I tore my gaze away.
Trees loomed around us, their dark boughs curving like ribs, moss draping their limbs. The air was thicker. Warmer.
“Where are we?” I asked.
“Far from Skalgard.” The executioner raked a hand through his soaked hair. “No one knows of this passage, but that doesn’t mean soldiers aren’t searching for us.”
I brushed dirt off my arms.
My dress was ruined. Once-fine fabric now stained, sleeves hanging in tatters, the stitching pulled apart. Worst of all, the wet material clung to every curve, transparent as gossamer, leaving nothing to the imagination.
His gaze slid over me. Then he unfastened his cloak and threw it at me like I was offensive to look at.
“Put this on. You’re useless to me if you freeze.”
I scrambled to catch it before it hit the mud, wrapping the heavy wool around myself with shaking fingers. It smelled like him—steel and pine, mixed with something lovely…like spring flowers at the market. The fabric swallowed me whole, his body heat sinking into mine.
“We need to keep going,” he said.
“Where?”
“To my people.”
I straightened. “Are you…a Dreadfae?”
Dreadfae raided villages, stealing livestock, gold, and sometimes women—none ever seen again. Some whispered that they enslaved these captives. Others claimed that humans were sacrificed during the blood moon. Nobody knew for certain, but fear of the Dreadfae’s savagery kept most far away.
And one of them held me captive.
He laughed coldly. “Dreadfae. What happened to nightborn devils?”
I crossed my arms. “You don’t seem offended.”
“Why would I be? It’s entertaining, listening to humans spin their stories about the fae. You’re all so afraid of us.”
“We don’t fear you. Wehateyou.”
“Do you always believe what you’re told?”
The low taunt sent a shiver through me.
“I believe my eyes.”
“What do you see now?”
I loathed him. “A killer.”
“Good. We understand each other.”
He was so infuriating. He stood, water streaming from silver hair that clung to his neck, perfectly at ease. Like he hadn’t pulled me through an underwater death trap.
“I’m not a blood-drinker,” he said finally. “The people you call Dreadfae have fangs. I don’t.”
“Comforting.”
“If I wanted to hurt you, I would’ve left you in that throne room.”
That sat heavier than the wet cloak on my shoulders.
