Tithed Read Online Free PDF Page B

give it all up. I don't care." She sounded hoarse, her voice like glass, brittle. Ready to shatter. "Make love to me, Connell, and all I'll lose is the thrall. I can live with the rest of my life doing only low magic. I can. But I can't live the rest of my life tithed to him. I can't! Not that way!"
         He hushed her, gathering her into his arms, burying his face in her hair. He didn't want to ask her what Des had done or what he was trying to do. He didn't want to believe it. His stomach twisted, but the words she'd said no longer mattered. She was with him now. His Ella, the only woman he would ever love.
         And then, another figure appeared in the doorway. The shouting began. Desmond Valerin, his parents' pride and joy, and supposed defender of his sister's virtue. He'd cried of scandal and threatened to kill Connell, and because Desmond was a magicreator and Connell not, the fight had been brief and unfair. By the time the binding spell wore off and Connell could leave his room, much had happened. The rose garden had been painted with Des's blood.
         And Ella had been lost.
         "Connell."
         His eyes opened wide to darkness, and he sat up. He was no longer dreaming. A shadow in his doorway had him on his feet in moments, fists raised.
         She murmured a word and the fire flared. She pushed her hair off her shoulders and looked at him, her eyes glimmering in the light. "I didn't mean to scare you."
         "You didn't." He ran a hand through his hair, then looked down, self-conscious at his bare chest and the loosely tied sleeping trousers he wore. "What are you doing here?"
         Ella—Elspeth, he corrected himself, looked hesitant. "I came to plead your mercy. For everything. All of it. I have no excuses. I was cruel then. You deserved better."
         This wasn't what he'd expected, and though her words softened him inside, he did his best not to show it. "You have my mercy. Now you can go."
         She did something he had not expected. She crossed the room and went to her knees in front of him, head bowed. "Connell, please, please forgive me."
         And he could no longer hold onto his anger. It had burned through him like a hot coal in a napkin, leaving behind a hole, but no more heat. He got down in front of her, unable to bear seeing her abase herself like that. "I forgive you, Ella. I told you that."
         She looked up at him. "Do you still hate me?"
         "I could never hate you."
         Her smile was small. "You told me you hated me."
         "You told me you'd never love me."
         "I didn't want to hurt you." She looked at him. "Des was dead by his own hand. My mother—"
         "I remember."
         Her mother had given her favored child a funeral full of pomp and circumstance, of glitter and glory. Amarata Valerin had slapped her daughter's face in front of the mourners, called her a whore and blamed her for Desmond's death.
         "When you found me in the garden afterward and took my hand, all I could do was think how my mother was right." She took a deep breath and reached for his hand. She linked their fingers together. "How it was my fault Des had died. And how I couldn't let her know how much I loved you, Connell, or else she'd send you away or find a way to hurt you out of spite for me. So I told you I didn't love you, and I pushed you away because I didn't know what else to do, and I went away because I couldn't bear to live with how much I'd hurt you."
         He pulled her into his arms. "You weren't crying. I thought you meant it. I shouldn't have believed it, Ella. I should've known different."
         Against his cheek, she shook her head. "You couldn't have."
         He held her tight against him, stroking her hair and losing himself in her scent the way he'd done so many years ago, when they were no longer children and not quite adults. Tears wet his face, and he wasn't sure if they