Sin frowned. “What for?”
The answer came swiftly, not in words, but in the familiar sensation of magic being locked away beneath her skin. The warmth and power that surged through her disappeared just as suddenly, leaving only cold emptiness.
Sin’s breath came in short, jagged gasps, her voice trembling through the haze of agony, “Thank you.”
Confusion crossed Audrira’s face.
“I don’t ever want that power,” Sin clarified. “I have no desire to kill again.”
Audrira frowned at Sin’s words. With a silent press of her lips, she offered Sin a clean dress. Sin nodded in gratitude and casually threw the dress over her shoulders. She didn’t care who was watching.
With a turn to Max, his hand reached for her.
For several seconds, they stared each other down. Over her dead body, would she take the hand of a betrothed male. Mate or not, she didn’t know him.
His lips curled into a small smirk, but the edge still simmered in his eyes. This was the male who scared off the suitors that fancied her, the male who almost took her virginity in a ballroom. But the scoundrel was engaged.
Leading the way out of the room, he walked ahead of her with his hands behind his back.
They didn’t speak as they walked through the winding halls of the palace, Max’s long strides carrying them both toward his quarters. With each step becoming increasingly difficult, Sin felt the heavy weight of her exhaustion. She had barely slept in days, and her body screamed for rest, though her mind refused to quiet. The opulence of the palace only served to mock her, and each flickering torch that lined the walls seemed to whisper her inadequacy.
When they arrived at his room, Sin eyed the bed with suspicion, as if it were a trap.
“You need rest.” Max gestured toward it, his expression softening. “I’ll show you to your new quarters when I’m certain you’ll survive the night.”
Despite her mind screaming ‘fuck no,’ her body had other ideas.
But despite her possessing exhaustion, completely giving in wasn’t something she was willing to do. She pulled pillows from the bed, constructing a flimsy wall between them—her line in the sand.
With a smirk he couldn’t hide, Max watched her climb onto the bed and promptly fall asleep.
A strong grip on her shoulder shook her awake after an indiscernible amount of time had passed. Blinking, her vision cleared to reveal Max standing over her.
His face and heavily tattooed chest were bathed in an orange glow from the hearth.
“Time to change your bandages,” he murmured.
Sin glanced at the clock. Already? It seemed as if she had just fallen asleep. The witches had warned her that the wound behind her head, still open and oozing slightly, requiredconstant attention to heal properly. Confirming Vivienne meant to kill her.
With a pained sigh escaping her lips, she winced as she slowly sat up.
Already at her side, Max unwrapped the old bandages with surprising care. His fingers grazed her skin, the touch gentle despite the roughness of his hands.
“You wasted your time with a glamour,” he muttered as he worked. “The scars do nothing to inhibit your savage beauty.”
A hint of a smile touched her lips. “Savage beauty? Not exactly every girl’s dream compliment.”
“What else can I expect of my little blade?”
Her gaze narrowed at the possessive tone, the softness in his expression disarming her. She was too tired to argue properly, the exhaustion weighing down her thoughts. A zip of something unpleasant rang through her. Anger? A quick glance at his eyes, and they were serpentine, pupils narrowing to slits.
“Why do your eyes do that?”
Max finished with the bandages, tying them off as he answered. “My mother is from Iostria. The realm of snake shifters. As I am half, I cannot fully transform. Though, sometimes when my emotions are high, certain parts of me shift, like my eyes.”
“Certain—” Sin stopped her question once she saw the sparkle in Max’s eyes, and remembered how she was deflowered by an unnatural scaly cock. “Oh.”
His gaze turned serious, as if assessing her reaction. “I would never harm you, Sin. I’ll never cross your boundaries… but nothing changes the fact that you belong to me. Just as I belong to you.”
