Opening
A charged reunion at Sept-Tours binds Diana Bishop and Matthew Clairmont in a vow that turns them into outlaws—and a family. As intimacy deepens, danger closes in: a brutal kidnapping shatters their fragile safety, forcing Matthew to reveal hidden power and the de Clermonts to go to war to save Diana.
What Happens
Chapter 26: Outlaws
Matthew returns to Sept-Tours and meets Diana in the courtyard. He admits he was wrong to leave, confesses he loves her, and kisses her—only for Ysabeau de Clermont to intervene, declaring the kiss an oath that binds them as mates. In a breath, they become outlaws for breaking the covenant. After fury and shock, Ysabeau claims Diana as her daughter and promises the de Clermonts will fight as one. Her condition is clear: Diana must learn magic and defend herself, or she endangers them all.
Inside, Matthew recounts the Oxford break-ins: creatures searched his lab and Diana’s rooms not for data but her DNA. Diana remembers her mother’s insistence on disposing of hair and nails—witchcraft precautions Ysabeau recognizes. Matthew reveals the Congregation has watched Diana her entire life because of her power, far beyond their interest in Ashmole 782. Diana admits her recent uncontrolled explosion of witchwater and wind. That night, Matthew lies awake in her bed to watch over her, sealing a new intimacy and vigilance.
Chapter 27: The Hunt
Determined to inhabit this new life, Diana demands to hunt with Matthew. He refuses in fear and anger, terrified his predatory nature could harm her if desire blurs into bloodlust. Diana refuses to be shielded. She reveals Ysabeau already took her hunting and told her of Matthew’s first wife, Blanca, and son, Lucas. Trust and honesty force Matthew to relent.
In the forest, Matthew hunts with strategy and reverence—so different from Ysabeau’s style. Diana calms the stag with silent empathy as Matthew makes the kill, witnessing and accepting the most dangerous part of him. After, Matthew confesses that Marcus Whitmore is his vampire son. When he tries to protect her with half-truths, blue fire sparks at Diana’s fingertips. He finally agrees to stop hiding his world from her.
Chapter 28: Bundling and Scars
While Ysabeau “cleans” their territory of Domenico and Gerbert’s encroachments, Matthew explains that by vampire law he and Diana are already mated. He proposes an intimate courtship through “bundling,” sharing a bed to learn each other without intercourse. Their night is tender and sensual; trust replaces secrecy.
Diana discovers the truth of Matthew’s body: beneath flawless skin lie hundreds of pale, snowflake-like scars and crosshatched lines—centuries of wounds accumulated by a 1,500-year warrior. The sight ignites her desire to protect him. They finally make love in total surrender. Matthew falls into an unusually deep, humanlike sleep. At dawn, Diana, restless and buoyant, kisses him and slips alone into the garden.
Chapter 29: The Oubliette
A witch with platinum hair lifts Diana into the sky: Satu Järvinen abducts her to a ruined fortress, La Pierre, where Gerbert and Domenico wait. Gerbert boasts of his history with Ashmole 782 and covets Diana’s knowledge. After the vampires leave, Satu tries to unravel Diana’s trust, claiming Matthew seeks only the book, gave Diana his blood to control her, and murdered Gillian Chamberlain.
Diana rejects the lies and condemns the witches for killing her parents. Satu switches to torture, binding and carving a magical circle into Diana’s back to force her power to surface. In agony, Diana sees her mother, Rebecca, who brings silent comfort. When Satu fails to break her, she throws Diana into an oubliette—a deep pit meant to erase memory and hope. In the darkness and pain, Rebecca’s spirit returns with a story of a little witch bound in invisible ribbons—hinting at a spell cast to hide Diana’s magic until she is ready.
Chapter 30: The Knights of Lazarus
The narrative shifts to Matthew, frantic as he and Ysabeau search. Baldwin Montclair, Matthew’s elder brother, arrives at Ysabeau’s summons, furious that Matthew mated with a witch—the species he blames for Philippe’s torture and death. The brothers brawl until Marthe and Ysabeau separate them. Baldwin forbids Matthew to continue the search and threatens to cast him out of the family.
Matthew counters by invoking his authority as Grand Master of the Knights of Lazarus, placing Diana under the order’s protection and absolving the de Clermonts of responsibility. Bound by his oath, Baldwin must obey. A call to Sarah Bishop and Em confirms the truth: Rebecca spellbound Diana as a child to protect her until a prophesied “shadowed man” could guard her. With Baldwin’s strategy and this new knowledge, they deduce the witches’ lair at La Pierre, fly in by helicopter, and discover Diana’s prison—the oubliette.
Character Development
These chapters forge identity through ordeal, turning private trust into public defiance and shifting the story from romance to war footing.
- Diana Bishop: Claims agency, demands honesty, and faces terror without yielding. She embraces the hunt, survives torture, and begins to understand her spellbound power.
- Matthew Clairmont: Drops his protective façade, reveals his lineage and scars—physical and emotional—and asserts hidden authority as Grand Master. Love forces him to integrate warrior and scientist.
- Ysabeau de Clermont: Moves from proud gatekeeper to fierce matriarch, adopting Diana and insisting on hard truths about power and self-defense.
- Satu Järvinen: Emerges as a ruthless antagonist, using lies and cruelty to weaponize prejudice and fear.
- Baldwin Montclair: Embodies the old order’s rage and rules, but his oath binds him to Matthew’s command, hinting at grudging cooperation.
Themes & Symbols
Forbidden love becomes formalized as a mating and instantly criminalized, sharpening the stakes of Forbidden Love and Inter-species Relationships. The hunt, the bed, and the battlefield blur: to love across species, Diana and Matthew must confront predation, secrecy, and power without flinching. At the same time, the revelations around spellbinding force a reckoning with Identity and Self-Acceptance. Diana isn’t powerless; she is deliberately veiled. Matthew isn’t only a cultured scientist; he is a centuries-old warrior whose scars—and command—can no longer be hidden.
These chapters also test the boundaries of Family, Lineage, and Belonging. Ysabeau’s adoption of Diana, Baldwin’s fury, and Matthew’s invocation of the Knights of Lazarus rearrange loyalties, showing how chosen bonds can supersede blood and tradition. Meanwhile, Secrets and Deception cut both ways: Satu’s manipulations fail, but the biggest secret—Diana’s spellbinding—redefines every mystery in the book.
Symbols deepen this turn. Matthew’s hidden scars are a living palimpsest of memory and violence, the past etched into the body. The oubliette—literally a “place of forgetting”—ironically becomes the crucible of remembrance, where Diana’s mother returns and the truth of her protections begins to surface.
Key Quotes
“That was not merely a kiss. It was an oath.”
- Ysabeau reframes intimacy as irrevocable allegiance. The line marks the legal, political, and spiritual consequences of Diana and Matthew’s bond, transforming private love into public defiance.
“Bundling.”
- This single word signals a courtship that privileges trust, conversation, and consent. It bridges the gap between danger and tenderness, allowing them to explore vulnerability before consummation.
“The Grand Master of the Knights of Lazarus.”
- Matthew’s title reveals latent power and networks of obligation. By invoking it, he moves from romantic partner to commander, forcing ancient hierarchies to serve Diana’s rescue.
“A little witch wrapped in invisible ribbons.”
- Rebecca’s image encodes the spellbinding. What sounds like a bedtime tale becomes the key to Diana’s identity, recasting her “lack” of magic as protection awaiting the right moment—and person.
Why This Matters and Section Significance
These chapters deliver the novel’s pivot from intimate sanctuary to open conflict. The reunion and mating cement the protagonists’ bond, then the kidnapping fractures safety and accelerates the plot into a rescue narrative. Thematically, love and violence stand side by side: the hunt teaches trust; the bed teaches truth; the oubliette teaches endurance.
Crucial revelations reshape the stakes. The confirmation of Diana’s spellbinding reframes her parents as strategists, not victims of chance. Matthew’s scars and leadership expose the cost and reach of his past. By invoking the Knights of Lazarus and compelling Baldwin’s aid, Matthew redraws the political map, setting the series on a collision course with the Congregation and ensuring that family, oath, and love now move in lockstep toward war.