Page 28

Thalia gasped.

Her magic rushed through me. I knew its warmth. I had felt it across rooms, followed it through the courtyard, recognized the familiar hum of it before she ever spoke. But at the serpent’s bare contact with her skin, I understood something else. Something I’d been too blind to see until now.

Her blinding, radiant life magic surged into my freezing death energy. They locked together in a perfect balance. They matched.

I’d thought she couldn’t be my mate because she wasn’t death-touched. I’d been an absolute fool. The truth struck me, sudden and undeniable. I went completely still, the realization eclipsing the violence that had just consumed me.

“Eryx,” she breathed. “Do you feel that?”

Yes, I felt it. How could I not? She was there, as she had been all along. The man who had just held a knife to her chest lay dead at our feet, but he no longer mattered.

I tore my bloodied gloves off, tossing the ruined leather into the broken glass. I caught Thalia’s waist with my bare hands.

The death energy woven into my being bled perfectly into her warmth. She gripped my coat, swaying into me, and I drew her flush against my chest.

I didn’t ask. I brought my mouth down hard on hers.

She rose into the kiss, parting her lips on a sharp gasp. I swept my tongue inside, swallowing her sudden exhale. She tasted of wild cedar, a feral heat that cut straight through the ice in my veins. She didn’t pull away from the cold or the violence. She grabbed the back of my neck and held me there.

I broke the kiss just long enough for us to drag in a desperate breath.

“You’re mine,” I rasped, my chest heaving against hers.

“Yes,” she panted, her eyes dark, her hands clutching my shoulders. “Now, take me out of this room. Make me yours, Eryx.”

I pulled her in for another fierce kiss, and we stumbled out of the room, still clinging to each other. I was done waiting. Today, I’d finally claim my bride.

10

The Connection

Thalia

Eryx didn’t stop kissing me. He kissed me while he stumbled through the dark corridors of the house. He kissed me as he blindly climbed the creaky stairs. Finally, he kissed me as we tumbled into my room.

He kicked the door closed behind him, and he never once pulled away. The frantic thudding of my heart hadn’t slowed since the knife fell to the floor downstairs, but beneath his hands, the terror was already giving way to a fierce need. I’d survived. We had found each other in the aftermath. I couldn’t bear to waste another moment wanting something I was afraid to ask for. I needed to feel him solid and alive against me.

I pushed at his heavy coat without breaking the kiss, my fingers clumsy with urgency. He drew one arm free, then the other, letting the coat fall to the floorboards. His hands returned to me immediately. He gripped my hips with a bruising strength that made me ache with want.

When we parted, his forehead stayed pressed to mine. His chest heaved against my breasts, his breathing as ragged as my own.

“Come closer,” I whispered against his mouth.

He gathered me to his chest, lifting me as if I weighed nothing at all. I wrapped my legs around his waist, burying my face in the curve of his neck as he carried me to the bed. The careful lines we had drawn between each other were gone. He wasn’t treating me like a fragile political bride anymore. He was holding me like I finally belonged to him, and he to me.

He laid me on the mattress and followed me down. The bed sank sharply under his weight. His hands went straight to the fastenings of my dress, but he didn’t rush to strip me bare. He took his time, parting the fabric to press open-mouthed kisses along my collarbone. He traced the line of my shoulders with his tongue, then explored further, dipping beneath my loosened bodice.

He was still wearing his blindfold, and he probably always would. But he could see me, just like I saw him. And that was the only thing that mattered.

Every touch felt like a confession. He had spent weeks keeping a strict distance, but now he was completely consumed by the need to taste every inch of me. The cool press of his lips against my overheated skin sent a liquid heat gathering low in my belly. His snakes shifted with a contented hiss, several of them sliding down over my bare shoulders.

I helped him push my dress and chemise down, exposing my skin to the evening air. Then I reached for the hem of his shirt, pulling it up and over his head.

His broad chest was sculpted and pale, marked by smooth patches of scales along his ribs. I ran my palms over them, marveling at the texture. The deadly reality of what he was should have scared me, but instead, it only pulled me closer to him. My own life magic rose to the surface, answering the death magic that pulsed through his veins.

“I want you,” I told him, my fingers mapping the hard line of his jaw. “I want all of this.”

Eryx let out a low, rough breath. “So do I. So much. I’ve wanted you from the moment I first sensed you.”