Chapter 9 · Untitled Chapter

"Don't move."

Cain's hand clamped around my wrist before my boot touched the red-veined ground.

"One more step," he said, "and Silas drops the child. Then he drops everyone else."

"I can see that. Let go."

His grip tightened.

Heat pressed through my sleeve. The black mark around my wrist burned in answer. Behind the trees, a woman sobbed. A little boy knelt in the mud with a blade at his throat while three soldiers aimed spears at the villagers' backs.

Silas stood behind them.

Clean coat. Clean boots. Clean hands.

He smiled when he saw me.

"There she is," he called. "Our lost heiress came back to watch her family work."

"You call this work?" I shouted. "You butchered half the village."

"I removed resistance. Don't make it sound so dramatic."

Cain stepped in front of me, blocking the clearing with his broad shoulders.

"The ground is marked," he said near my ear.

"Marked with what?"

"My blood. Your blood. His command."

I looked past him.

Thin red lines cut through the dirt beneath the leaves and trampled grass. They circled the hostages, crossed under the soldiers, and ended at Silas's boots.

"It's a binding field," Cain said.