Outwardly, Ksar didn’t let himself react.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he said.
Seyn laughed. “Do you think I’m stupid? When you described Leylen’shni’gul’s symptoms, they sounded very familiar to me. I don’t feel you on the bond’s other end, and my bond is weak and faulty.” He cocked his head to the side. “So, how high-level are you? Class 4? Class 5? Worse? Or should I say better? I guess now we know why you’re such a high-handed ass.”
Ksar swore on the inside. This had never been the plan.
Harht was staring at him wide-eyed. “Ksar? Is that true?”
Ksar swept a calculating gaze between Harht and Seyn. If he was careful, he could—
“Don’t even think of erasing our memories,” Seyn said, stiffening. “My mental shields are too intricate and personalized for you to rebuild them perfectly. I’ll know they’ve been messed with and I’ll go to mind adepts. You wouldn’t want them to find out what you did—or the state of my bond, for that matter.”
Ksar wondered what it said about him that his cock actually twitched at Seyn’s defiance. The completely inappropriate reaction of his own body in such a serious situation made Ksar’s lips thin in distaste. His…thing for this brat was getting out of control.
Seyn smiled humorlessly. “So you can go without a bond, but Harht can’t, huh? Fucking hypocrite.”
“It’s different,” Ksar said.
Seyn raised his eyebrows mockingly. “Enlighten us why it’s different.”
“Our bond never quite took,” Ksar said, choosing his words carefully. He decided to be honest…to a degree. Seyn didn’t need to know that Ksar had a perfectly functional access to his emotions and thoughts all the time—if he wanted it. He also didn’t need to know that Ksar could have formed a fully functional bond between them—if he had wanted to. “I’m not entirely sure why. Perhaps it was because of our age difference or the fact that I was much older than the age children got bonded at. Perhaps you were too young. Either way, our bond has been defective from the beginning. You could never feel me through the bond, so you didn’t know it wasn’t normal. Leylen’shni’gul’s bond to Harht had been perfectly functional, and she obviously can tell that something is wrong with the bond now. You could never tell the difference.”
“So you used my obliviousness against me while all my life I wondered if there was something wrong with me.” Seyn chuckled. “Nice. And here I thought I couldn’t dislike you more. Just out of curiosity, what were you going to do in two years’ time? Fake the completion of the bond? Mess with my head and make me think our bond was fine?”
Ksar kept his face neutral.
In truth, this was something he’d given a lot of thought to over the years. He had two options, and neither was satisfactory.
The first option would be to form a functional bond between himself and Seyn, so that the mind adept performing the marriage ceremony didn’t suspect anything and married them. The obvious downside was that he would lose most of his telepathic abilities if he chose that route, and that wasn’t an option, as far as he was concerned.
That left the option of manipulating Seyn and the mind adept’s memories, making them believe the bonding ceremony was successful. It was a feasible option, far preferable to the first one. And yet…the idea of messing with Seyn’s mind didn’t sit well with him. As annoying as he found Seyn’s defiant personality, he had grown…accustomed to it. The idea of manipulating Seyn’s mind didn’t appeal to him. He didn’t want to do it. He didn’t want to brainwash him. He didn’t want the brat to change.
And it wasn’t a good enough reason.
Such sentimentality was unacceptable—even dangerous, considering what was at stake.
“I haven’t come to a decision yet,” Ksar admitted. “But that was one of the options.”
Seyn paled with fury.
Dragging his gaze away, Ksar fixed it on Harht. “In any case, it’s irrelevant for you. Leylen’shni’gul would definitely notice—she already has. And before you ask, she’s not bonded to me, so I can’t exactly ‘mess with her head’ and make her think her bond is fine, at least not indefinitely. It’s not feasible.”
Harht’s shoulders slumped.
Softening his voice, Ksar said, “If you don’t come back, her parents will go to the Council. The consequences…you can’t even imagine them. You have no choice, Harry.”
Perhaps it was the use of his human name, perhaps it was something else, but either way, all the fight left his brother; it seemed Harht finally accepted the reality. He looked defeated and very small. Miserable.
Ksar ignored the knot of disquiet in his stomach. He was doing the right thing. He was.
Harht swallowed visibly. “Just let me write him a note, then. I can’t disappear without a word again. I can’t do that to him, Ksar.”