13. Chapter 13
The table and chairs disappear, which is how I end up falling directly on my ass, yelping as my tailbone collides against the floor .
Bella grimaces from beside me and Lily releases a slew of curse words from under her breath, some of which are directed at my mother.
Maxine helps us to our feet, but not before gloating over her wise-ass decision to step away from the table quickly enough.
I dust myself off and spin around, gasping at the sight before me.
The ballroom’s walls twinkle in a kaleidoscope of color, shifting from pearly whites to seafoam greens, to peachy pinks, and then back again.
Satin drapes ebb and flow like ethereal sea waves along the ceiling, cascading down around bouquets of flowers, their flowing folds reminding me of clouds.
They pool around the base of an ivory clocktower hewn from twinkling glass, its single hand notched just below the six.
Six. There are less than six days remaining until the Curse of Love goes into effect, and the gods are exiled to Purgatory.
I can already taste my worries melting away like an evening sunset, softening like butter along the horizon.
If I can manage to stay alive for six more days, then I will finally be free of the gods forever.
Unless, of course, the other girls break the curse.
Then I guess I’m fucked.
The queen snaps her fingers, triggering a sea of people garbed in stiff suits and bedazzled gowns to sweep past us in a practiced waltz.
Dozens of servants materialize next. They weave through the crowd like a frenzy of bees, balancing trays of sparkling liquor and roasted walnuts in their arms. I watch as a servant stops before the queen and bows deeply, handing her a crystal goblet spilling with rum.
The queen takes a sip, frowns with disapproval, then waves us all onward. “Well, go on. Dance!”
No one flinches.
She slams her sloshing goblet back onto the serving platter so hard the poor servant nearly catapults through the floor.
But instead of reassuring him or apologizing, a pained expression warps her beautiful features.
“You do understand how to make someone feel loved, don’t you?
” she asks. The servant’s cheeks flush cherry-blossom red, and he gulps, presumably because he’s under the impression that she’s speaking directly to him.
Rhaziel and Thalmos exchange a look. Augustine looks at me.
The servant seems to realize that she was speaking to her brothers, and he rushes away.
As if to prove her point, the queen reaches for Lily’s hand in a grand display of affection. Lily accepts her gesture happily, and the pair flutter across the room, moving quicker than all the butterflies whirling around in my stomach.
Please, Lily…
Please don’t fall in love with that abomination decorated in glitter.
Begrudgingly, Thalmos turns to Bella next, whose brown eyes are completely devoid of emotion.
He places an index finger beneath her chin, guiding her gaze up to meet his.
Then he leans forward and whispers something inaudible against her ear, causing her body to visibly tense.
Beside them, Rhaziel seizes Maxine by the waist and whisks her away, giving her little chance to protest. Though it’s not like she looks like she wants to anyway.
In fact, she seems tickled pink by the gesture.
Great. Fantastic. They’re all going to fall in love with their gods, and I’m going to be murdered for my noncompliance.
Seems fair enough.
Augustine appears beside me. I spend a moment contemplating the idea of falling in love with him, or at least giving the prospect of marriage a fair shot. But then I remember that he’s the reason I’m even in this situation in the first place… so I think I’d rather die.
“I’ve had this nightmare before,” I grumble at him.
“The one where you incite the anger of three separate gods?” Augustine asks with a soft chuckle. “I have that dream often, although I wouldn’t call it a nightmare.”
“No. It’s a dream where I’m stuck with you on the dance floor,” I say, pushing him away.
“Does it end with you professing your unwavering love?” he asks as he staggers backward with a delicious smirk, like he can’t get enough of tormenting my every waking thought.
“Go away, Augustine,” I hiss at him.
He leans against a pillar beneath the comfort of the shadows, looking right at home. “And miss the glaring opportunity to bask in the glory of my siblings’ outrage? I think not.”
“What outrage? What are you prattling on about?” I ask, stalking into the shadows to meet him head on.
I fully intend on stomping on the toe of his boot, but instead, I find myself staring up at him, realizing that somewhere between the minuscule wedge of time that we’d been apart, I’d forgotten how tall he is.
This man is like a weed, one that I’m not entirely convinced is done growing.
One who seems determined to find all the broken pieces of me and prod his way through them.
“Honesty is not the best policy when it comes to my siblings,” he says with a breath so close that I can feel it billowing off my exposed collarbones.
“You may have won the battle, but you have not won the war. My sister will remember that little indiscretion of yours, and she will punish you for it.”
“You smell like a wolf,” I reply with a glower. Truth be told, he smells like fresh pine needles and rain. But he doesn’t need to know that.
“You should feel thankful that you can smell at all,” he replies, his piercing eyes penetrating all the way down into my damned soul, his perfect lips creasing in a way that almost seems like he’s concerned for my well-being.
But that can’t be right, because that would require him to have a heart.
And I’ve already decided that he doesn’t.
“In the future,” he adds, his thoughtful gaze lurking over my shoulder and pausing on something behind me, “I highly suggest you wait to piss off my sister until I am present. She’s been known to carve out noses for fun. ”
I picture a nose-less abomination traipsing around the castle, and my lips part open in shock.
But before I can ask any follow-up questions about the logistics of that, a servant blitzes past, carrying a tray of skewered fruit in his hands.
“Would either of you like a kabob?” he asks, holding out a stick filled with plump fruit.
I stare at the brightly colored pineapples and mangoes, imagining that if I gobbled them all up, I could then use the skewer to prod Augustine straight through the eyeball. A two-for-one.
“No thanks,” I say and whip my gaze back on Augustine.
As much as I’d love to inflict him with some type of injury, like a kabob to the jugular for instance, so far, he’s been the only god who hasn’t threatened to kill me.
Which means that as much as I loathe him, I also need to keep him around for the time being.
Or at the very least, until I can figure out how to escape from here unscathed.
The servant bows and dissolves back into the crowd, but not before Augustine whisks up a kabob for himself and stuffs a bite-sized pineapple into his mouth.
“Are you ever not hungry?” I ask him, for curiosity’s sake.
“No,” he replies frankly between bites. “In fact, you look absolutely ravishing tonight.”
“Fuck you.” I glower.
“Here? In this ballroom? A fine offer, but don’t you think we should find somewhere a bit more private first?
” He licks his fingers. I try to rip the kabob out of his grasp, but he’s too quick.
He raises it above his head and whistles lowly.
“You really expect me to hand over such a sharp object when you look like you want to kill me? How stupid do you think I am?”
My nostrils flare, and I reach for it again. “I think you’re incredibly stupid.”
His smile is contagious. “Not so fast,” he says, glancing up at the kabob stick.
“Perhaps I could interest you in some cheese instead? Something a bit more difficult to murder someone with?” His tone might suggest he’s trying to be helpful to anyone else.
But I know that pompous smirk like the back of my hand.
He’s goading. “There’s a platter, just over there. My personal favorite is pepperjack.”
“Pepperjack makes my stomach hurt,” I retort, watching him with feigned disinterest as he takes another mouth-watering bite of his pineapple.
“Is there anything in this world that you do like?” he asks me seriously.
“No,” I quickly reply, even though a small part of me wants to see his body lathered in pineapple juice. I think that I would like that very much, especially if he had a papercut.
He bites into a mango next, then tosses the kabob stick into the trash can beside him. “You have such a sunny disposition, Raven. Always so cheerful about everything.”
“Why do you keep calling me that?” I snap.
“Calling you what?”
“Raven.”
He cocks a brow. “Ah, I guess I hadn’t noticed.”
I cross my arms and pout. “My name is Shadow.”
“Right, of course.”
Gods. The insufferable man can’t even get my name right.
I pinch the bridge of my nose and let out a deep exhale.
“Did you bring me here just to torment me?” I ask.
“I mean, don’t stop at my expense. You’re doing such a great job thus far.
I feel utterly tormented, mind, body, and soul.
Although I can’t help but wonder if you have some kind of ulterior motive for locking me in your castle. I mean, why me? Why not someone el—”
He moves like a shadow as he seizes up my raw and aching wrists, cutting me off mid-sentence.
“Must you always flay me with questions, Little Bird?” he asks, his voice dropping down to a dangerous whisper against my ear.