At last, we arrive at a vine-laden door. A pink beetle scuttles across the wood, then takes cover inside a glowing purple flower.
I stare, envious of its ability to hide. Meanwhile, I stand here defenseless, my breath short, my pulse a chaotic drumbeat in my ears. Each passing moment only worsens my anticipation.
Calen knocks, then pushes open the door without waiting for an answer. “Your mate is here,” he calls across the threshold. “Like you asked.”
He shoots me a meaningful look and melts away, leaving me to face Amriel alone. It’s just me and the king, now. The lord of Velindra, ruler over all the fae.
And my mate, apparently. The bastard.
“Come in, Princess.” That now-familiar drawl sends shivers down my spine. “Sariah.”
Well, at least he remembers my name. I clench my jaw and step inside, prepared to find myself in yet another vine-crossed room. But the sight that greets me isn’t at all what I expect.
I’m in a solarium at the very top of the castle, a haven of glass and light and curling wrought iron. Broad panes offer views in all directions—to my left, mountains crowd the horizon, their jagged peaks dusted with white. To my right, the world drops away. The Wildwood spreads across the landscape like a stain, and from this height, I realize just how vast it is, how impenetrable. How its shadows seem to writhe, as if they’re breathing.
I wrench my gaze away, unwilling to confront that threat just yet. Thankfully, the rest of the room holds my interest. Telescopes dot the space, their brass cylinders shining in the sun. All look well-used, theirlenses polished, their mechanisms worn smooth from continual adjustment.
Among them, sprawled in a chair by the windows, is Amriel.
He looks much like he did yesterday—long-legged and golden, his pale hair spilling over his shoulders as he takes up space with casual assurance. Black trousers cling to muscular thighs while the deep vee of his shirt bares the lines of his collarbones. His feet are bare, and a bottle dangles from his hand, its garnet liquid catching the light.
My skin prickles. The fae king is up here drinking in broad daylight. He doesn’t even have the grace to wait until evening to indulge in his sinning.
“Princess,” he says, his voice cold and smooth and slightly slurred. “Looks like you’ve survived the night.”
My blood surges, a hot rush that has me clutching my lunch sack so tightly my knuckles ache. “Barely. Not that I haveyouto thank for it.” After all, I’m only standing here by the Shadow’s grace. Because he came to my rescue last night after Amriel laughed me out of the dining room.
“Oh, don’t be angry.” Amriel takes a pull from his bottle, his throat working. The wine sloshes in its container when it returns to his side. “My Shadow never would’ve let you fall. You know that as well as I do.”
I slit my eyes, unsure how he even knows about my harrowing close call. Did the Shadow tell him? He must have, but when? While I was sleeping? “Of course I’m angry. You left me to fend for myself. You brought me here and didn’t lift a single finger to help me.”
Amriel’s gaze flickers over me lazily. “What would you have had me do?”
“Anything,” I snap, my temper already fraying. Half a minute in this fae bastard’s company, and I already want to throw something at him. “Literally anything besides sit there and laugh.”
His frigid scoff cuts through the air as cleanly as a knife. “You’re the one who bolted from dinner. What would you rather I have done, Princess? Gone after you? Chased you?Caughtyou?”
My teeth clench so hard my molars ache. When I don’t respond, Amriel sets down his bottle and pushes himself from the chair. He stalks toward me, his yellow eyes tearing ruinous holes in my ability to think.In the simple processes that tell my lungs to expand and my heart to contract.
“What would you have had me do, my mate?” he croons, his lashes dropping toward his cheeks. “Should I have caught you? Dragged you back to the dining room? Maybe I should’ve spread you out before me. Pulled up the skirts of that”—his gaze slides downward, back up—“dressyou’re wearing and had you for dessert. Is that it? Would you prefer I have fucked you on the dinner table, right there in front of everyone? Or would that have only made you madder?”
Rage ignites in my belly, so hot my nerves glow molten. That’s not what I mean at all, and he knows it. “You’re drunk,” I accuse.
He stops just inches away, his wintry scent too sharp to block out. Too sharp, too close, toomuch.
“I’m not, sadly,” he says. “Despite my best efforts.”
“Oh, no? So you’re this horrible all on your own, then?”
His mouth curves. He bends close, his wine-drenched breath warm against my cheeks, and…goddess. His eyes are the exact same color as the Shadow’s, only emptier. As if something behind them has perished.
Yet try as I might, I can’t unstitch my gaze from his. Or stop heat from flaring down my spine like a match dragged against flint. Just as it did last night, the rest of the world fades, leaving me with nothing but an unsettling awareness of my own heartbeat. Of the flush in my cheeks, my labored exhales, the disorienting rush at the base of my stomach.
Good goddess, this fae wields some kind of terrible power over me. No matter how badly I want to deny it, I only have to look at him to know something intangible binds us together.
“I may be horrible,” he says, “but you feel it, don’t you? The pull. Even hating me, you feel it.”
“Maybe,” I say on a hard exhale. “All right, yes. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to do anything about it. You mean nothing to me and never will.”
