Mauldrene, however intimidating the castle was, didn’t make him stumble.
That feat was reserved exclusively for her.
His prisoner.
His greatest torment.
Stomp, stomp, stomp he went. Up, up, up, when he had no reason to go to the tower beyond distancing himself from Crown Princess Soravelle Davana of House of D’Arco.
Common sense dictated that the farther away from her he got, the easier it would be to resist the pull to go to her. But once he emerged onto the balcony of the castle’s tallest turret, thirteen arching stories above ground level, all he could think of was her.
He’d only first laid eyes on her eleven days before, and yet he could conjure her face and body with a vividness and precision that suggested they’d known each other for eons. That there had, inexplicably, never been a time when they hadn’t known each other, when they hadn’t been pulled toward each other—with the force of dragons colliding in midair.
Outside, Mauldrene was shrouded in her usual damp, gloomy mist that clung to his face and neck, and curled the hairs that had escaped their plaits and queue around his head. It was a grayish white so dense that it nearly glowed. He couldn’t distinguish the gnarled, dark trees whose branches he knew stretched for the stone walls like the long, bony fingers of monsters.
At least at the center of the impenetrable fog it was possible to forget that the island extended only a few hundred feet to any one side of Mauldrene before its edge crumbled into the abyss, which yawned wide and pitch-dark. Legend claimed it was endless. There’d been those stupid and ballsy enough to explore it, vowing to be the first to map its bottom. None who had entered had ever returned.
On foot, the abyss was more uncrossable than any moat anywhere, and was supposed to guarantee only invited visitors. And yet a parvnit and a goblin had arrived on the floating island five days ago, the parvnit to reveal Soravelle’s identity, the goblin to prevent her from doing so.
His prisoner hadn’t given up even that much about herself.
Baz clutched the balcony railing so ferociously that the cold iron creaked. He was the general of Junot’s armies, for fuck’s sake. He commanded entire legions. He was responsible for the lives—and deaths—of so many. Way too damn many.
How was it that he couldn’t get a single woman out of his mind? A woman, no less, whom he knew to be dangerous to him, and therefore to those he had sworn to protect. To those he wouldn’t fail, not again. Not ever.
He froze but for his arms, squeezing the railing so hard that the hollow iron curved around his grip.
“Ow,” he yelped, yanking his hands back and narrowing his eyes as blood beaded up in drops across his palms.
Mauldrene had bitten him!
What … a scorching … cunt.
Unlike Lev, he’d never call her that aloud, not so long as they were forced to live here.
Frowning at his palms, which were bleeding with hundreds of pinpricks, he wiped them on his pants, crossed his arms over his chest, and took a step back from the now indented railing.
The powerlessness he experienced toward his prisoner definitely was not natural. And what else was unnatural?
Dark faithum.
Sorcery.
That was it. Had to be. She must be a sorceress. It would explain his obsession with her. How it took every bit of his self-control to keep away from her, and how he often couldn’t.
Warm relief bloomed through his chest. It wasn’t he who was failing to resist her. It was a spell, a dark enchantment of some sort. Like a sängmortarán, she’d cast her thrall over him.
All he had to do now was find the way to break free of her magical influence.
Warm relief spread through him, butting against the scar where she’d done her damnedest to stab him in the heart. She’d failed—just. The wound had healed into a shiny, dark welt when, despite his countless battles and injuries, his fae nature had otherwise preserved his smooth skin. Only she had ever been able to mark him—another sign of sorcery. There was no one more dangerous to him in all the Opalese. He needed to get her out of this castle, off this island, and as far away from him as possible. Then he’d be able to forget all about her. He should send her to Orania, the faraway continent to which she believed her brother, Mateo, had been exiled. She might even go willingly. The only one of her motivations Alobaz had been able to ascertain was her desire to see her brother again—even if that was only to set eyes upon his corpse…
The piercing whistle of a raptor’s call sliced through the fog. Baz straightened and scoured the sky for the incoming rapplecon. The island’s unrelenting mist—of fucking course—concealed its silhouette, preventing him from properly preparing for its landing.
The rapplecon was larger than a raven and wickedly fast in flight. Shrouded in swirling shadows as much as feathers, with blade-sharp beak and claws, they were Junot’s preferred messengers. Unlike a sänglure, they used sonar frequencies and their bat-like ears to sense their way through bad conditions like fog.
Baz just managed to roll down his sleeve and stick out his arm when the rapplecon hurtled from the mist like a cannonball. The creature unswervingly latched on to his arm and stuck its landing by sinking its hook-like claws into his forearm. He hissed as they sliced deep, clamping onto bone. Blood welled around the punctures, rapidly spotting his shirt.
“Take it easy there, Poriel,” Baz snarled around gritted teeth.
