She felt him settle. Felt the rage bank itself into something controlled, something that would burn slow and steady until it found its target. Felt his love, fierce and protective and absolutely certain.
Six days until the full moon. A demon on their heels. Her grandmother’s recipe in enemy hands.
But at least, finally, they were facing it together.
She pressed her hand flat against his chest. Felt him breathe. Slept.
Chapter Sixteen
Ten years. He’d trusted Malachar for ten years.
Alessandro counted them off in the grey hour before dawn while Marina slept curled against his chest. Murder, it turned out, took up almost no space in the body. It was small and hot and entirely portable.
She’d told him everything the night before: every terrible detail Malachar had admitted. The curse. The manipulation. Her grandmother’s death. And with each word, Alessandro had felt the foundations of his worldview crack and crumble.
Every meeting. Every consultation. Every piece of advice that had seemed so helpful, so considered, all of it had been poison wrapped in silk. And Alessandro had swallowed it eagerly, grateful for guidance, never questioning why the family advisor’s recommendations always seemed to make things slightly worse.
And Marina had tried to warn him, and he hadn’t listened.
He felt her stir, the gradual shift from deep sleep to drowsy awareness. She was warm against his side, her breath evening out against his chest, and for a moment he let himself pretend everything was fine.
It wasn’t.
“You’re brooding,” she murmured.
“I’m planning.”
“Those feel the same.” She pulled back enough to look at him, and he saw the shadows under her eyes. She hadn’t slept well. Neither had he. “What kind of planning?”
“The kind that ends with Malachar’s head on a spike.”
“Alessandro—”
“He killed your grandmother. He threatened you. He’s been destroying my family for two centuries.” He sat up, the sheets pooling at his waist. “Give me one reason I shouldn’t burn him where he stands.”
“Because he’s a demon.” Marina sat up, pulling the sheets around her shoulders. “A centuries-old demon with powers we don’t understand and contingencies we can’t predict. If you go in breathing fire, he’ll have planned for it.”
“So we plan better.”
“We plan smarter.” She met his eyes. “We get the book back first. Then we break the curse. Then, if there’s anything left of him to deal with, we deal with it.”
The logic was sound. He hated it.
“I want to kill him,” Alessandro said quietly. “The way I’ve never wanted to kill anything in my life.”
“I know.” She touched his face, gentle, grounding. “I can feel it rolling off you in waves. But dragon rage won’t help us. Dragon strategy might.”
He caught her hand. Held it against his cheek.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “That I didn’t believe you sooner. That I let him get this far.”
“I know.”
“I’ll spend the rest of my life making it up to you.”
Pain crossed her face, quickly hidden. “Let’s just focus on surviving the next five days.”
The research confirmed everything.
