A Slave to Love, Broken Hearts, and Everything In Between

Chapter 8: Sinbad and Robin Revisited, Part 2

********IMPORTANT NOTE AT THE END OF CHAPTER! PLEASE READ IT THANK YOU********

Blade Pov

Being with Mona for so long had some uses; I knew how to effectively and properly remove makeup. Something I'd seen Mona do a million and one times, and something I'd seen her yell at her assistants over even more than that for doing it wrong. I was able to get Robin cleaned up and looking more herself without too much struggle.

Her face was a little pink when I was done but she looked like an almost entirely different person. Younger. More carefree now that she was peacefully sleeping instead of being terrified out of her wits and goaded by me. She still hadn't woken up, not even with all my makeup removal efforts, so whatever drugs they may have given her or magic they used on her with the stress of this evening must have taken its toll.

I finished cleaning her up, wiping the blood from her skin, unable to help trailing my fingers over the tattoo on her forearm, her skin branded with my blood, the intricacies of the spiky swirls of it.

We hadn't yet finished our bond yet. Our cuts had since healed, replaced instead by our bonded marks, our tattoos, but that was a problem for later when she was awake. Now that I had time since she was cleaned up and taken care of, I washed the blood off myself and changed my clothes. I couldn't chance a shower in case she woke up and made a run for it, so rinsing off in the sink would have to do. I was sure a place like this had seen plenty of bloodied people before. What was one more?

In the harsh light of the motel bathroom I'd rented for the night, it only made my tattoo that much starker and shocking. A vivid scarlet painted across my pale skin, looping and twisting with sharp edges like a spider web. It itched and ached occasionally, as uncomfortable to be on my body as it was to look at.

This was going to take some getting used to and I sure as shit didn't want to get used to this mark or anything else that came with it.

I had no tattoos otherwise and no piercings, and after being alive for several centuries, I had grown used to not having a random and fucking unwanted red mark taking up most of my fucking forearm. Call me a creature of habit, but this was going to be bothering me in more ways than one. Even if I somehow got rid of our bond, I'd always have this mark as a permanent reminder of the way I'd screwed up tonight and Aros had put me in my place.

What would even happen when we completed the bond? Would it just stand out more? Would it only itch and irritate me to the point where I'd rather lop my own arm off when she was near? Or would it finally stop irritating me? Why the hell was it doing that anyway? I knew our bond was supposed to make us aware of each other, but they'd always said it was more of a general feeling, nothing to do with being--

Hmm.

We hadn't finished our bond. What if...

I rounded the doorway and found Robin still sprawled out where I left her, dead asleep. Her arm upturned, black mark facing up where I could clearly see it. Just seeing it made me itch and ache more, the restless instinct to press our healed marks together to complete the ritual.

But what if I didn't?

Being bonded meant we needed to spend time together. Be near each other. But if we weren't fully bonded, then technically we wouldn't have the urge--or the obligation--to fully commit to our needs?

I shouldn't be too hasty. Already I'd made a mistake tonight, so I needed to think before I made any other decisions. She was asleep after all so I had time to experiment.

I slipped out the door, locked it tight, then took off like a shot. I made it down several blocks before the aching faded, the irritation in my forearm gone like there wasn't a bonded mark there at all.