Her dagger whistles past my ear. A wet thud and gurgle behind me. I whirl to see one of the Baron’s men crumple, my blade lodged in his throat.
She flips her hair, casual as can be. “As I was saying. Fucking her good and proper?—”
“That’s not what you were saying?—”
“—is the only way to stop anyone else staking their claim.”
“Were you not listening?” I put my hands on my hips and sigh. The naïve optimism of youth. “There’s still a God to contend with.”
“First,saveher from being hunted,thenworry about the God.”
“You make it sound so easy. ”
“Love makes everything easy.” She strides over and commandeers my bow. “And you’re not old enough to be so jaded.”
She has a point. I’m only a decade older than her, but the years without Flori have felt like an eternity.
“Florienne can’t love me,” I grumble. “She doesn’t know me—not this version of me.”
“There’s only one you.” She tests the bow’s string tension like she’s done it before. “And for your information, she always talked about you in the Pen.” Her big brown eyes meet mine. “Told us the story of how you went down fighting. How you never gave up.” She steals my quiver full of arrows—directly from my hip. “From how she spoke about you, how she looked at you tonight, and how she trusts you to take care of me, well, it’s definitely love. If you’re too stupid to see that, then I guess I’ll have to do this myself.”
“Like hell you will.”
Chapter 18
Drayven
The greatest trick of the Laughing God is convincing us that games can be won.”
—FALLEN HUNTER’S CONFESSION
My fingers twitch over Kasaros’s mask. One slip into madness, and I could tear through this Labyrinth like a storm. Finding Flori will be less risky that way. But I can’t claim her like that. It feels wrong. So wrong.
So the mask stays off.
Which means I’ll be weak. I’ll have to rely on someone else to have my back and I’ve never done that before. Florienne is the only person I trust. But she trusts Demaya. She must. Otherwise, she wouldn’t sacrifice herself to save the girl.
Maybe Demaya is right. There’s only one of me. I’ve changed. Made mistakes. I lived a little, but I still have many years ahead. And I wouldstillrather die than be apart from Flori. I’d still rather go down fighting.
So if claiming her as my bride means giving Flori the chance to love my darker parts, then that’s what I’ll do. It’s what, deepdown, I want to do. At the thought of spending every waking hour with her as my bride, something dark and hungry unfurls in my chest, and I toss the crumpled mask at Demaya’s feet.
“She’s going to hate that I don’t get you to safety,” I warn.
She lifts her chin. “No, she won’t. Flori knows our voice is only as loud as the choices we stand by. This is mine.” Her gaze pierces me. “And yours is her.”
“You always this sure of yourself? Or do you actually have a plan?”
Her eyes glitter with mischief. “I might have a few tricks up my sleeve.”
“Fine,” I grunt, unconvinced. But beggars can’t be choosers.
“Lead the way, oh wise one.”
“That’syour plan?” I roll my eyes.
“You seem to know your way around here.” She shrugs. “And you found me hiding in a barn when no one else could.”
“The mask gives me special skills.”
