Page 25 of Sworn to the Shadow Throne

I was just finishing the last stitch when there was a harsh inhalation then a soft, pained grunt. My stranger was awake. His eyes were half-open, unfocused, but alert enough to lock onto me.

“Good timing,” I said softly, setting the shirt aside and wiping my hands on my apron. “I was just about to check on you.”

He didn’t call me a witch or interrogator again—though the accusation hung between us anyway—just watched me like he expected fire to burst out of my hands.

I reached for a wooden cup and ladle to pour him some broth. “Will you allow me to help you prop your head higher so you don’t spill half a cup on yourself this time?”

His jaw tightened. He eyed the cup with the kind of suspicion that would’ve been insulting if I hadn’t just realized how high the stakes probably were for a man like him. Since we’d already addressed the poison issue, his wariness had to be about something else entirely.

A muscle in his cheek twitched. At least he wasn’t glaring.

Fine.

I would treat him like a startled animal. Most creatures responded better to calm than force. Though that hadn’t worked out so well with his stallion…

“Stranger,” I said gently, “you’re running a fever. I made a broth to help.” I inched toward him. “May I?”

His silence and continued eye contact felt like the closest thing to permission I’d get. So I walked the rest of the way and seated myself by his head. “I’ll just prop you on my knee. Muffin isn’t allowed inside until he behaves, so don’t worry about being attacked again.”

His eyes narrowed at the mention of Muffin, but he didn’t object.

Carefully, gently, I slid one hand beneath his head, the heat of his scalp startling against my palm. He was trying to hide his pain, his weakness, his wariness. My stomach twisted in sympathy.

“I’m sorry for whatever happened to you,” I whispered.

He grunted as I slid my folded knee beneath the back of his head next, letting him rest against the fabric of my skirt. My hand moved without conscious thought to sweep a lock of long hair away from his forehead.

I immediately regretted it when his eyes shot up to mine.

Too intimate.

For him or for me, I wasn’t sure. A flush crept up my neck, but I forced my breathing to stay steady as I held the cup to his lips.

“Slowly,” I murmured.

As I leaned over, his breath ghosted across my ribs with every exhalation. He sipped until the broth was gone then sagged back against my knee, exhausted from the small task.

“You’re burning up. I need to clean your wound. It will hurt. A lot. Do you understand?”

A faint nod.

“Okay, remember rule number two: no killing your hostess,” I warned.

That caused a small smile to form on his lips.

I soaked the cloth in the whiskey and pressed it gently to the mangled flesh at his side.

He didn’t scream. Didn’t even grunt. But the breath he sucked in sounded like steel bending. He clutched the sheet I’d laid over one side, knuckles bone-white, a slight tremor in his jaw.

“Sorry for the pain,” I murmured, tapping lightly on the wound.

His eyes flashed open and locked on me again, but they weren’t dark purple anymore. They were black.

Storm clouds, like those out of a nightmare, rose in his eyes as they searched my face. A ripple of cold brushed my skin, as if the door had just opened or Muffin had run past. And then more darkness pooled around us—not from the hearth, not from any crack in the shutters, but from him. It lifted from his skin like smoke rising off coals, swirling out over the floorboards.

The encroaching darkness swallowed the light. The wild thyme and bulbs of garlic drying on the rafters above swung on their ties. A single wooden cup fell from the shelf where I stored them, shifted by the magic now crawling up the walls.

This was no mere illusion. It had substance.