“It’s a saying. From the Book of Disciplines. About how to live.”
He regards me with a frown, skepticism heavy in his eyes.
Color warms my cheeks. “But…I guess you don’t believe in any of that, do you?”
He grunts. “I believe in what I can see. In what I can smell and touch and taste.” His gaze drops, perusing the length of my body. “Or in what Ican’ttouch, andcan’ttaste, as the case may be.”
Heat crawls up my neck as I endure the force of his stare. “You can’t keep doing that, you know. You can’t keep…covetingme. Not if you want us to get along.”
He barks out a laugh, short and sharp and biting. “You might as well ask the stars not to shine, Princess. I’m agoblin.”
I arch an eyebrow. “So?”
“So? Do you know what that actually means?”
I cross my arms, which makes for a flimsy defense against the fact that I absolutelydon’tknow what that means. Which the Shadow must realize, because his mouth flickers into a savage half-smile while something dark swirls behind his eyes.
“Don’t think of me as fae,” he says. “In this form, I’m not even really a person.”
“Not a person?” My brows lower as I eye him with suspicion. “What do you mean?”
“Imeanthat as a goblin, I’m more like a force. An idea. When I’m in this body, this skin…” He turns up his hands, his claws splayed, his palms glimmering with quiet light. “There’s nothing in here but want. Hunger. Desire and instinct and impulse. A goblin is nothing but a need come to life. I’m my fae self’s darkest wish, the one that lives at the very center of his heart.”
A surprised whimper blooms in my throat, but I tamp it down.
The Shadow’s stare intensifies. He takes a step closer, then another. Maybe on purpose, maybe without really meaning to, but either way, the atmosphere shifts, all the oxygen bleeding from the room. Yellow eyes bear down on me as silence crowds in from all sides.
I edge backward, my nerves snarling in the pit of my stomach. Goddess, I knew better than to end up alone with him. Hewarnedme about his lack of control, and now it’s unfurling before me, because the Shadow prowls closer, his movements sleek. Predatory. I dart a glance toward the door, my muscles primed to run.
“I don’t even have a name,” he continues, his voice swerving into darker territory, its rhythm mesmerizing, hypnotic. As if, in looking inward, his hold on himself is slipping. “In this body, I’m just a shadow. A nighttime reflection. A secret wish let off its leash.”
My back hits the wall. When did I retreat from him? “You’re… You’re scaring me.”
Sharp teeth flash in the azure dimness. “Am I?”
“Yes,” I breathe.
He chuckles and leans in. Hunger glazes his eyes, his pupils blown so wide the black swallows the gold. He’s close. Close enough that the heat radiating off him promises to consume me.
“Shadows below,” he murmurs, his voice like oiled smoke. “Yousmell so— So—” He angles his head, his lips parting, those teeth straining toward my neck.
I flatten myself against the wall, but I have nowhere to go. No other choice but to defend myself.
The strike explodes out of me. My hand cracks across his face, snapping his head sideways. His hair fans out in a blue-white shimmer.
He stays like that, his head turned, his breathing harsh and shallow. Briefly, I consider running, but where would I go? He’s a solid wall, hemming me in, cutting off my freedom with a body carved from raw power.
So I wait, my throat working around nothing. I can’t believe I justhithim. Slapped a goblin across the face. What if he hits me back? Or worse? He could overpower me with as little effort as it takes him to breathe. He could tear me apart with hardly more than a thought.
But when he raises his head, his pupils have shrunk to lucid pinpoints.
“Shadows take me, I’m…” He wheels around as if searching for something that might explain his lapse in judgment. “I’m sorry. I should’ve left already. I should never be near you this close to sunrise.”
“Sunrise?” A frown drags at my mouth. “What does that have to do with it?”
He makes for the window, where the faint glow of dawn warms the sky. “Everything.”
“Okay, that’s…cryptic.”
