Chapter 9
Maddox
The king is all angles and shades of brown—a color I’ve always associated with warmth and comfort. Yet there’s nothing warm or comfortable about this man. Horns like a devil’s. Hair like the bark of a felled redwood tree. Eyes like a mahogany dagger through the heart.
And his eyes are on me.
My tongue is still tingling from my low blood sugar. Though I likely overshot things with all those tarts. Giving myself some insulin to counterbalance the sugar would be a marvelous idea, but I don’t have the time, not while the king’s gaze remains locked with mine.
Moving through the mass of spinning dancers is a challenge I hadn’t anticipated. Every step forward nearly gets me hit by a tail or trodden on by a clawed foot or whisked into a fairy waltz. I swear, I will whip this dagger out if someone so much as tries to make me—
“Dance, golden girl!” a voice shouts. “Why are you standing there? Dance!”
A dryad with eyes the amber of tree sap and pine-green hair erupts from the dance floor, wrapping a hand around my waist and sweeping me off my path.
I’ve never waltzed before, but I’m fairly certain this is not a waltz.
In another time, another world, Javen and I would be out here making absolute fools of ourselves like we did at the closest gay bar, in Eugene.
But this isn’t another time, and it’s this world.
A world where cruel magic and calculating dryads are commonplace.
A world where dazed mortals wear collars.
A world where I will turn from a homeless diabetic to a murderer.
I don’t have time to dance.
The dryad doesn’t budge as I push against him, attempting to wriggle out of his ironclad grip.
“What sort of dance is this?” he asks with a Cheshire grin, pulling me along in an arc across the smooth wooden floor. “Mortal dancing is so odd, isn’t it? Care to teach me?”
I whip my head left and right, seeking a way out. I can’t find my voice; we’re moving so fast.
Then everything stops.
“Not tonight, Archer,” comes a familiar voice.
The dryad releases me immediately and takes a step back, bowing. “Your Highness.”
Whirling around, I find the king standing before us in the center of the dance floor. He holds out a hand to me. “Care to not dance?”
I glance over my shoulder, but Archer has already disappeared into the swirling mass. Allowing myself one single second to put on my invisible mask beneath my literal one, I offer the king a coy grin. “I would love to not dance.”
Taking his hand, I join him in crossing the dance floor, expecting an inevitable collision, but the dancers part around us like water bypassing a sharp stone.
He swipes a glass off a tray carried by a server caught up in the dancing, not spilling a drop. “Care for a drink?”
Don’t drink the wine.
“I’m not much of a drinker.”
“What are you?” He drops my hand as we make it off the treacherous dance floor. “If not a drinker.”
I glance to the empty throne at the top of the staircase carved from the massive tree invading the room. If he goes back up there, who knows if I’ll get another chance to slice his throat. My pulse stutters.
Canting my head, I peer up at him through my lashes, lowering my voice to a hopefully seductive murmur.
“Why don’t you take me somewhere private and find out.
” Guess I’m driving this disaster train down the femme fatale track.
Is there really any other route to go when you have glitter-covered cleavage and a dagger strapped to your thigh?
Something flickers across the visible half of the king’s face. He glances up to his empty throne before taking a deep drink of his wine, as if buying time.
Doubt creeps like an unwelcome guest through my mind. Before he can talk himself out of it, I add, “I’m sure your subjects can go on dancing without you watching over them.”
His right brow lifts. “My subjects?”
Shit. Was that somehow offensive? Did I just word vomit my ignorant mortal-ness all over him? Hopefully, the harder I flirt, the less likely he is to hang my body from the nearest sturdy branch. “Your followers. The members of your kingdom. Whatever you prefer to call them.”
“Members of”—his eyes narrow at me for a long moment before flicking up to his throne again—“my kingdom.”
My heart speeds as I wait for the king to order his guards to seize me or run me through with a golden spear. Though, despite Drosera’s remarks about the heavily guarded king, there are currently no guards around.
“Perhaps you are right,” he says in a voice so low I can barely make out his words. “My subjects can go on without me for a time. I am the king, after all.”
My hand moves to my throat, fingering the golden pendant in the shape of a teardrop. “Know of any dark corners we can tuck ourselves into?”
“A few.”
He offers a hand to me again, which I take with a smile.
This time he doesn’t let go as we move through the party.
Masked fae practically leap out of the way if we step near, two snakes winding through a field of mice.
Seems the Myrtle Queen was misinformed about the reverence the king’s subjects hold for him.
It’s almost as though they look at him in fear rather than admiration.
My right hand ventures into the bottomless pocket of my dress, stroking two fingers along the cold hilt of the sheathed dagger.
We duck into the shadows behind an immense sculpture of shattered rubies pieced back together in the shape of a rose.
A spiral staircase emerges. The king relinquishes my hand, making his way up the coil of stairs.
I tilt my head back, neck cracking from the awkward angle.
I can’t see the top, but I follow him anyhow.
We climb and climb and climb some fucking more.
My chest screeches for air, and my legs feel as though someone is attempting to surgically remove the muscles from my femurs.
The tightness of this bodice does nothing but work against me, keeping my lungs from fully expanding.
If my blood sugar were still low, this would be near impossible.
But I have a feeling it’s climbing right along with me.
The staircase lets out onto a deeply recessed balcony.
An oversized chaise longue the color of a dying rose takes up a third of the cramped space, and twinkling lights stream through a multicolored stained-glass window.
Upon second glance, I realize the lights are actually bioluminescent pixies, as a handful of them are now pressing their tiny faces against the glass to peek in at us.
The king moves to the balustrade overlooking the masque far below, resting his forearms on the railing. I approach his side, focusing ninety percent of my energy on breathing without panting. The other ten percent of my mind is on the dagger.
“During masques and revelries of the past, when I was just a sapling, I would hide up here,” he tells me. “I’d watch my brother as he welcomed guests from all across Sylveris to our kingdom.”
His brother—aka, the king my father killed. Sixty percent of my brain is on the dagger now. I start to slide my hand into my pocket, but he speaks again, and I pull it right back out.
Music ascends, distorting into something different up here, almost celestial. A network of mezzanines and verandas transect my view of the dancers below. The height is dizzying.
Breathe. In and fucking out.
“I’ve always thought it seemed so dull to be king,” he says. “Sitting there on that throne while everyone else danced and enjoyed themselves.”
His jaw tightens. Square and sharp, like I could cut myself on the edge of it.
My hands grip more tightly around the rail. “And now?”
“Now?”
“Now that you’re king, what do you think?” I say. “Has anything changed?”
There’s a subtle shift in his expression. He blinks more forcefully, just once, and casts his eyes down. Someone less observant wouldn’t notice.
“Everything has changed.”
What an answer. I refrain from rolling my eyes. “Doesn’t it always change?”
“What?”
“Everything.”
He almost smiles. “Regrettably, no. Some things stay rooted in place for centuries.”
I should do it now, before I lose my nerve. We’re alone up here. Completely and utterly alone. Even the pixies have moved away from the colored glass. Sliding my right hand from the rail, I stuff it into my pocket. My fingers are trembling, and for once it’s not from my blood sugar.
Creeping my hand down as casually as I can, I wrap my fingers around the handle of the blade. All it will take is one fluid motion. Like throwing an axe at a bull’s-eye. I zone in on his throat. Just one slash and my end of the pact is done.
I can see my heartbeat on the edge of my vision. Pulsing. It feels like the first time I tried to give myself an insulin injection all on my own, hovering the needle above the skin and wincing each time I attempted to jab it in. Stopped by a mental block.
Suddenly, he pushes away from the railing, threading his right arm through my left, stepping back and drawing me along with him. “Shall we make ourselves more comfortable?”
My stomach drops like I’ve just jumped out of the back of an airplane without a parachute. Like I’ve pulled him with me. Like I know we’re going to splatter all over the ground when we land.
The king doesn’t appear to notice me struggling to pull my hand out of my pocket, leaving the damned dagger behind again.
Sliding his arm from mine, he sinks onto the chaise, right beside the curving back of the chair.
The only open space is on his left side, which effectively ruins my chances of secretly unsheathing my blade.
I hesitate.
The king flashes me a charming half grin, but something feels fake about it. “You don’t have to be afraid of me.”
This sounds like a worn-out mantra, like he’s said it before. Many times.
“I’m not afraid.”
A lie I’ve told before. Many times.
Instead of taking the seat to his left, I shift to stand before him, leaning down and placing my hands on either side of his mask.
He stiffens but doesn’t move. “What are you doing?”
“I’m taking off your mask,” I tell him, low and quiet. A hunter reassuring a fox while holding a gun behind her back.
Unhooking the silken fabric, I let his mask fall to the ground.
Without the disguise, his dangerous edges soften, even with those rough black horns that curl back like a ram’s, and that razor-edge jaw.
His eyes hold every ounce of vulnerability he’s attempted to lock inside.
I wonder if that’s what people see when they look at me after I’ve locked myself down.
Can they see through the windows even when they’ve been slammed shut?
Stroking my thumbs across his cheekbones, I say, “Now it’s your turn to take off your mask.”
His throat bobs. “I believe you just did that for me.”
“I mean your other mask. The invisible one. The one you always wear unless no one is watching.”
The king’s lips part, the crease between his brow softening as his guard drops like a drawbridge. Exposed and defenseless. Right where I need him.
“There you are,” I whisper, moving closer, giving him time to turn away. He doesn’t.
I don’t kiss him immediately. I press my forehead to his, stroking my left hand down the side of his face. His eyes close, and he looses a breath. Even dryad kings are predictable, I guess.
My right hand slithers back into my pocket, finally pulling the dagger free of its sheath. Do it, I urge my conscience. This isn’t the time for second thoughts or moral pondering. Do it. My pulse screams in my ears, or maybe that’s his pulse. My telltale heart hidden beneath the floorboards.
My fist tightens around the blade as my lips brush against the king’s. He breathes me in.
Do it.
My bicep flexes. His hand moves up to cup the back of my neck. Gentle. Delicate.
Monsters aren’t supposed to be delicate.
Do it.
But the queen was wrong about the king’s subjects worshiping him.
She said he was arrogant and told easy lies.
Drosera said he liked to play sick sexual games with mortals, but his trembling hands say otherwise.
What if they were wrong? What if the Redwood King is not as cruel as they thought? What if—
Do it.
The Myrtle Queen said he was self-serving. Selfish. So selfish. This is so selfish. I’m doing this for my own self-serving desires. Spilling someone else’s blood to cure my own.
How did my dad do it?
I clutch the dagger behind my back. The king’s hands move up into my hair, his thumbs sweeping along my jawline. His kiss is a waltz. My grip on the dagger slackens.
Suddenly, a hand grabs my wrist, twisting until a sizzle of pain shoots up my arm.
The blade clatters to the floor. My lips sever from the king’s as I’m yanked to my feet by someone unseen, someone who twists my arm behind my back and presses a curved blade much larger than mine to my throat.
Then this delicate dance fractures around me.
The king stares from me to the dagger on the floor. When his eyes meet mine again, I watch as the drawbridge rises. And just like that, he’s locked himself back up.
He retrieves his half mask, securing it over his face once again. Then he approaches me and whoever has a knife to my throat—a guard, I think. The one dressed all in black.
Frenzied panic frolics with fury in my gut as the king swipes my dagger off the floor, tossing it into the air and catching it by the hilt.
“Well, well.” He holds the blade to my temple. “Looks like it’s time to take your masks off, darling.”
With a flick of his wrist, my golden shield falls away, skidding across the floor and leaving my face bare.