Shadow Bound
Page 108
“Oh, hell,” Kori said, turning to see if I’d come to the same conclusion. And I had. Only I knew more than she did. More than any of them could possibly know. “Love Knot,” she said, and I nodded. But the name was a misnomer—you can’t control someone’s emotions, no matter what you bind them to. But that didn’t stop the occasional love-sick adolescent—or desperate college student—from preventing the object of her affection from marrying—or proposing marriage—to anyone else.
Kenley watched us, obviously trying to think through her own pain to follow the conversation. “You’re saying the Love Knot my college roommate used my blood for six years ago was targeting your boyfriend’s twin brother? What are the chances?”
Kori shrugged and shook her head slowly. “I stopped asking that years ago. How did Jake break the seal?”
“He didn’t. He said he couldn’t,” Kenley said, and my temper flared.
“He only said that because he didn’t want you to know you could break your own bindings.”
“So, what, he just lied and said the binding was broken, when it wasn’t?” Kori asked.
Kenley shook her head. “He helped me transfer it.”
I frowned. “You can’t transfer a binding.”
Kenley shrugged. “Evidently you can, under certain circumstances. In this case, he said the target had a dead brother, close in age. And Nadia didn’t have a sample of Steven’s blood, so she used a name binding. Jake’s man showed me how to transfer the binding to the dead brother, where it couldn’t hurt anyone.” She gave another little shrug, brow furrowed from the headache. “Dead people don’t fall in love, you know.” Then she turned to me, frowning. “Except that you’re not dead.”
“He’s not bound, either,” Meghan pointed out. “If you transferred the binding, why is Steven still bound?”
I exhaled heavily and rubbed my own forehead, leaning back in my chair. “Because she transferred the binding to Steven, not from him.”
“I don’t understand,” Kori said.
“Oh, shit. Your names,” Aaron said, and I looked up to see him still sitting on the floor, his fractured arm clutched to his chest. He wouldn’t take care of his own injuries until he knew his sister was safe.
“What about your names?” Kori asked. “The quick version,” she added, with another glance at the clock.
“My mom raised us to be paranoid,” I said. “She told us from the time our Skills manifested that people would want to use them. She said we’d have to hide our Skills, and possibly hide ourselves. Turns out she was right. When we left home for college—we picked schools on opposite sides of the country—we switched names, to help protect our true identities. That way, if someone tried to track me by my name, they’d actually be tracking him, and he was so far away even the best Tracker in the world couldn’t pick up his signal.”
Fortunately, Steven’s skill as a Reader was more common and less powerful than mine, which was why he’d felt safe enough just hiding his name, whereas I’d had to hide my entire existence.
“So, you’re not really Ian?” Kori said.
“No, I’m Ian. But in college, I called myself Steven, and I registered with his records and ID. So when Nadia bound Steven, she was actually binding me—Ian—because he was using my name. He got his degree as Ian—my brother really is a systems analyst—got his first job as Ian, and applied for his mortgage as Ian Holt. He still uses my name to this day,” I said, glancing at Meghan for confirmation, and she nodded. “And I joined the Marines as Steven Holt.”
“You’re the dead serviceman?” Kori’s eyes were narrow, her voice unsure. She was trying to untie a knot of identification my brother and I had worked for years to tangle. To keep each other safe. But that had obviously backfired. “You faked your own death?”
I shrugged. “I just took advantage of the opportunity when the Corps thought I died, along with most of the rest of my unit. Steven chose to hide in plain sight. I chose to hide in Australia. In Steven’s name, which now belonged to a dead U.S. serviceman.”
Kori sat on the end of the bed, eyes closed, thinking out loud. “So, Nadia bound Steven, but she used your name—Ian—so she was actually binding you. Then, when Kenley transferred the binding to you—in Steven’s name—she was actually transferring it back to the intended target. Is that right?”
“Yeah. I think so.” I turned back to Kenley. “Does that give you enough information to break the seal?”
“I sure hope so.”
“Please, do it,” Meghan begged as Kenley closed her eyes. Her hands shook in her lap as she concentrated, and I wondered how much harder this would be, with so much resistance pain already crippling her. Her eyes moved behind her eyelids, and her hands clenched around the arms of her chair
The rest of us waited, hardly breathing. I watched my brother—my twin—trying to find some change in him to indicate her success. Or her failure. His breaths were shallow, his chest hardly moving. He’d grown way too thin, especially in the past week, when food became too hard to keep down, even when Meghan managed to get it in him. He’d stopped letting me help. In fact, he’d kicked me out of his room eight days earlier—that was the last time he’d had the strength to shout—and it took me a while to understand that seeing me was hard for him, because I looked like he remembered himself, even as he wasted away a little more every day.
Kenley watched us, obviously trying to think through her own pain to follow the conversation. “You’re saying the Love Knot my college roommate used my blood for six years ago was targeting your boyfriend’s twin brother? What are the chances?”
Kori shrugged and shook her head slowly. “I stopped asking that years ago. How did Jake break the seal?”
“He didn’t. He said he couldn’t,” Kenley said, and my temper flared.
“He only said that because he didn’t want you to know you could break your own bindings.”
“So, what, he just lied and said the binding was broken, when it wasn’t?” Kori asked.
Kenley shook her head. “He helped me transfer it.”
I frowned. “You can’t transfer a binding.”
Kenley shrugged. “Evidently you can, under certain circumstances. In this case, he said the target had a dead brother, close in age. And Nadia didn’t have a sample of Steven’s blood, so she used a name binding. Jake’s man showed me how to transfer the binding to the dead brother, where it couldn’t hurt anyone.” She gave another little shrug, brow furrowed from the headache. “Dead people don’t fall in love, you know.” Then she turned to me, frowning. “Except that you’re not dead.”
“He’s not bound, either,” Meghan pointed out. “If you transferred the binding, why is Steven still bound?”
I exhaled heavily and rubbed my own forehead, leaning back in my chair. “Because she transferred the binding to Steven, not from him.”
“I don’t understand,” Kori said.
“Oh, shit. Your names,” Aaron said, and I looked up to see him still sitting on the floor, his fractured arm clutched to his chest. He wouldn’t take care of his own injuries until he knew his sister was safe.
“What about your names?” Kori asked. “The quick version,” she added, with another glance at the clock.
“My mom raised us to be paranoid,” I said. “She told us from the time our Skills manifested that people would want to use them. She said we’d have to hide our Skills, and possibly hide ourselves. Turns out she was right. When we left home for college—we picked schools on opposite sides of the country—we switched names, to help protect our true identities. That way, if someone tried to track me by my name, they’d actually be tracking him, and he was so far away even the best Tracker in the world couldn’t pick up his signal.”
Fortunately, Steven’s skill as a Reader was more common and less powerful than mine, which was why he’d felt safe enough just hiding his name, whereas I’d had to hide my entire existence.
“So, you’re not really Ian?” Kori said.
“No, I’m Ian. But in college, I called myself Steven, and I registered with his records and ID. So when Nadia bound Steven, she was actually binding me—Ian—because he was using my name. He got his degree as Ian—my brother really is a systems analyst—got his first job as Ian, and applied for his mortgage as Ian Holt. He still uses my name to this day,” I said, glancing at Meghan for confirmation, and she nodded. “And I joined the Marines as Steven Holt.”
“You’re the dead serviceman?” Kori’s eyes were narrow, her voice unsure. She was trying to untie a knot of identification my brother and I had worked for years to tangle. To keep each other safe. But that had obviously backfired. “You faked your own death?”
I shrugged. “I just took advantage of the opportunity when the Corps thought I died, along with most of the rest of my unit. Steven chose to hide in plain sight. I chose to hide in Australia. In Steven’s name, which now belonged to a dead U.S. serviceman.”
Kori sat on the end of the bed, eyes closed, thinking out loud. “So, Nadia bound Steven, but she used your name—Ian—so she was actually binding you. Then, when Kenley transferred the binding to you—in Steven’s name—she was actually transferring it back to the intended target. Is that right?”
“Yeah. I think so.” I turned back to Kenley. “Does that give you enough information to break the seal?”
“I sure hope so.”
“Please, do it,” Meghan begged as Kenley closed her eyes. Her hands shook in her lap as she concentrated, and I wondered how much harder this would be, with so much resistance pain already crippling her. Her eyes moved behind her eyelids, and her hands clenched around the arms of her chair
The rest of us waited, hardly breathing. I watched my brother—my twin—trying to find some change in him to indicate her success. Or her failure. His breaths were shallow, his chest hardly moving. He’d grown way too thin, especially in the past week, when food became too hard to keep down, even when Meghan managed to get it in him. He’d stopped letting me help. In fact, he’d kicked me out of his room eight days earlier—that was the last time he’d had the strength to shout—and it took me a while to understand that seeing me was hard for him, because I looked like he remembered himself, even as he wasted away a little more every day.
