Chapter 4
Chapter
Four
I read until my back ached and my eyelids were beginning to droop. There was no way to tell how much time had passed, though if my grumbling belly was any indication, I’d read right through lunch and dinner.
No one tried to stop me as I strode out of the library with a teetering stack of books in my arms. I didn’t spare a glance for Adriel, but I could feel the Morkahlf’s shadowy presence like an itch along the back of my neck.
Soaking in the tub back in my chamber, I continued to thumb through Broken Continent . Since both Kaden and the demon king had ambitions to take the throne of Anvalyn, I figured I might as well learn everything I could about the Ravaging and faerie politics.
Freydolf didn’t knock on my door, which told me Adriel had succeeded in scaring the faun away.
Once my bath had grown cold, I set my book on the windowsill and climbed out of the tub. Crossing the room in my towel, I threw open the doors to my armoire and stared.
Gone was the assortment of comfortable linen garments and nightclothes. In their place hung a gown unlike any I’d ever seen.
The cool material flowed over my hand like silk, but it was so fine that it was nearly transparent. Each strand had its own luminous sheen that made the fabric look like glistening water.
Layer upon layer of the stone-colored material was gathered over one shoulder and cinched at the waist in a style reminiscent of the clothing depicted on the statue of the goddess I’d defaced in the courtyard.
My temper flared, and I cast around for my discarded clothes from earlier. I’d tossed them in a careless heap before climbing into the bath, but now they were nowhere to be found.
I swore loudly.
Kaden hadn’t bothered to leave a note, but this was as clear a summons as any. And I was fed up with his demands.
Dropping my towel to the floor, I yanked the dress off the hanger — not caring that the garment had probably been custom made for me, or else magicked into existence. The fabric slid over my skin like water made solid, and it grated on my nerves that the bodice of the gown fit me like a glove.
Leaving my hair a dripping snarl of waves, I snatched up two daggers and kicked open the door, half expecting to find Adriel waiting.
For once, the royal guard was not skulking outside my chamber. He must have known what Kaden had planned for me this evening, and he was too much of a coward to stick around.
Propelled by my own fury, I stormed down the stairs, heading blindly in the direction I’d gone the day I’d been searching for the kitchen .
The dining room wasn’t difficult to find — not in such a grand house.
Vibrant tapestries twice my height adorned the amber stucco walls. The intricate needlework depicted scenes of death and rebirth along a winding river that spanned the length of the room.
Huge archways left the entire west wall open to the elements, leading onto a balcony that overlooked the river, which glittered in the perpetually setting sun.
A tall figure stood with his back to me, wings silhouetted against the dying light and the tips of each talon gilded with gold. Dark shadows climbed either side of the archway where he stood, chasing away the glow of the sun.
In the short time since I’d seen him, I’d forgotten what a foreboding presence the demon prince was. Muscles rippled beneath the velvet finery he wore, and I could feel the hum of that menacing power buzzing over my skin.
Kaden turned at the precise moment I released one of my daggers. I relished its death song as it soared through the air, barely nicking one high cheekbone before the tip embedded in the column behind him.
The prince’s brows lifted in surprise, and he reached up to swipe at the streak of red with his thumb. “You missed. I have to say I’m a bit disa?—”
I hurtled my other dagger at him before he could finish the sentence.
I aimed to pin one of those wretched wings, but Kaden moved faster than I could blink.
One moment, he was standing idly with his hands in his pockets. The next breath, his every muscle was taut with predatory alertness as he plucked my dagger from the air.
My stomach lurched as he fingered the blade, his stormy silver-gray eyes flashing with unmistakable warning. “Now, that’s not very nice.”
He moved toward me, and when he spoke, his voice was low and deadly. “I’ve been a gracious host, little huntress.”
He took another step, his shadows billowing across the floor and disturbing the hem of my dress. His aura pulsed with menace. Everything inside me screamed to retreat, but I forced my feet to remain planted.
“I overlooked the slight of you ignoring my invitation to breakfast,” he said, thumbing the tip of the blade. “And lunch. And dinner.”
His voice grew softer with every word, as though he were listening to the frantic gallop of my heart. Savoring the way it sped up with each step he advanced.
“I am a tolerant male,” he murmured, coming close enough that those membranous black wings cast me into darkness, joining with the shadows that lapped at my ankles.
Gods , his wings were huge — each wider than I was tall. I could see the light shining through them. See every vein and the hundreds of tiny scars that crisscrossed each one.
They were powerful. Muscular. All it would take was one sweep, and Kaden could send me sprawling halfway across the room.
He took another step, invading my space, and I inadvertently breathed in his intoxicating scent. Leather. Charred cedar. Crisp mountain nights.
“I am a patient male. Disciplined. Slow to anger, under most circumstances.”
Another step, and my breath caught in my chest. He stood close enough that I could feel the warmth rolling off his body — feel his next words ghost across my skin as his shadows snaked up my legs.
“But if you’d succeeded in piercing one of my wings with that dagger, you would have found me suddenly much less civilized. ”
A sickening chill raced down my spine, and my mind lurched back to that night in the alley behind Julian’s shop — how those demons had fled when Kaden appeared. He’d been formidable then, even with the apokropos stone cloaking the darker half of his magic.
Kaden might have been a powerful demon, but I wasn’t just a Coranthe witch.
I was half huntress — born and bred to stalk the shadows for evil and exterminate it with cold, sharp steel. My instincts screamed at me to end his existence. Every drop of my blood sang for his demise.
“Is that why you confiscated my witchwood blade and barred me from the training room?” I asked, fisting my hands to stop them from shaking and tilting my head to the side. “Afraid for your precious wings?”
Kaden’s answering smile was positively feral. “I’m not afraid of you, little huntress. But I’m no fool. To allow you to keep such a blade when I know how you thirst for my blood would be . . . unwise.”
I grinned back. At least he didn’t underestimate me the way most males did.
“Do you always starve your guests until they agree to speak with you?”
“Do you always attempt to maim those who disagree with you?”
“Yes. But only when they’re immortal assholes holding me in purgatory against my will.”
Kaden let out a huff of cruel laughter and turned to pry my dagger out of the column. “First, Adraeis isn’t purgatory. ”
He frowned at the small hole it had left, though I knew he was giving me his back — his wings — in a brazen display of how truly unafraid he was. To show me he didn’t even have to be looking in my direction to pluck my daggers from the air.
“Purgatory is a place for sinners to purify their souls after death,” he murmured, still staring at the slice in the column as he chewed on the inside of his cheek. “I promise there is very little purification going on here.”
“Is this really what you wished to speak to me about?” I snapped, fed up with his games.
“No,” he said, suddenly businesslike as he turned to face me. “I merely wished to discuss what your days will look like until we depart for Anvalyn.”
“Anvalyn?” I repeated. “I thought you planned to drag me to Dorthus to run your father through with my blade.”
Kaden gave a cold scoff, that darkness rolling off him in an oppressive wave. I realized then that I hadn’t felt even a fraction of his true power.
“If I thought it possible to end my father’s existence with a mere blade, I would not have made this quite so complicated.
For you to attempt to kill him now would be to have you captured and tortured by my father’s soldiers until you were reduced to a pitiful, weeping husk with no mind left to speak of.
Then he would have you killed, and you would be of no further use. ”
My insides tightened. The witchwood dagger that Kaden had stolen from me was an iron-rich blade with a rowan core imbued with runes that could kill a demon.
I’d slaughtered one in the alleyway behind Julian’s shop.
I knew it was possible. So why didn’t Kaden think the blade would be enough to end the demon king ?
“As it stands, my father is the most formidable being to exist on either side of the veil, and he grows more powerful by the day. You are the best hope the realms have to avoid total destruction, but for you to have even a scrap of a chance, his power must be diminished.”
“How do you?—”
“Sit,” said Kaden, smoothly cutting me off. “Dine with me, little huntress, and I will answer your questions.”
Fury rose within me, fresh and searing after his declaration that the ransacking of my mind and my eventual death would be a mere inconvenience.
I tilted my chin to meet his gaze, willing my knees not to buckle under the oppressive wave of dark magic pouring off him. “I wouldn’t share a meal with you if my life depended on it.”
Kaden’s nostrils flared. “You need to train.”
“And yet you barred me from the training room.”
“Not with a blade,” he gritted out. “We must fortify your mind to withstand invasion.”
“I know how to shield.”