Turning my head, I meet the dead eyes of the beast whose mask dislodged in the fall. His stare is cold, vacant, as blood pours from an apparent wound in the back of his head—if the sharp rock next to it is any indication.
Adrenaline courses through my veins, but there’s no time to dwell on the moment because in the next, a strong, masculine voice cuts through the air, silencing everyone.
“Enough.”
My eyes pop open wide. The beast scrambles off me, and I push up on weak arms, instantly meeting the green eyes I’ve been in love with for weeks now.
Shit. Love. That’s what this is, isn’t it?
I wouldn’t have accepted this for anything less.
He’s wearing a gold skull mask that looks like it was forged from the actual metal and a thick crimson cloak. His gaze burns as he takes me in, and I imagine his nostrils flaring, anger heating his skin.
“Incarnate. Anathema,” Pythia says, appearing at his side. “You’re just in time. We were ensuring your pick was worthy of?—”
She cuts off as his arm lashes out, his hand grabbing her throat. The mask lifts a little, revealing pale skin, and my nerves vibrate with anticipation, waiting to see if it falls all the way off.
“If she’sworthy?” Sutton spits, and she clutches at his fingers, trying to pry them off. “You kidnap her, threaten her with violence and death, and have the audacity to say you’re doing this for my benefit?”
“Since she’s an Anderson, we just had to be?—”
The woman’s words get choked off, and she wheezes. No one rushes to her aid.
“Ichose to spare her. Didn’t I?”
She nods.
“So what gives you the right totesther in any way? She’smine, not yours.Mypartner, the life to my death. My Maiden. You do not touch her. You do not so much as look at her, or I swear on these cursed school grounds I’ll burn all the skin from your body and use your bones inmynext sacrifice. Under my authority as Incarnate, is that understood?”
“E-elder?—”
He shoves her to the ground, a noise of disgust puffing past his lips.
I glance around the room, noting how every masked figure seems stricken in place, like they physically can’t move.
Like whatever beliefs they hold actually keep them from retaliating against their chosen leader.
Sutton exits the stage, pulling a spare mask and cloak out from a pocket inside his. He shuffles closer to me, holding the mask out—it’s a pretty white one decorated in dozens of different flowers, the embodiment of springtime.
The Maiden’s mask.
“How did you know I was?—”
He shakes his head, offering the mask. “Do you accept your role as Incarnate’s Maiden? His ultimate partner? His other half—in this life and the next?”
My heart skips a beat. This sounds an awful lot like a wedding proposal, but I’m not really lucid enough at the moment to decline. I know he’d mentioned something of the sort, but in truth, I hadn’t thought it was real.
It’s only now settling in that he meant it.
I nod, just barely, my vision swimming as his arms come around me. He fits the mask onto my face and lifts me while a small round of cheers erupts around us.
Sutton drapes the spare cloak over my shoulders and sets me on the stage edge. I avoid looking at Percy, pressing my palms into the ground to keep from falling over.
Behind his back, Sutton brandishes a shiny dagger, and the breath stalls in my throat. He crouches before Pythia, tilting her chin up with the dagger’s tip.
“Since you’ve injured my Maiden, I won’t be participating in the usual ceremonial practices. But she dons the mask, so sheisthe Maiden. Which means only one person can decide if she’s worthy—and if she gets to live.” He taps her skin, his voice dark and low, unlike anything I’ve ever heard before. “I decide itall.”
With that, he angles his arm, driving the dagger through her stomach, and I lose consciousness.
