Chapter 19
Belle
Nothing I’d witnessed in Cassius’s court could have prepared me for this.
Immortals and humans filled the softly lit room, dressed in dark lace, plunging necklines, and sheer outfits.
Some I recognized from earlier, others I didn’t.
They mingled freely in a raucous debauchery.
The bloodsuckers drank from the thighs, necks, and arms of their consorts, as well as intimate places that set my cheeks ablaze.
Rather than pulling away or fighting to get free, the humans in their arms moved with delight—just like figures in the murals that adorned Silverthorn’s great hall.
My stomach flipped. Ella had told me that letting Cassius feed from her was more enrapturing than a kiss, and as intimate as making love. I’d never fully believed her. Not really. But there was no denying the bloodsuckers held their victims in thrall.
I pressed myself against the black velvet drapes, unable to resist the hypnotic pull of the scene before me. My gaze rolled across the sea of sweat-slicked bodies, and I froze, my pulse quickening.
The king towered over a woman in a black, diaphanous robe.
She gazed into his eyes as if he were hers.
One of his arms was braced against the wall, caging her in, while his other hand stroked her upper thigh, pushing the flimsy fabric up as he lowered his mouth to her neck and whispered something in her ear.
Her cheeks reddened, and she bit her lower lip and nodded—
“My, my, what an interesting morsel,” a voice behind me mused.
I spun around.
An immortal. He was tall and had the telltale features of a bloodsucker—too sharp, cold, and menacing. He wore the elaborate garment of a noble, with extravagant flourishes and fine embroidery.
I stepped back.
“Come now,” he said, moving forward with cold precision. “I won’t bite—unless you want me to.”
I pulled the shawl around me to shield myself from his gaze. “I was just leaving.”
He moved impossibly fast, positioning himself between me and the door. “You’re the king’s new whore, aren’t you? The one he keeps locked in the tower. I missed you at the reception. Lucky for me to find you here, and this time, alone.”
“I’m the king’s guest, and I’m not part of the entertainment, so let me pass.”
I stepped to the side, but he moved as well, dragging his teeth over his lower lip. “So shy for one so beautiful. Perhaps you just need a little encouragement. I can have one of the girls show you how it’s done—or one of the men, if you prefer.”
There was nowhere to run. Like all bloodsuckers, he could move faster than I could blink. If the brute came for me, did I dare cry out?
I glanced back toward the king in the chamber below.
His head was bent to the woman’s neck, his face hidden by her tumble of thick curls. Suddenly, his hand paused mid-stroke on her thigh. He lifted his head and licked the dribble of blood that stained the corner of his lips, as he searched the room, then the heights of the gallery.
His gaze landed on me. Recognition became flames of fury.
Oh no.
I tried to slip around the lord who’d cornered me, but he moved like the wind, looping his arm around my waist. “Where are you going, sweet thing?”
He yanked me against him, my fur shawl falling to the floor. His floral scent hit me—sweet and cloying. I elbowed him in the gut and tried to twist free of his clammy grip. He chuckled, his warm breath dampening my neck. “If that’s the way you like to play, I’m happy to oblige.”
A feral roar shook the room, and the bloodsucker’s grip loosened. I twisted free and staggered backward against the wall.
Below, the king had cast his consort aside. She sat on the floor where she’d fallen, staring after him. His fists were knotted, and if he clenched his jaw any tighter, I was certain it would break.
I bolted.
The sound of splintering wood echoed down the hall behind me, followed by a man’s scream. I rounded into the smoking room and hightailed it to the hidden door behind the tapestry.
A deep growl cut through the darkness, setting my skin ablaze and drawing out a muffled whimper from my throat. The servant door snicked shut behind me, and I fisted the torch and ran through the narrow tunnel, retracing my steps from earlier.
My breaths came fast, and when I glanced back, the shadows toyed with my mind, shifting into shapes that sent terror through me. Had the king followed me into the tunnel?
Of course he had. I’d broken out of my room and interrupted his orgy after he’d explicitly sent me to my room.
I fought to keep my gaze ahead. One mistaken turn and I’d end up in the wrong wing of the castle. Finally, I saw my exit. I slipped through and raced down the hall toward my bedroom, but when I reached the door, it was locked.
I twisted the doorknob, but it wouldn’t budge, because…shit. It wasn’t my door. I was on the wrong damn floor.
Stupid, stupid, stupid.
Footsteps whispered down the hall. No time. I hurried forward, trying to get my bearing. Where had I taken a wrong turn?
I stole a glance behind, and my breath caught as a dark silhouette entered the end of the hall. There was only one male who stood that tall and whose shoulders loomed like ramparts. He strode toward me with an inevitable grace. He could be on me in a second, but he was taking his sweet time.
He was enjoying the hunt, driving me like an animal.
There was no way to escape. I should’ve turned to face him, but my feet drove me forward. No matter how many times I tried to deny it, I was prey.
I slipped around the corner, then ducked into a servant’s passage, spiraling up a tight stairwell and out into another hall.
Familiar portraits gazed back in the light of the sconces, and some of the tension in my shoulders loosened.
I’d been a floor too low. My room was right ahead—the only refuge I had in this haunted place.
I flung open the door, slipped inside, and slammed it shut—
It caught on a boot.
I stumbled backward as the door swung wide, and the king stepped into the room. His lips were stained crimson from his feasting, and he slowly fisted one hand—his sword hand if I was guessing—and took a step toward me.
“Get out,” I commanded, but it came out in a whisper.
He paused, the muscles in his neck tensing. “You escape from your bedchamber, sneak through my castle to areas forbidden to you, and interrupt my feast—and now you’re giving me orders?”
His presence was all-consuming—spice and smoke and flames licking across the short distance between us. I couldn’t think. Couldn’t breathe.
His daggered gaze dipped to my bodice, and his expression became stone. “He touched you.”
I glanced down, and shame threaded through me. The laces of my nightgown had loosened in my flight, and without my fur shawl the soft fabric now hung low, revealing the swell of my breasts. I quickly crossed my arms over my chest. “No—I mean, he did, but he didn’t do this.”
Gods, why couldn’t I say what I wanted to?
A low growl built in the king’s throat, and he took another step toward me. “You expect me to believe that your gown came undone all by itself? Or were you inviting him?”
The gall of his accusation cut through me. “I would never invite that! I despise you and your kind.”
The king’s cold and calculating gaze silenced the words tumbling from my mouth. His expression was unreadable beneath his mask, but the weight of his judgment pressed down on me.
“How did you get out of your room?” he asked in a tone that was as smooth as my silk nightgown and yet as threatening as a dragon’s smile.
The backs of my thighs hit the settee, and I jolted. I stepped around the furniture, refusing to take my eyes off the predator who was slowly stalking toward me, his body taut, his solid forearms visible below his rolled-up sleeves.
“Somebody unlocked it,” I said, my voice trembling.
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“You’re lying,” he growled, violence ghosting his face. “You’ve been lying since you got here. Tell me the truth—how the fuck did you get out?”
My back collided with the cold stone of the wall, and my chest seized beneath a crushing force that felt like it was pressing in from both outside and within.
The monster was going to kill me. It was in his eyes. Something feral—a beast, just waiting to break free.
His anger was so strong I could feel it shaking the room—an energy that couldn’t be restrained. It was in him, caged and violent and rumbling just beneath the surface.
I glanced down at my trembling hands. Or was it in me?
He consumed the distance between us in a single step, his expression murderous.
“Get away,” I screamed.
The tightness in my chest snapped, rushing over me like a breaking dam. The emotions churning through me drained in a furious cascade, and my veins turned to ice.
My wardrobe careened across the room and slammed into the king. He held his ground, and the wood shattered against him.
My breath stilled, and I stared, dumbfounded, as the king hurled the remains of the wardrobe against the wall, breaking it into pieces.
What in the Fates just happened?
The king angled his head at me, his expression lethal. “What did you just do?”
Frozen through, my body quaked, and I staggered against the wall. “I didn’t—”
“You did.” His shadow loomed over me, his posture that of a man who wouldn’t be denied.
A wave of exhaustion shuddered through me, and the truth slipped from my lips, as if it were the last thing I carried. “I don’t know.”