“Release me,” Alora hissed, though her voice faltered with his breath ghosting her ear. She tried to shove back, but his shadows tightened. “I truly cannot withstand you.”
Her pulse betrayed her, skittering fast and traitorous beneath his touch.
She hated that most of all.
Rune grinned, fangs flashing as he dipped closer. “And yet you cannot stay away.”
Alora’s scowl faltered. He had a point there.
She came looking for him first,severaltimes.
The icy wind blew through the balcony, making her shiver. Braziers lit at the snap of his fingers, flames flickering to life with a hiss, casting a warm glow over them.
For a moment, neither of them spoke. Now that the chaos had faded and the harem had dispersed, this was the first time they could trulyseeone another.
Really see.
Alora let her gaze roam over the God of Shadows. This strange, terrifying creature who had touched her, teased her, saved her. He looked unreal, veiled in smoke and silk, his red eyes reflecting the firelight like glowing cinders.
“I am going to ask you a question,” Alora said at last, her voice quiet, trembling at the edges. “And I want you to answer me honestly.”
Rune waited patiently, listening.
Her hands clenched in her skirts, her lungs catching with a held breath. “Did you kill my parents?”
His body stilled. The silence pressed, and her eyes burned with sudden tears.
Somewhere deep in the stone, something answered her grief with a low, aching hum.
“My mother… she went mad after she made a deal with the shadow in the mirror. That’s what she wrote in her journal. She said that the spindle was the key. And that was how I contacted you. So tell me…” Her voice wavered. “Did she break her bargain? Is that why you killed her?”
Rune reached, catching the tear trembling on her lashes. He brushed it free with his thumb, then, never breaking her gaze, lifted it to his lips.
“Alora,” he said softly, “I have made many bargains in my lifetime, and I remember each one. I did not bargain with your mother.”
Alora’s chest sank with painful relief, confusion rushing in its wake. If not Rune, then what had driven her mother to madness?
Perhaps it truly had been due to leaving the Midlands. Most fae needed the Essence found in nature’s magic the way humans needed food to survive. Without it…they died. But why would her mother remain in Argyle if returning home would have saved her?
Alora shook her head fiercely. “How do I know you’re not lying to me? How can I possibly trust you?”
Rune tucked a lock of hair behind her ear, his touch uncharacteristically careful. “My voice can bend will, if I choose.I could make you yield to me. I could make you believe everything I say blindly as you sit enamored at my feet. But I have never spoken such words to you, and I never shall. Every word I give you will be truth. Take this as my vow—sworn in shadow and bone.”
The air rippled.
A silvery sheen shimmered faintly between them, as though his promise itself had been etched into the night.
Her breath shuddered out, some tight part of her chest loosening. Then he had not killed her mother.
“Then what of my father?” she whispered. “At the keep, you looked at him as if you knew he would die.”
Rune’s expression grew wary, shadows flickering across his face. He turned his gaze outward, to the wide and pitiless night. “I am the King of the Netherworld, Alora. I can see when shadows linger over mortals when their time has come. And your father bore the shadow of Death.”
Her throat closed, tears threatening again. “Was it… because of me?”
“No,” he murmured, lifting her chin until she had no choice but to meet the depth of his crimson gaze. “Your father’s life had reached its end, regardless of what brought it.”
The words wrapped around her like a shroud. He hadn’t denied it. Simply shifted the blame to inevitability. Her stomach turned, her thoughts circling like vultures.
