Soul Bound: Bound Essence, #2

By Margaret Malory

Emrick

For a long time I feared the magic inside me. Then I met Kerrienne. I didn't even realize that something was missing in my life until the day she stood her ground against me on the battlefield, matching me blow for blow. 

She's not only helped me embrace my magic but she's amplified it... 

I can regenerate almost any wound.  I'm damn near impossible to kill but if I lost her, I know it would be the end of me.  How do I know that?  Because For a short time, I thought I'd lost her and it broke me.  Literally.  Her touch is the only one that can soothe the restlessness within me and her kisses have surely branded me as hers.

And as the fates would have it, they have designated us as each other's soulmates.

 

Kerrienne

I died once, but I didn't stay dead.  As it turned out, the matebond that I share with Emrick kept me from crossing over but even if I didn't have a soulmate, I wouldn't have died.

Why?  Because I'm a Phoenix and my great-grandparents are Egyptian Gods.  Yeah you heard me.

Intrigued yet?...

 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Margaret Malory
• Release date: Nov 30, 2021
• ISBN: 9781393970118

Book preview

One  (Power Hungry)

Alastair

Ifell to my knees in shock. Felt the magic leave my body as I bled out onto the sand. How the hell did that mongrel know I was behind him? What should’ve been an easy kill and a powerful boost to my life force and magic was turning out to be my undoing. I’d grabbed a nearby person to use as a shield, not caring if it was one of my own men or one of the enemy’s. But it backfired. Oh, he took the main blow but that bastard’s sword was so long that it went through the man’s body and into mine. Though without my meat shield I would now be dead.

Now here I was on my knees, with the bastard standing over me about to end me. Me? Just then, someone fell down beside me, dieing. My right hand warmed up and I felt the power collect there. I flexed my hand and touched a leg. I absorbed what remaining life he had left in his body and felt the bleeding in my wound slow and when he exhaled his last, his soul flew to my grasp. I slammed my hand against my chest right above my heart and felt my body fill with energy. With renewed life. 

I threw an energy bolt in Emrick’s direction as he raised his sword to take my head. The bolt hit him in the chest and he stumbled, but I didn’t stay to gloat. I needed more energy since I’d just used most of the little bit I’d just absorbed to throw that energy blast at Emrick. But there was still a little bit of juice left in my body, so I closed my eyes and recited a teleportation spell. 

I landed in the hallway outside my bedroom door, startling  a maid. I was leaning heavily against the wall when she turned in my direction. When she realized that it was me, she approached me cautiously. She must have realized how hurt I was because she said, I will go and fetch help, my lord. 

But as she turned to go, I saw a glint in her eye. Not trusting it, I grabbed her arm as she tried to leave and sucked her dry then claimed her soul. I cannot afford to show weakness now. I’m not stupid enough to think that any of my people wouldn’t kill me if they got the chance. After all, I know I’ve made their life a living hell, and beaten them down so low into the ground that any of them with an ounce of courage left would jump at the chance to usurp me. So to avoid mutiny and because I know that if I hadn’t been dealing in the dark arts I wouldn’t be laird, I oppress them. 

My father was the previous laird, the only reason I became laird in the first place. He was beloved by our people. If any of them were to ever find out that I had killed him to take over as the Laird, magic or no magic, they would make a play for me and I’m not sure I would survive it. 

So I oppress them and rule them with fear. I’ve been pissed at my father since he let my demon-bastard of a cousin rule the McCleod lands. Lands that should’ve been mine. 

At his father’s death, ownership of the lands should’ve reverted back to my father and since my father was already laird of our own township, I should’ve become Laird of those lands. But my father told me to my face that my sixteen year old cousin was more of a man than I would ever be. I was twenty-three, and that’s when I started plotting.. 

The maid’s life force and soul had given me enough of a boost that I was now completely healed. I fed off my people without their knowledge. Which is how I stayed in power. I kept them afraid and weak, even my soldiers. The only time they felt strong was when they went into battle because I benefited from the havoc and the deaths they cost. All those delicious souls. 

Unbeknownst to anyone, I’d placed spells in every entryway in the keep, including the windows. Anyone who entered left some of their energy behind. Any small animals who wandered through an open window fell dead, because they were too small and whatever energy their life force contained was sucked dry by the spell. Energy I later collected and fed on. 

I called another servant to dispose of the maid’s body, then in the same breath, requested that bath water be brought to my bathing chambers. 

...

I wasn’t always this cold, this power hungry. When I was twenty one, I fell madly in love. As it turned out, the bitch was only using me. She didn’t love me. I overheard her telling the man she truly loved, one of my father’s soldiers, that she was with child, his child and that once she became lady of the keep. She would poison me then take him as husband so they could raise their child together. 

I heard them plotting to drug me. I overheard her telling him that she would put something in my drink later that night then when I woke up she’d accuse me of taking her virtue and I’d have no choice but to marry her. 

She’d only agreed to marry me because it was the only way for her to be near her true love, the soldier, my father’s second in command. The only reason I’d overheard this conversation at all was because I had dropped a brush I’d been using on my horse in the barn and I’d bent down to pick it up. They had come into the barn because they thought it was empty.

I’d crouched there listening to them plot against me then he’d fucked her against the same stall where I was hiding. I sat in the hay for a long time, tears running down my face. Then I felt rage unlike any I’d ever felt before. That was the first time I’d felt the warmth in my hand. I didn’t know what it was then.

Depressed, I’d saddled my horse then galloped into the woods behind the castle. That’s where the old crone found me.

Hello young laird.

Who the hell are you?

Who I am doesn’t matter. What I can do for you on the other hand... She paused.

What can you do for me?  I scoffed in a derisive manner.

I can show you how to use the power in your hand.

Power, what power? And you still haven’t told me who the hell you are.

I am your grandmother. She answered.

I don’t have a grandmother.

Well, that’s not exactly true. My daughter cast me out after she married your father.

I looked at her in shock. My mother was your daughter?

Yes. She fell deeply in love with your father. He was just a young laird back then. At her request, I put a spell on your father. The spell was designed to attract your father and blinded him to all others.

You...  you what?

She cackled. Where do you think your power comes from?

I don’t have any powers. I said in exasperation.

The warming that you feel in your hand is how it starts. You can suck the life out of someone, thereby getting stronger.

Okayyy... why did my mother cast you out? I asked, with growing interest.

She had become a lady and didn’t want to be associated with an old witch. She cackled again, then told me exactly what needed to be done. Her only request was that when I become laird, she would get a room in the castle and I agreed.

Maris came to my room that night to try and seduce me. Instead I gave her a sleeping potion, courtesy of my grandmother. She came to, under me, with my body riding hers, taking my pleasure. Pleasure she had denied me but had freely given to another. 

She opened her mouth to scream and I wrapped my hands around her throat, choking her and effectively silenced her. That was the first time I’d used my power to take someone’s life force. I’d been so shocked that I’d pulled back. But then I realized what I’d done. 

Her father was an important leader. The arranged marriage between her and I was supposed to bring his lands and my father’s under one banner. I panicked. She was barely conscious. So I dressed her, then using long forgotten passageways that I’d discovered when I was a carefree child, I took her to the highest peak in the castle.

Though she was weak, she started fighting back when she realized where we were. I put a hand on her neck to stop her from screaming then more of her life energy poured into me. 

This time I didn’t stop. I took it all. Then the weirdest thing happened. I watched as a small glowing ball left her and floated between our bodies. I reached for it without thinking and it flew to my grasp. I felt a sharp pain in my chest, right over my heart. I slammed the hand holding the glowing ball against my chest then the pain was gone. I removed my hand to find the tail end of the glowing ball disappearing into my chest. And I felt my body vibrate with power. My grandmother hadn’t said anything about a glowing ball. I threw her body down into the yard below, discarding her like the peace of trash she was.

I took her lover’s life the same night I slew my father. I sucked their life force then took their souls as I’d taken hers. Then I used my father’s sword to stab him and used his sword to stab my father, making it look as if they’d killed each other in a disagreement. 

Then I used the hidden passageways to go back to my rooms and that’s where the servants found me. In bed, sleeping. Peacefully. A knock at the door brought me back. The servants came in with loads of