He knew.
He’d known for… for years.
Then how could he have still fought so hard for this to work between us? To hold onto something so corrupt? “But… then why…”
He shook his head with a smile, like I was some ignorant child, finally realizing the Tooth Elf wasn’t real. “I always knew there was something wrong with you. That something was keeping you from accepting the mate bond between us. Even I can admit there was a small voice in the back of my mind telling me that the feeling of your hair in my fingers was too rough, the sounds of you whimpering in pleasure beneath me were never quite right, the taste of your blood a bit more fruity than I wanted.”
The old me, insecure to be with a man who’d always dated women that looked nothing like me, would have been hurt.
But now, I hardly cared. He could find me vile and it would mean nothing.
Because he wasn’t my mate.
“It didn’t take me long at all to make the connection. And yes, one look at Liora, one stop by her parents’ house and a whiff ofher old, stale scent, and I knew she was my true mate, the one blessed by Sanguiel to be mine.”
I gritted my teeth. “Then why keep me? Why pretend?”
He shrugged apathetically. “It was too late. I’d claimed you, the bond was there, my powers had grown…”
His eyes flashed crimson.
“And you were good enough.”
Well, that one did sting a bit, and I spit out my response. “And ‘good enough’ was good enough for Victor Corvane, Premier of Noctis?”
“Half a mate is better than no mate,” he responded with a cruel tint in his eye. “And besides, I’ve been working on how to remedy your… deficiencies.”
I gripped the blankets beside me, fear icing its way through my veins. Things were about to get so much worse than they had been.
* * *
I woke up untouched the next morning. Victor skirted the line of consent often enough, but when he’d tried to kiss me and I’d screamed at him to stop, he’d thankfully, albeit angrily, backed off, handcuffing me to the bed before taking more blood and leaving me.
“You’ll see reason soon enough,” he’d growled, slamming the door shut.
As happy as I’d been to see the back of him, the need to pee grew uncontrollably through the night. I thought about calling out to Victor for help, but he would probably make me give him something in return, and I’d rather have made a mess than do whatever he wanted.
So I waited, thinking of dry deserts, until finally someone else arrived.
Someone new.
His presence brought goosebumps and an inexplicable wave of dread, and when he opened the door to the bedroom, I nearly wet myself from fear.
He was dressed like a priest from a temple, only his robes were black, a color unclaimed by the gods. His hooded cloak hid the top half of his face, his dark blue lips and the pallid gray skin of his cheeks and chin almost corpse-like.
“Hello, witch,” he spoke, his voice causing a shiver to run down my spine.
“W-who are you?” I stammered in reply.
He took a step closer. At least, he came closer. I heard no sound aside from the swishing of his robes.
“Just a humble servant.”
I shivered again, breaking out in a cold sweat as he reached towards the cuffs. “Of who?”
He laughed. If you could call that high-pitched tittering a laugh. “An excellent question. But one I don’t think you’re prepared to hear the answer to yet.”
When he unlocked the cuffs, I backed up on the bed, rubbing my wrists before he could try to touch me. His hands were the same shade as his face. He just looked… wrong.
