I reached down, scratched behind the pup’s ears, and earned a contented nudge against my hand.
“Good boy. Keep watch, yeah?” I shook my finger at him. “If you hear so much as a floorboard creak nearby, I expect full growling and intimidation tactics.”
He yawned, showing off teeth that’d make a velociraptor jealous, and I left, easing the door shut behind me.
10. Weight of Exhaustion
Seri
“One, two, three, four, five, six, seven,
All good children go to heaven.”
I woke up with Eluned’s creepy nursery rhyme keeping time in my head with the aches pounding through my body.
Blinking, I saw a white ceiling above me and tried to move, just to test how bad it was, and quickly found out that it wasreallybad. A sharp, jagged pain sliced through my ankle, my arm, my side, my head, well, justeverywhere. I sank back against the pillow and sighed.
I didn’t know where I was, or how I’d gotten here.
The last thing I remembered was Amabel siphoning the last drop of magic I had left, and then Eluned kicking me, and then nothing.
I glanced around and saw lace curtains letting in golden light that gleamed on rich, polished furniture. The air smelled like clean linen and evening primrose, and the bed I lay in was soft and warm.
Not a vampire prince’s dungeon, at least,I thought with grim humor,but that doesn’t mean I’m safe.
I looked down and froze. My old clothes were gone, replaced by a plain white t-shirt that hung off me. Bandages wrapped my bad arm and a few other places, which meant someone had seen the wounds. Someone hadundressedme to see them.
Panic began to curl low in my chest, tight and breathless, but before it could rise too high, another thought shoved it aside.
Brumous! He was with me! Where is he?I looked around again, a little more frantically this time, but didn’t see him.He must’ve stayed hidden. He must be okay.
And then, all at once, my heart remembered.
Mates. I found my mates.
But I was here to marry a man from the vampire court!
I’d signed a binding contract!
I can’t marry anyone else, though, I thought with a determined frown.Iwon’tmarry anyone else.
The certainty rang through me like a bell, pure and clear. What it meant, what it would cost, didn’t matter. The Goddess knew what kind of trouble it would stir up. King Lucian would be furious, I was sure, and Arabesque?
I shuddered.
Arabesque would kill me before she let me ruin one of her schemes.
Assuming I didn’t just imagine the whole thing.
Which was definitely possible. I only remembered fragments, after all. Three voices, three scents, three sets of eyes. A sense of rightness that had settled into my bones like moonlight.
First things first. I’ll find Brumous.
Then I’d figure out if I really did meet my mates or only dreamed them in the dark.
I braced my hands against the mattress, ready to sit up, but the door creaked open before I could even lift my head.
A blond man stepped inside, a tray balanced in his hands. The scent of warm bread and broth filled the room, chased by the heady perfume of moonflowers. He moved like someone used to being watched and radiated calm control. When his green eyes found mine, I shrank back just a little without meaning to.
