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now?”
    â€œNow?” Jax shrugged. “It is what I am. Blood servant to the sorceress. I cannot remember any other life.” He paused to meet her gaze. “You are not Yvaine. Already I know the difference. Yes, I serve you willingly.”
    â€œUntil I can learn how to release you.”
    He set his mug on the cupboard and bowed. “If that is your wish, sorceress.”
    Amanusa scowled at him. Was he as agreeable as he seemed? Or would he turn on her the minute sherelaxed her guard?
He’d seen her in her nightgown.
“You’ll sleep outside.”
    â€œOf course, my—Miss Whitcomb.” He bowed a little deeper.
    â€œAnd you’ll keep your hands and the rest of yourself to yourself.” She was never doing
that
again. Ever.
    Darkness overtook her suddenly, and pain. Her neck strained, twisting to turn her face away from the wet mouth, the teeth, the stinking, heaving male body crushing her. As quickly as the sensations swept over her, they departed again, leaving her shaken, shivering with sudden icy sweat sliding down her spine. She took a slow breath, hiding her shattered state. The memories would never be totally gone, but it had been a long time since one had possessed her like this.
    â€œNo, Miss.” Jax tilted his head to look at her from his bow. He seemed to have noticed nothing. “Were you worried about that? About me . . . taking liberties?”
    She couldn’t deny it, despite her little, not-so-nonchalant shrug.
    â€œYou needn’t.” He straightened, blushing a little as he picked at the battered edges of her cupboard, keeping his eyes down. “That’s part of the binding. I can’t—” He coughed. “Have intercourse without permission of the sorceress. It’s the magic. The . . . Well . . .” He trailed off.
    â€œI . . . See.” Amanusa’s own blush burned. She ought to be more comfortable talking about this, given her past, but she wasn’t. “Truly?”
    â€œTruly. I am a—a eunuch, until permission is given.”
    Pity mixed with the relief rolling through Amanusa, knowing what she did about men and their affection for their private parts. Had the old sorceress suffered like she had? Amanusa didn’t know, didn’t want to ask. But the information reassured her. The man wouldn’t have confessed such a thing if it weren’t true.
    She heaved a sigh and drank down the last of her tea. She needed to come up with a plan, but a plan for what? Did she want to learn this blood magic?
    The promise of true justice, even the mere possibility of achieving it, pulled at Amanusa. And the hunger for knowledge, to
know
new things, burned deep inside her. She’d eagerly gobbled up everything old Ilinca had to teach her and begged for more, but Ilinca had none. She’d warned Amanusa against learning more, saying the Inquisition would notice a woman working any magic greater than these small spells and tiny charms, and they would pounce.
    â€œWhat about the Magician’s Council?” Amanusa asked. “Hasn’t blood magic been banned? Will they even let a woman learn magic?”
    â€œBlood magic isn’t banned. Not officially.” Jax shook his head slowly. “I think I would have heard and remembered if it were. It has merely been shunned. Avoided. Because it is women’s magic. And because only the sorceresses know the truth of it.”
    â€œAnd women are banned from learning magic.”
    â€œThey are?” Jax sounded surprised.
    â€œHere, they are.”
    â€œThen we will go somewhere else. To Scotland. To Yvaine’s tower. The English council doesn’t bar women from magic.” He frowned, as if trying to recall something difficult. “At any rate, there’s nothingin the charter to prevent women from becoming members of the Magician’s Council of England.”
    â€œThe Hungarian council bans them,