Chapter 108 Chapter 108

Chapter 108 Chapter 108

Roman checked the straps of her pack himself scarred hands careful against the plush give of her waist. Pale green eyes searched her face through the bond.

The moment the threads push harder than you can hold we stop. No arguments.

She nodded once the soft laugh that once hid pain now only a quiet breath of agreement.

I will tell you. I promise.

Darius finished the last of the golden communication runes and tucked the bloodline maps into his jacket. His chest wound had closed enough for travel yet every movement still pulled. Silvia tested the balance of her blade and the weight of the quiet scouts she had chosen. Twelve fighters in total mixed East and West no longer divided by old banners. Lucien stood slightly apart ancient features turned toward the mist beyond the broken road as if he could already see the blood paths waiting.

The team moved out in silence. No horns. No farewell speeches. Only the soft sound of boots on stone and the distant crash of waves against the cliffs far below. Eliasa walked between Roman and Lucien the generous weight of her thighs brushing with each step. The living seal pulsed in time with her heartbeat the two threads shifting restlessly the farther they traveled from the academy’s original wards. Heat spiked through the soft core of her stomach yet she locked the balance and kept moving.

The blood roads revealed themselves only after the last torchlight of the Golden Throne vanished behind the first ridge. Lucien raised one hand and the mist parted along a path that no ordinary eye could have found. Stone that looked solid under the fog became a narrow track of darker rock veined with faint crimson light. The air grew colder. The scent of salt and old blood rose from the ground itself.

Eliasa felt the change immediately. The trapped threads lunged against their stitches as if the road itself called to them. Pain lanced through the plush layers of her body. She staggered. Roman’s arm locked around the soft curve of her waist before she could fall. The bond flared with shared warning.

Talk to me.

The threads know this path. They want to follow it all the way to the deep water vessel. Every step makes them stronger.

Roman’s jaw flexed yet he did not slow their pace. He simply adjusted his hold so the generous weight of her body leaned more fully into his strength.

Then we keep the pace you can sustain. Lucien how much farther to the first marker?

The Vampire King answered without looking back.

Two hours at this speed. The deep water vessel will sense the key the moment we cross the second marker. After that the road will no longer hide us.

Silvia ranged ahead with two scouts blades ready. Darius walked just behind Eliasa golden runes already forming between his fingers in case the threads forced an early crisis. The rest of the team kept tight formation eyes on the mist and the shifting crimson veins underfoot.

An hour passed in near silence. The blood road narrowed until the team walked single file between walls of fog that pressed close enough to touch. Eliasa’s soft breaths came shorter. The living seal heated until the freckled skin across her chest and shoulders flushed. She pressed one hand against the plush curve of her stomach and forced another layer of obsidian stitches into place. The threads fought her every motion whispering through the pain.

Turn back. Return to the door. Let the network rise through the soft body that already carries the primary seal. The deep water vessel will thank you when it arrives.

She rejected the whispers with the same stubborn love that had closed the greater seal once before. Silver light flickered under her skin reinforcing the soft foundation of her thighs and hips. Crimson hunger rose and bit down on the threads without consuming them. The scar held. Barely.

Roman felt every struggle through the bond. His free hand found hers the large scarred fingers closing gently around her smaller softer ones.

I have you. Keep fighting them. We are not far from the marker.

The second marker appeared as a single standing stone half swallowed by mist. Crimson light pulsed along its surface in a rhythm that matched the restless threads inside Eliasa. The moment the team stepped past it the temperature dropped and the fog itself seemed to listen.

Lucien stopped.

It knows. The deep water vessel has turned fully onto this road. We have perhaps until dawn before the first thralls reach us.

Eliasa’s blue eyes closed as a fresh vision slammed through the open scar. Cold black water. A figure rising from depths that should not exist beneath any mountain. Eyes like drowned starlight. A voice that spoke in the pressure of the deep rather than sound. The two trapped threads answered that voice with pure hunger. The living seal tore another hair thin fraction before she could stop it.

She cried out. The soft weight of her body folded. Roman caught her against his chest the oversized sweater bunching between them as he lowered them both to the cold stone of the road. The bond transmitted white agony. Darius dropped to one knee golden runes flaring around the pair in a hasty containment circle. Silvia signaled the scouts into defensive positions around the marker stone. Lucien placed one cold hand against Eliasa’s freckled forehead and pushed a thin stream of ancient strength into the bond to help her hold the scar.

Eliasa forced words through clenched teeth the full swell of her chest rising hard against Roman’s.

The vessel is not days away. It is hours. It has been moving through water under the stone itself. The thralls will rise from the road. Not from the mist.

As if the words had summoned them the crimson veins under the blood road flared bright. Stone cracked. Dark water welled up through the fractures carrying shapes that had once been wolves and something older. Jointed limbs pulled free of the flooded cracks. Eyes the color of drowned starlight opened in faces that no longer remembered air.

Roman lifted Eliasa against his side the soft curves of her body shielded by the massive frame of him as the first thralls hauled themselves fully onto the road. Silvia met the nearest with a cut aimed at the joints. Darius expanded the golden circle trying to slow the rising water. Lucien blurred forward draining what little essence the deep born thralls still carried.

Eliasa locked her knees and poured everything left into the living seal. The two trapped threads lunged for the open scar seeking reunion with the deep water power that called them. She met them with silver strength drawn from the generous foundation of her own flesh. The plush give of her stomach and thighs became the only solid ground in a road that was rapidly turning to flooded ruin. Crimson hunger bit down. Obsidian stitches flared. The scar held by the width of a single breath.

Roman’s voice reached her through the roaring bond rough and absolute.

We fight here. We hold the road. And we do not let the threads win.

The deep born thralls kept rising. The blood road itself seemed to reject their presence even as it delivered them. Somewhere farther along the flooded path the true deep water vessel moved closer with every surge of dark water. The living seal inside Eliasa’s soft core pulsed in time with that approach the two trapped threads straining toward freedom with renewed fury.

Eliasa lifted her blue eyes to Roman’s pale green ones the freckled skin of her cheeks damp with effort and the first spray of the rising flood.

Together.

His answering hold on the generous weight of her body was iron and tenderness both.

Always.

The first true wave of deep water thralls hit their line as the last light of dusk vanished completely under the mist.