He rolls his tongue sinfully over the word. With precision, I squeeze my trigger finger and brace myself for the kick back.
It never comes.
The man lets out a wild peal of laughter. “Bit out of our depth, aren’t we?” he drawls with barely concealed delight, tipping his head to where tendrils of his power have unspooled from his wrists and stuffed themselves into the barrel of the gun.
I bare my teeth, tightening my fingers on the grip. “I told you,” I tell him, my voice dangerously low. “Your shadows don’t scare me.”
I’ve seen so many horrors, both during the plague and my life before it, that only one thing truly scares me now, and it isn’tsome ridiculously dressed, murderous asshole. It is the promise of pain. And shadows cannot cause pain; they can do nothing but shroud me in darkness. And unluckily for him, I’ve been shrouded in my own brand of darkness for years.
The man tilts his head, hatred and curiosity comingling on his face. “Since we’ve established whatyou’reto be called, Darling, I suppose it’s only polite to introduce myself.”
The gun turns ice cold in my hand, the metal biting so sharply at my skin, I’m forced to let go. The weapon clatters to the ground between us, but I don’t dare take my eyes from the monster in front of me long enough to track where it lands.
“I am the King of Carrion,” he says with flourish, raising his hand toward my face. It takes everything in me not to flinch back in preparation for the strike, but he only plucks something from my hair so precisely, his gloved fingers don’t even graze a strand of my hair. The beautiful teal flower.
Its vibrancy is almost an affront in the dark of the throne room as the king nods to my hand expectantly. My heart wallops against my chest as I stretch out my fingers, out of curiosity or stupidity, I’m not sure. He doesn’t take his unsettling gaze from mine as he gently drops the bloom into my palm.
“I rule this land and the dreams of every person in it.”
Ever so slowly, he removes his gloves finger by finger, revealing more winding tattoos beneath. Then he laughs again, a wicked, wild sound that sends ice careening through my veins.
“And, my darling…I donotwield shadows,” he croons viciously as the dark tendrils of power slither from where they’ve wound around his fingers, to the petals of the bloom in my hand.
In an instant, the flower shrivels entirely. It takes less than a blink for the king’s magic to siphon everything beautiful from it, and leave only a rotted, black corpse behind.
I’m still staring in horror at the dessicated ash crumbling in my sweaty palm, when, in barely more than a whisper, the King of Carrion says, “I am death itself.”
Chapter four
Istomp through the palace without truly noticing where I’m going, death trailing behind me in silky ribbons of ebony, as it always does. It shudders and winds in restless spirals, vibrating with an unusually agitated energy.
Slamming my palm against the door hard enough to rattle the paintings in their frames, it takes me a full moment of breathing to realize where I’ve ended up. I hadn’t had any particular destination in mind beyond the need to getaway.Away from that wild woman with her even wilder mouth. But even the soothing beauty of my chambers isn’t enough to calm the fire racing through my veins or the roughshod beat of my heart. And it certainly isn’t enough to dim the image of her before me, achingly exquisite in her anger.
The woman’s unexpected appearance has reduced the world to a blur of shadows, with only one thing in focus:her.
And it infuriates me.
When Sam and I found her at the beach, her skin had been leeched white with cold and terror. Her eyes were squeezed shut,her hair matted with sea water, hanging limply in dark ropes down her back. The woman had been little more than a dim matchlight in comparison to the cold rage eternally burning in my chest, no more vibrant than anything else in this forsaken place.
It was exceedingly foolish to be assuaged; to be unprepared for the way seeing her true colors would affect me. I’ve spent so long in this colorless palace, she was a jolt of electricity. Those eyes with a thousand different shades of browns, golds and greens. Hair that shimmered like melted caramel in the candlelight. Olive skin as rich and warm as sunlight on sand.
And that fucking flush. The one borne of fury and indignation, beginning at her cheeks and flowing down the delicate curve of her throat.
It’s like I’ve existed for over one hundred years in a prison of dark, and the first glimpse of light has left me blinded. Now, I can see nothing else. She’s burned into my retinas.
When Sam sidles in behind me, I don’t bother to turn around. Instead, I round the large desk and collapse into my chair. Leaning over the mahogany like I might be sick, I let a breath leak between my teeth and press my thumbs so hard into my eyes, colors bloom.
But even those are dim compared to that feral woman.
“How do you think it went?” Sam ventures, the teasing tone of his voice immediately spiking my annoyance. He knows exactly how it went. Not well.
“Fine,” I grit out.
I can feel Sam’s smile more than see it. “Fine,” he repeats in amusement, his eyes roving over my slumped formed. “Yeah…you seemtotallyfine.”
I lift my head to glare, but Sam remains as unruffled as ever by my rancor. Most people cower from my unnatural gaze, but heonly sets me with his own. Light brown, kind, and unfortunately for me, highly entertained.
“Nice touch murdering her plant. I hear women love that.”
