Chapter 4 #2
“She’s here,” the Shadow snaps. “And now, by the terms laid out in the Treaty of Vellin, you must present her for consideration. If you won’t step aside on your own, I’ll gladly move you myself.”
A raw gulp slides down my father’s throat.
For one endless moment, I think he’ll argue—he has that look in his eye, the same one that warns of an impending lecture.
But then his posture softens and he eases back.
“No, no need. Go ahead, Sariah.” His gaze locks briefly with mine, promising a conversation about this later.
I duck my head. Once this is over, he’ll probably sentence me to a full day’s penance, spent praying in the temple until my knees go numb. But I’ll go. I’ll want to.
“Come, Princess,” the king’s Shadow urges. “Sariah.”
He tacks my name on as little more than a murmur—a featherlight brush against my skin—yet the syllables linger in his mouth, as if he’s sinking those starlit teeth into them.
A shiver travels over me before I force my attention forward. The fae king must already be here, but when I crane my neck toward the dais, my sisters block my view. They stand in a line before me, their shoulders touching, their shorn heads facing my father’s throne.
I know I have to join them. But I fail to take a single step.
When long moments creep by and I still don’t move, the goblin extends his elbow. The offer of accompaniment draws hisses from the crowd.
I barely notice, fixated as I am on the Shadow’s outstretched arm, on the flicker of blue light beneath violet skin. Goddess, it’s not just his eyes that glow, but all of him. Here in the shadows of the throne room, he gleams like a shard of cosmic steel.
Not that I have any desire to touch him. I wrench my gaze away. “No, thanks. I’m fine on my own.”
The goblin drops his arm without any further discussion. He strides toward the apex of the room, circumventing my sisters on the way.
The moment he passes into their view, gasps tear from their throats. Carina stumbles back, shooting panicked glances behind her. After a moment of indecision, she turns on her heel, then bolts for the doors.
Fear blazes to life inside me. “Carina, no. You can’t run, or he’ll chase you.”
She doesn’t slow. Terror glazes her eyes, so much that I don’t think she truly sees me.
“Carina, stop.” Strangled words spill from my throat. “Or that goblin’ll come after you.”
She doesn’t relent. I move to intercept her, but she evades my grasp, her arm slipping from my outstretched hand. Near the dais, the king’s Shadow turns to regard us.
All my muscles clench. I’ll throw myself into his path if I have to. If that’s what it takes to protect my little sister.
Except…he doesn’t move. His gaze locks with mine and stays there, even when the door hinges squeal behind me. Even when the throne room doors whump shut again and Carina’s footsteps fade to nothing.
The goblin arcs a brow, as if silently questioning my assumption that he would chase my sister.
No. Just me, apparently.
I shudder and look away.
My father clears his throat. “I apologize for my youngest’s behavior. I’ll go after her, bring her back so we can start.”
“Don’t bother.” The clipped command comes from the dais. “I have no interest in her.”
Ishanna help me, that voice. It slides icy fingers down my spine and wrenches my attention up to where the fae king peers at me through the gap Carina left behind.
On the dais, Amriel sprawls across my father’s throne like someone poured him atop it, his long legs spread, dark jewels glinting from his dangling fingers.
And…goddess, he somehow looks like he belongs there.
Like he owns that chair, this room, this entire castle. He looks like he owns all of Aethrolia.
A cold smirk dances across his mouth. He lifts a finger and crooks it at me, and before I know what I’m doing—before I can process the fact that he just summoned me like he would a servant—my feet obey. They carry me toward him while the rest of the room fades away.
Amriel eases upright, leaning into my approach, draping his elbows across his splayed knees.
A strange crackle leaches into my bloodstream, a…
compulsion, almost, like he’s tied a rope around my middle and is hauling me toward him, hand over hand.
Questions rustle in my mind—is this the magic the fae are rumored to possess?
Because somehow, there’s only us here, adrift in this sea of torchlight.
There’s me, and there’s this immortal—the cruel planes of his face, the stark blaze of his eyes, the way his smile silences my ability to draw air.
I draw abreast of my sisters and stop. Their arms brush mine, warm and solid, but the contact somehow feels insubstantial. I’ve never felt as frail, as mortal and defenseless, as I do right now.
“Thank you for coming,” Amriel says with a sneer.
A shudder passes through me. I hate that this fae bastard can crush the breath from my body with nothing more than a handful of words.
Something squeezes my fingers, and I glance down to find Evelyn’s grip tangled with mine. “Don’t worry,” she whispers. “It’ll all be over soon.”
I squeeze back, but the surety that bolstered me earlier has slipped from my grasp and gotten lost in the shadows. Even my pendant feels strangely inert, a dead weight around my neck, as if Ishanna can’t reach me here.
Goddess, I should’ve listened to Brynne. I should’ve cut my hair.
Amriel unfolds from my father’s throne, slow and deliberate. He’s even taller than I realized, and when I glance past him, I find the Shadow backing him on the dais. The two stand shoulder to shoulder, their heights a perfect match. Almost as if they’re brothers. Maybe even…
Oh. Oh.
The floor tilts as understanding snaps into place. Ishanna help me, these fae aren’t just brothers, they’re twins. The goblin might have fangs where Amriel doesn’t, and gleaming purple skin to Amriel’s gold, but now that I see them beside each other, there’s no mistake.
Amriel and his Shadow stare at me from behind two different versions of the same face.
The king saunters close, his smile venomous. For all that I longed to run from his Shadow, I want to run from Amriel even more. But I stand frozen, all the blood in my body puddling into my feet.
He stops before me. Evelyn whimpers at my side, but Amriel doesn’t spare her a glance.
He leans down to inspect my features, the planes of his face rendered harsh by the torchlight.
His attention glides along the arch of my eyebrows, the curves of my cheeks.
When he finishes with my face, he steps back and peruses every line of my body, right through my dress.
A burn saturates my cheeks as I fight the urge to hide myself with my hands. I can’t believe he’d stare this openly. This wickedly. As if I’m nothing more than chattel. Flesh to be weighed and judged.
Whatever he sees pulls a condescending chuckle from his throat. I dare to hope that means he finds me lacking, but my wish dissolves when he steps in and wraps a hank of my hair around his fist. I angle away, my eyes squeezed shut, revulsion like a cold boulder lodged in my gut.
Breathe, I tell myself. Trust in Ishanna, and this will be over soon.
But when I pry an eye open, Amriel only sidles closer.
Goddess, he’s enormous. Up close, he smells like frost and winter berries and something astringent.
Something that must be wine, because I’ve smelled it before, on my cousin, right before he was ejected from my father’s castle for the crime of intemperance.
“You’re right, my Shadow,” the fae king murmurs. “She smells like no one else.” He dips his head and presses his nose to my neck, sucking in my scent like he’s entitled to it. His hand tunnels into my hair, cupping my nape, pulling me closer.
I sway on my feet, my pulse a fiery roar in my ears. This has to be a routine part of the Claiming, right? Amriel must smell everyone like this. Any moment now, he’ll decide he doesn’t want me and step away.
But long seconds die between us, and the fae king doesn’t retreat. His breath skitters across my skin, an invasive heat I try to pull away from. But his hold only tightens, his grip like iron.
“She smells like…” He inhales even more deeply this time. “Our mate. Finally.”
Our mate. Those two words slice across my thoughts. I jerk back far enough to meet the fae king’s eyes. He stares back at me.
Our mate.
The world tips, a dizzy kaleidoscope of light and sound and color. In some alternate reality somewhere, people are talking over one another, but none of it touches me. How could it, when the fae king’s gaze lances into me as mercilessly as a nail driven through my skull?
Mate, mate, mate.
I want to deny it. I don’t even know what it means, exactly. And yet a horrible confirmation is budding in the space between us. I feel it in the heat that unpeels from my bones when his stare pierces mine. In the way his touch spills a fiery poison through me, one that will surely bring my ruin.
Our mate. A parched whimper sticks in my throat.
Ours.
Too late, I understand why the delegate seemed so amused, out in the hall just now. I told him it wouldn’t matter if I was the Shadow’s mate, but if these fae are twins, if they share the same face, the same blood…does being a mate to the Shadow also make me a mate to the king?
“Are you really so surprised, Princess?” Amriel says flatly. “I thought you would’ve realized from inside your cabinet.”
Savage energy screams through me. I try to pull away, but Amriel crushes me closer. Then I feel it—his tongue, hot and wet, as he drags it up the side of my throat, a long lick from collarbone to jaw.
A cry of revulsion tears from my lungs, which Amriel ignores. “Delicious.” He ends his assault with another stolen inhale, his nose buried in my hair. “I’ve never smelled anything like you.”
“Let go of me,” I hiss.