore it out and killed it.

Because even though we were linked by this fragile, fluttering thing, it wouldn’t take much to ruin. It was already on the brink.

He’s sentenced me to pay the Second Debt.

How many more would he carry out?

Did I trust him to be strong enough to end this before my life was stolen?

Looking over my shoulder, his family glowered at me as if I’d killed their loved ones with a barely spoken curse. They watched with trepidation—as if they believed I’d descended from the witch they hated and would turn them to toads at any second.

Superstition perfumed the breeze. Hate bloomed from the roses. And impatience spiced the water lilies.

I missed the intimacy of the First Debt. I missed the throbbing chemistry between Jethro and me even while he did something so wrong. It had just been the two of us. Together.

Now, it was just me against them.

“Do you know what this is, Ms. Weaver?” Jethro asked, stealing my attention.

I pressed my lips together. My neck hurt from straining to look over my shoulder.

When I didn’t answer, Jethro recited, his voice silted and cool. “You’re sitting in a ducking stool. It was used traditionally as a torture method for women. Its free-moving arm swings over the river to extract truth and confessions by ducking into the freezing cold water.”