ISI
My blade had just impaled someone’s flesh.
The man grunted. Quicker than I could think, he shoved me away. He slapped his hand over his abdomen and I’d swear light winked briefly before extinguishing.
I tumbled backward, landing hard on the ground. He was on me before I could recover, knocking me backward, pinning me with his much-larger body.
A sharp gasp jerked out of me. Maybe my back wasn’t as healed as I’d believed.
He grappled with my hand that somehow still held the bloodied blade. Wrenching it from me, he flung it into the lake.
With a snarl, he clamped his hands around my wrists hard enough to bruise, wrenching them upward, grinding them into the gravel above my head.
His golden eyes rimmed with gray burned into mine.
The man from the ceremony. The one who’d challenged me, who’d seen through every carefully constructed lie I’d built around my role as Lady of Mercy.
His gaze lingered on my face, studying my features with anintensity that made my blood turn to ice. Something shifted in his expression, recognition flickering like a candle flame, there and gone.
But instead of accusations, hunger burned in his eyes, the same pull I felt clawing at my chest. How could he look at me like he wanted to devour and destroy me at the same time?
His thumb brushed across my wrist where he held me pinned, such a small touch it could’ve been accidental. But the way his breathing hitched told me it wasn’t.
He was arebel.
We were enemies.
I was here to kill him or someone he might care about.
“Were you or were you not told that you’re not allowed to bring weapons?” he growled.
Around us, everyone had stopped to watch the drama unfold. A few jeered. Others snickered. The rest gave me looks full of anger.
“I—” I struggled to find words, a challenge with his rock-hard body pinning mine to the ground. “I’m sorry. I tripped. I didn’t mean?—”
His knee rose to gouge into my belly while his free hand started roaming my body.
His touch was clinical, efficient, but every brush of his fingers across my frame sent fire racing through my veins. I hated that my breath snagged when his palm skimmed my hips, hated that my skin burned wherever he touched.
This is humiliation, not desire,I told myself.He treats you like a criminal. Feel nothing.
My body ignored the command.
He quickly found the knife in my boot, ripping it free. With a flick of his wrist, he sent the blade through the air like an arrow. It arched too high for a simple throw before splashing into the lake far enough from shore I’d never reach it even if I dared challenge the serpents.
The knife I’d tucked into the back of my pants followed, his magic sending it spinning end over end into the depths.
When his hand glided up my spine, I jerked in a breath.He paused. Frowned. And wrenched me onto my belly, keeping my hands pinned over my head while yanking up my tunic.
“Lashes. Who the fuck did this to you?” he roared, his voice echoing through the surrounding hills.
“Let me…”
He rolled me over with a much gentler touch and studied my face. “Tell me.”
“It’s nothing. I…scraped myself on brambles while traveling through the swamp.”
Leaning close, he snarled in my ear. “Who did this to you?”
