Chapter 21
A Little Shadow
“There’s a snake,” I screamed and tried to escape Soren’s hold.
I shoved at his chest and pressed my elbows out against the arms that barred me to him.
He turned us so that he stood between me and where I’d come from, shielding me from the snake.
I caught a glimpse of the hallway behind him.
It was empty.
Where’s the snake?
I looked down at my legs, expecting scales to be winding their way up, tight as rope, ready to strangle me or snap my spine.
Or, as big as it was, it could unhinge its jaw and swallow me whole.
Nothing.
Soren stepped back but didn’t let go. His hands stayed on my shoulders, steadying. His eyes searched mine, checking for something. He twisted to peer in the direction I had come from and then back at me again.
“You’re shaking,” he said quietly.
And I was. My entire body trembled, lips quivering, muscles quaking.
My nerves jittered with static.
“There’s a snake,” I choked out again. “It was chasing me.”
His right brow arched, the other dipping lower. “A snake.”
He didn’t believe me.
I growled and tried to shove him away, but he didn’t budge. “I know what I saw! And I saw—”
“Shh.” Soren cut me off. He looked to his right, and that’s when I noticed the doors on this hallway all started with the letter N.
“Wait here.”
Soren strode off down the corridor, calm as ever. He made it to the end, glanced both ways, then turned back. His expression remained unreadable, but his brow twitched.
I shook my head. “It was right behind me!”
“Shh,” he repeated, placing a finger over his lips. “Might not want to advertise your presence to some of the residents on this hall, Xiao Ying. Unless you want to witness murder.”
“Huh?”
“Come here.”
Soren’s hand swallowed my wrist, and he pulled me toward the door to his left.
N023
I followed, casting one last frantic glance down the hallway. Still nothing.
The room was cold and nearly black—sleek charcoal walls, onyx furniture, a faint glow from a lamp casting sharp shadows. A gray knit blanket carelessly adorned the chaise.
The moment the door clicked shut behind me, I whirled on him and started in again.
“I swear. There was a snake. It was chasing me. I’m not making this up!”
“There was nothing there.” Soren leaned back against the door, gaze locked on me. It was the softest expression I’d seen on him. His brow furrowed as he tilted his head to one side. “I was watching you from the moment you turned the corner.”
“I’m not crazy!” My voice cracked, sharp and splintered with the threat of tears.
“What are you doing out of your room?” The imagined softness from a moment ago vanished. His tone shifted into gravel and ice.
The hair on my arms stood up with goosebumps, and I rubbed at them to try to smooth them out.
“I had a nightmare,” I shrugged.
Not entirely a lie.
He raised one brow.
“Pretty sure I told you not to sneak around tonight.”
“P-pretty sure I d-don’t care what you have to say.” My sass fell flat with the chattering of my teeth. I glanced around. “Is th-this your room? Why is it s-so cold?”
The gray blanket caught my eye again, and before I could reach for it, Soren brushed past me and snatched it up. He wrapped it around my shoulders, then tugged me close.
“The N-Block is for those of us who could kill you in seconds if we wanted to—and some of us do.”
“I thought you said you’d protect me?” I whispered.
It had nothing to do with obedience to his earlier shushing and everything to do with his scent suffocating my throat and the voice box within.
Soren chuckled, I think. A low sound with barely a hint of amusement. But his breath came out so close to me. Fire and ice, and the whole room smelled like him now that I thought about it: mint, ash, that sharp and citrus hint wrapped tight.
“Doesn’t mean you should be asking for trouble, Xiao Ying.”
“Why do you keep calling me that?” I asked and struggled uselessly against the blanket now trapping me to him.
“‘Cause that’s what you are. A little shadow.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“It means I’m stuck with you.” His words inked out slow and gentle, not matching the meaning of that sentence.
Grunting, I pulled the blanket tighter and stepped back now that he had finally released his grip on it.
Not sure why I even tried. There was absolutely no point in asking this guy questions.
“And you’re going to follow everything I say, because that’s what a shadow does,” Soren continued. His voice dropped. His eyes turned blacker than black.
I backed into the door, nerves firing like struck flint.
Soren watched me squirm for a beat and then stepped forward in two strides, effectively cornering his prey once again.
That’s me. I’m prey.
His prey.
Soren’s hand reached out toward my hip, but then he turned the knob and pulled the door open. “You should get back to your room before you get yourself into trouble.”
I didn’t move.
That snake was still out there.
And another reason. Something else rooted me there.
He watched me frozen there too long before offering, “I’ll walk you back.”
He bowed his head slightly, a challenge in the tilt of it that urged my feet to move from blocking the door and follow him out.
Slap. Slap. Slap.
Bare feet against marble drowned out my shallow breaths.
We walked side by side in not-so-companionable silence toward the L-Block.
When we reached L044, Soren opened the door, and I slipped in without argument.
He followed.
“You know,” he said, tone lazy but loaded. “Next time you want to come see me in the middle of the night, you don’t have to make up a story about a snake.”
I groaned and looked up at the ceiling. “I’m not making it up!” Gone was the breathless whining from before. Fists clenched, I straightened. “And I wasn’t coming to see you. I was running away from something, not toward someone. I’m back in my room now, Warden. So you can leave.”
He didn’t.
“You look angry,” he said, stepping closer, “But you feel scared.”
I mashed my molars together and scrunched my nose. My breath hadn’t faltered. But the speed of my pulse failed me.
“I’m not scared of you. You can’t kill me.
” I don’t know where that came from, but as soon as I’d said it, I knew it was true.
Regardless of whether all the shivers and other strange sensations that I would not be mentioning to anyone in this lifetime had more to do with fear or hormones, the truth was simple: Soren couldn’t kill me.
“I’m a Daughter of the Scepter, and you’re just a Guardian.” Wasn’t sure about the validity of that ‘just’, but I was on a roll, and he didn’t deny it.
His jaw twitched, and a deadly quiet fell between us.
“Leave.” I licked my lips and swallowed down the image of murder bleeding from his eyes. “Or I’ll tell Winifred that—”
I started backing up three syllables ago, but never stood a chance.
Soren moved in like the lion ready to tear the gazelle into shreds before devouring every ounce of meat left behind.
I tripped over the bathroom step.
He caught me with an arm around my waist and a hand on my jaw, fingers anchoring at the back of my neck. None of that was what cut my sentence short.
Snarling, Soren's lips crashed into mine.
His mouth carried out a threat, all teeth and heat and fury. One hand pinned my jaw in place while the other hauled me against him, spine arched, everything else stolen. There was no space to think—only the bruising press of lips and the sharp demand of his tongue against mine.
I couldn’t have responded.
It was impossible because I had no idea what was happening.
Then I did. React, that is. I reacted.
I reacted to the kiss, though, forgetting it wasn’t a kiss at all to him. It was a hunt, and when my tongue grazed his, he bit down—hard.
Pain seared. Metal flooded my mouth.
I tried to jerk away, but he held me there, his tongue brushing over the wound until I whimpered. The same mouth that bruised was now mending. The whimper turned into a sigh, and I melted completely in his hold, folding to his will.
Only then did Soren release me.
He stepped back, and the only sign of what he had just done to me was the silver in his eyes.
“I warned you,” he rasped, gaze cutting through me as he turned toward the door. “Keep. Your tongue. In your mouth.”
Then he was gone.
And I was left standing in the bathroom light—breathless, bleeding, and pissed as hell.
I went to sleep wondering if I’d just had another dream. Soren’s gray blanket lay at the foot of my bed, proof that it hadn’t been.
Maybe the blanket had been in my room all along, and I’d never been chased by a snake right into the devil’s arms.
Maybe I was losing my mind.
The past week was enough to drive anyone crazy.