“Good to know.”
He slams his hand down on the table, overspilling the ink that pools like blood over the parchments. “You don’t understand.”
“Try me.”
“I was raised in the Scarlet Temple, where sex and death are entwined, but you are trained in only one. Some are raised toworship the Shadow Devils with their bodies, while I was trained to worship it with death.”
I meet his gaze steadily. “You didn’t choose that.”
He pushes his hair angrily out of his face. “Does it matter? Fate chose it for me by cursing me with The Power. My mother betrayed me into the hands of the High Priestess. I have been told my entire life that I was too dangerous to have an Omega or a nest.” He glances down at his hands. “Nebet ordered me to wear these gloves. She told me that my touch was death. And, my dear, these gloves have been coated with more scarlet than you could possibly imagine.”
What’s most frightening is that I am not horrified to imagine just how many people Lanlin has killed as a trained assassin and soldier for Nebet and this kingdom, but that a child could have been taught such lies about themselves.
I remember holding my own hand underneath the bedclothes at night, as an orphan Omega without any family, trying to imagine what it would be like for someone else to hold it.
Daire grasps mine now with the deep need of a child thrust into adulthood too soon.
I struggle to control my rage. “You call me your Queen. Well, then you are myKing. And I won’t let anyone forcemy Kinginto wearing something that he doesn’t want to, as if it is a collar and leash. Fuck that knotless witch. Nebet has been persecuting people with your amazing powers for generations. You do have a nest, and you are bonding. So, you don’t need to wear those fucking gloves all the time.”
Lanlin looks torn. “But what if…?”
“Then I’ll turn into a pile of ash or whatever.”
“That’s not funny.”
“It wasn’t meant to be.” It sort of was. “Come on,I dare youto hold my hand. What’s the worst that could happen?”
Lanlin growls, prowling around the table. “You are reckless.”
“One of my many good qualities.”
Lanlin takes a shuddering breath. Then he drags his right glove off his elegant hand, hurling it to the floor with a clank.
His chest is rising and falling. His eyes are wild, as if he is going into battle.
He is terrified.
“It will be fine.” I soothe him with my pheromones.
“I can’t risk?—”
“I trust you.”
I raise my hand, holding it out but not touching Lanlin. I wait for him to make the move.
Slowly, as if he truly believes that I will be turned to ash, he moves his hand toward mine. He barely seems to be breathing.
Then he presses the pads of fingers toward mine, hovering just shy of touching.
At last, he grabs my hand like I will change my mind.
Yet the moment that Lanlin’s fingers close around mine, it isn’t death but rather pleasure that surges through my blood.
I collapse to the stone floor.
I’m being cradled in someone’s arms. Their hand is still squeezing mine. Their dark head is bent over my other wrist, and their fangs are latched over my pulse point, nuzzling and licking.
Yet I’m frozen, sunk in the sudden bond that has bound Lanlin and me.
