“Uh…” Marco backed away, features twisted with uncomfortable horror. “Do you need anything? Can I… get you a glass of water or… or something?”
“Please,” she replied, then dissolved into incoherent tears anew.
“Asher!” Marco shouted, uneasy, retreating to the sink. “Hurry up, mate! And make mine a double!”
Lips brushing my ear, Alicia sobered in an instant, whispering, “There’s a box under the captain’s desk,” in a voice absent the abject sorrow of only moments prior. “For your eyes only, with love from beyond the Veil.”
I blinked, trying to keep up. “What—”
She hushed me, sobbing all the louder to keep Marco cowering by the sink, then said, “We’re not quite free o’this place, lassie, but wecanbe. Do whatever it takes t’get that box, understand? You canna let her death be for nothing.”
Returning with a heavy bottle of amber liquid and two glasses, Asher’s countenance softened at the show of soggy femininity. “You knew Sasha well, did you?” he asked, and uncorked the bottle, splashing two finger’s worth into each glass.
“N-No,” Alicia hiccupped, releasing me with a sniffle and held my gaze. The duplicity between words and the unspoken straining my already limited capacity. “It’s just sosad!She was a brilliant woman. Didna get t’work with her much, but she was always kind t’me when I did.”
Clutching what must have been the world’s most carefully poured glass of water, Marco risked patting her back, and forced an awkward, “There, there,” around his cigarette.
Alicia claimed the whiskey glass meant for Marco and drained it in a single swallow. And then, wiping her lips with the back of her wrist, she claimed the bottle from Asher’s hand, refilled her glass, and said, “To the Mistress of Milithia. Last o’her kind.”
Asher raised his glass, tossed the contents back, then refilled it.
“And to freedom,” Marco said, and got two mugs from the cupboard. He waited for Alicia to fill them before adding, “With Tilcot dead, you’re free. You are without equal, old man.”
Hiding his smirk behind the rim of his glass, Asher took a sip. Obsidian eyes glittering, he nudged the final mug toward me. “Drink, Miss Tannovic. The whiskey will settle your nerves.”
I heard what he didn’t say. Knew there was some deformed version of respect growing between us. A begrudging, fragile trust that would prefer starvation and neglect to existing, yes, yet there all the same. But as long as Caledonian gold burned through my veins into his, Marco wasn’t wrong. Even with Sasha’s ring filled to bursting and a mystery gift waiting to assault me with a whole new set of headaches,nonecould match my bonded Elite.
Eyes squeezed shut, I too seized the bottle.
I knew what it would take to distract a man like Asher. A man glued to the very fabric of my soul, who could sense deception before I’d even begun to lie. There was butonesure way to claim Sasha’s gift. All it would cost was my dignity—and that got cheaper the longer I remained in this place.
With him.
Using both bandaged hands to keep the decanter steady, I whispered, “To Sasha,” under my breath and threw my head back. Throat working to swallow great heaving mouthfuls of amber liquid, I couldn’t be bothered to grimace.
Against my thigh, the ring warmed for just a moment, but I ignored the whispers that weren’t there. Ignored the tingle heating my branded knuckle and didn’t stop drinking until Asher pulled the bottle from my lacerated fingers.
“Hey,” he breathed, crowding me against the counter. “Easy.”
I snorted, smothering the derisive retort. Avoiding those inky black eyes, I embraced the caustic burn settling in the pit of my empty stomach, welcoming the return of false confidence I hadn’t earned.
“You look tired, lassie,” Alicia said, sweeping around the edge of the table. “Perhaps you should retire? I can turn down the bed. Get you dressed for sleep an’ tucked away.”
Thumbing the brand, I pulled a long, slow breath through my teeth, modified canines pinching my lower lip. Licking at the pressure-cracks spidering throughout my torn psyche, I let my lungs stretch around held breath. Banished the trembly sadness taking root, and salted the wound with something… darker. Something familiar that sunk toothy maw to bone and drank from the marrow that spilled from the wounds.
Sasha hadn’t bought my freedom—she’d taken it for herself. Leftmeholding the burden of her mantle and the fate of my people so she could greet her beloved dead Goddess as a fucking martyr. Worse, she’d stolen the retribution that had kept my fire burning all these long, lonely years. Barred me fromeverbeing able to face my father for the shame ofconstantfailure now utterly beyond my ability to atone for.
Her sacrifice had spared me a lifetime of horror, forwhat?To be enslaved to another Elite destined to grow sick with the lust for power? And this one I couldn’t escape, even in death? How long before Asher followed in his cousin’s footsteps? Before his mind twisted under the pressure and he was corrupted by what I’d become?
I exhaled. No. I couldn’t rest. Not yet. Maybe not ever.
Asher touched my wrist and stepped as close as he could. Hip bumping my knees. Without speaking, he began to unwind the bandages wrapping my hands. Gentle. Intimate, yet ceding privacy, for he made no effort to catch my eye. Didn’t try to soothe the tempest raging inside my skull or flood the bond with forced calm—though I knew he could feel my ire.
“Goddess, but some o’those are deep,” Alicia breathed, making a funny sound at the back of her throat.
I lifted my shoulder, fixing my eye on the pendant sitting proud atop his breast. More a mark of uncontested dominance thananycrown or scepter, for he was the only one equal to wielding it. And when he cradled my bloodied hands and commanded the ruined flesh to mend, I did not fight it as I once had. Might even have sensed it coming, if I could bother to untangle my thoughts from the heavy fog swirling and choking my vision.
“Freedom has never been my birthright.” The words crossed my lips without intention. Without realizing my cheek was pressed to the heat radiating from my bondmate’s chest, or that my fingers idly traced the pendant as his threaded through my hair. Working at the snarls that suited me better than flowing silk.
