Chapter Forty-Six
B lake blinks. The wolf disappears from his eyes.
“Oh, it’s you. I thought you would have been sensible enough to leave while I was sleeping.” His grip around my wrists loosens but he doesn’t let me go. “Is there something I can help you with, little rabbit?”
His thighs press against either side of my hips. His scent is everywhere, dark pine and poison. It’s stifling. Words evade me.
He arches an eyebrow. “I’m actually trying not to provoke your master right now, believe it or not. It’s not the best time for you to visit me in my bed.”
I roll my eyes. “Get off me. I was... It’s none of your bloody business what I was doing!”
He laughs. “You’re in my room.” I try to clench my fist around the folded parchment without him realizing. I try to nudge him aside. He doesn’t move. His gaze travels slowly from face to my hand. “Oh, I see.”
I shake my head. I stretch my arm as he slides his fingers up it. His touch heats my skin. My knuckles hit the headboard. I try to twist away and knee him in the crotch, but I can’t get out from beneath him. His chest is inches from my face when he looms over me, frees of one of my wrists, and plucks the parchment from my fingers.
He releases my other wrist, then kneels over me. He clucks his tongue. “Naughty little rabbit.”
I get the familiar tingle in my teeth, the urge to bite him. Those pages are mine . Those answers are mine . He doesn’t have the right to take them from me. I’m fed up of letting people take things from me.
Blake tenses. The ridges in his torso become more pronounced. He drops his voice to a whisper. “Whatever you’re thinking of doing, I’d advise against it.”
When we were in the chapel, and his wolf started to surface, I did something to him. I grabbed him through the bond, and I pushed the wolf back. I open the cage that binds my emotions and invite him in.
I feel him everywhere. That thread of him coils around me, and I grab it.
“Aurora. Don’t.”
Instead of pushing him away, I pull. His breath hitches, and it might be the most delicious sound I’ve heard. His eyes become amber and feral. Sweat breaks out on my skin. I feel his wolf, and it’s agitated. It wrestles against my hold.
He falls down and clenches the pillow on either side of my head. He dips his mouth to my ear. “Why would the rabbit provoke the wolf?”
“Because I know you don’t like it.” My voice is strained. I’m losing my grip on him as he battles against me, and the room starts to swim.
His laugh is breathy. “Are you sure about that?”
He stops fighting. Lust surges down the bond, hot and restless. Hunt. The air thickens. He shifts his position on top of me, and nudges my knee with his thigh, spreading my legs. He’s trying to distract me. He wants me to loosen my grip, to let him go, because he’s afraid.
I cry out and I pull harder. His hand flexes by my head and a low groan escapes him. He presses his forehead against mine.
“Aurora. . .”
I touch something inside him. A hollow, endless ache fills me. It’s like falling down a hole that has no bottom. I hold on. He mutters something under his breath. It sounds like he’s counting. When I know I consume every inch of him, as he does me, I roll him off me. I snatch the pages from his loosening grip.
I let go of the bond, and I feel him retreating, fast. I can breathe again. The posts of the bed blur around me. I feel like the fever is coming for me as something wild floods my blood. I half stumble, half crawl, to the foot of his bed.
I unfold the parchment. I catch the words Anam-Cridech .
He is on top of me again. I try to fall down onto the pages to protect my prize, but he hooks an arm around my waist and pulls my back against his chest. “Don’t,” he whispers.
There’s a tempest inside me. I have the answer I’ve been searching for in my hand, and he’s going to take it from me. “I deserve the truth.”
“You don’t.”
He snatches the parchment from my hand. His chest bumps against the top of my head as he leans over me and tosses it into the fire. It lands on the logs, and the flames take it.
A soundless scream tears from my lungs. Whatever thin line of peace that has existed between us lately snaps. Red clouds my vision. My blood howls. Wildness rises inside me, and I can’t suppress it. I sink my teeth into his arm.
A low sound scrapes against his throat. His arm tightens against my torso.
“Fuck.” His voice is strained. “Easy, little rabbit.”
I snarl. Something takes over me and I bite harder. I don’t think I could let go if I wanted to. I want him to hurt like I hurt. I want to make him bleed.
“Aurora—”
I try to stop, but there’s something rabid inside me and it won’t let go. His breathing is ragged. His heartbeat thunders unsteadily in my ears. His knuckles brush my torso as he clenches his fist. He groans.
“If you break the skin, you’ll mark me. You don’t want to do that.”
I don’t know what he’s talking about, but panic floods me. This is not me. I’m not in control of myself. I can’t stop. I moan against his arm.
“Okay. I’ve got you.” He sends his emotions through the bond, a surge of them that I cannot decipher. They flood me. He’s everywhere. His ice cools my fire. My vision blurs, and when darkness rises, I let it take me.
I slump onto the bed, and Blake crashes down on top of me.
***
For a moment, I’m falling through darkness.
I land in a dimly lit room. There are grates near the ceiling, and moonlight seeps through. A musty scent lingers in the air. I think I’m underground.
Someone mutters under their breath behind me. They’re counting, I think. I turn. I stumble away and my back hits a workbench. Jars and scalpels rattle. Blake is strapped to a gurney in the middle of the room. He is shirtless, and covered in blood.
“Two... Four... Eight... Sixteen... Thirty-two... Sixty-four,” he mutters under his breath. Something lurches inside me. I used to recite my mother’s stories when the priest beat me. It took my mind off the pain, and stopped me from losing my mind. “Two-thousand and forty-eight... Four thousand and ninety—”
“Blake?”
His eyes jolt open. He frowns. “You shouldn’t be here, little rabbit.”
He wrenches his arms free. He pulls the strap from his neck, then his ankles. He slides off the gurney and prowls toward me.
“I’ve shown you mine, now you show me yours.”
He grabs my arms and pushes.
The shadows rise and swallow us.
We hurtle through the darkness.
I land, and I’m somewhere else. My arms feel like they’re jerked from their sockets. There’s a rattle of chains. Metal bites into my wrists and my legs are wrapped around something. No. Someone.
Blake stands before me, and his hands grip my thighs. I’m shackled to the ceiling in the small cell in the manor house.
“If you kiss me, I will bite off your tongue.” The words come from my mouth before I can stop them, as if I’m the puppet in my other nightmare. Panic floods me. This is a memory.
Blake smiles, only it’s not Blake. He seems different, like he’s a puppet, too. His eyes are black, and his skin is too smooth. “Depends where I kiss you, little rabbit.” His voice sounds wrong in the darkness.
I jerk back as he drops to his knees. No. No. No.
The darkness stirs behind him, and the real Blake—covered in blood—slits his throat. The puppet melts into the shadows. Blake cocks his head to one side. My cheeks flame.
“This is your dream, not mine,” I lie.
He shakes his head and a dimple punctures the corner of his mouth. He steps closer. His heat and scent ambush me as he wraps my legs around his waist. “I don’t think so, little rabbit.”
I stiffen. “What are you. . .?”
He brings his lips to my ear. “In my dream, I’m in chains, and you are on your knees.”
My eyes widen. He grabs the chains and pulls. They dissolve like ink between his fingers. I fall, and my hands land around his neck as the floor disappears.
We hurtle through darkness once more.
We land in a pile on the floor. Grass tickles my cheek. The scent of summer floods my nose—flowers, and woodlands, and baked earth. I clamber from beneath Blake and raise my head. I breathe in sharply.
About one hundred meters ahead, a woman sits in front of a vast, moonlit lake. She has long wavy hair, and wears a baggy cream dress. A small girl is curled against her side, and the woman strokes her head. The full moon and infinite stars are reflected in the surface of the water.
My heart swells, then tightens. My throat is thick. I don’t remember this exact moment, but I know my mother brought me here.
Turn around , I will her. Turn around.
She’s talking, but the words sound muffled. I push myself up and walk toward her. Blake strides past me. I grab his arm, and my fingers curl around his bicep. This isn’t his memory to intrude upon. I don’t want him here.
He shrugs me off and keeps walking. There’s something determined in his eyes. The voices get louder, but no less jumbled. I hurtle into his back, and this time, I take him to the ground with me. We hit the grass with a loud thud. My mother should be able to hear us. She doesn’t turn.
Turn around , I will her. Let me see your face.
Blake pushes himself to his knees, and I pull him down. I crawl over him to get to her before he does. This is important. The weight of this moment hangs in the air. Blake feels it too. He grabs my ankle and drags me across the earth.
Mother! I have no voice. I elbow Blake in the side, and a soundless grunt escapes him. Get off me!
What is she saying to you? He looks like he’s shouting, but no words come out. What did she say?
We’re so close now we should be able to hear her. I can smell the water. I can see the kinks in her red hair, and the threads in her cream dress. The ground starts to shake and a crack appears between us. No!
I reach out, and my fingers almost touch her back.
She starts to turn.
The floor disintegrates, and Blake and I fall through it.
***
I’m too hot. Something hard and heavy pushes me down.
My eyes peel open. It takes a moment for my vision to adjust, for my mind to make sense of what is happening. Blake lies on top of me, and his arm is caught beneath my torso. His gentle breaths warm my ear.
We’re at the foot of his bed. The fire flickers in front of me. The pages Blake stole are nothing but ash. The warmth I felt when I saw my mother cools. There is nothing soft inside me anymore. I slam my elbow into Blake’s gut and he makes a low sound before rolling off me. I fall off the foot of the bed.
I land on the sheepskin rug “You snake! You treacherous snake!”
His legs hang off the end of the bed, and he plants his bare feet onto the floorboards. He stares up at the ceiling. His bare chest moves up and down deeply. I can’t tell what he’s thinking, but I feel a thread of his frustration wind around my own.
I stand up. I’m trembling. Shaking. There’s a tornado in my chest and I can’t contain it. I’m fed up of his games. I’m fed up of being used. I’m fed up of answers being concealed from me. He had no right.
“Break the bond,” I snarl.
He pushes himself upright. “No.”
“I will make you pay for this, Blake.” I step closer to him. “I will haunt you. Every waking moment, I will make you feel me. Every dream, I will be there. Every moment of joy that you manage to feel in your sad little life, I will turn it into darkness. Break this bond, Blake, or I swear to every goddess, I will consume you until there is nothing left of you. I will ruin you. I will coil myself so tightly around you that you will beg me to release you, and still then, I will not let you go.”
He rubs his face with both hands. “You already haunt me, Aurora.”
“Then let me go!”
“I cannot!”
“Why?”
He leans forward and he clasps his hands together between his thighs. “I suppose I should tell you the truth.”