AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Setting the photo on the windowsill, I press my hands over the glass, the pane startlingly cold. Outside, snow drizzles the air, but there’s something almost peaceful about it. In the distance, the half-moon glints off the frozen surface of the lake.
I can’t see the main campus building from here, but it’s out there. And in a few short hours, I’ll be inside the academy’s walls.
The familiar nervous pang begins in my gut as I start mulling over what my first day will be like. All the usual worries flash through my mind.
Will I know anyone in my classes? What if I’m still too far behind to understand what they teach? How will I find my way around?
Then my thoughts take a dark turn. What if I see the Winter Prince? We’ve been holed up inside our dorm for two days, long enough to nearly forget the possessive way he claimed me.
But now . . . well now the thought of being near him fills me with anxiety. The scrape of his sword from its scabbard when he nearly executed me echoes inside my skull. The way he looked at me earlier, the way he pervades my mind . . .
All at once, a dizziness washes over me. My thoughts go blank. My vision dark. I blink and suddenly I’m in someone else’s room. A huge, opulent chamber ten times the size of my dorm room.
I’m not actually there, I realize. I’m in someone else’s mind. A male someone. Seeing what they’re seeing. Feeling what they’re feeling.
Speaking of feeling . . . oh my God . . . he, whoever he is, is sitting in bed without a shred of clothes.
He looks to his right, and I recognize the royal blue hair spilled over the pillow. The blue lips, smeared slightly and swollen, like they’ve been kissed hard.
Inara.
She looks up at him, her big dewy white eyes full of adoration. But all he feels is disgust. I can sense the dark emotion swirling around him. Whoever this is, he’s awash in darkness. Beyond that, there’s a cold indifference inside him.
Layers and layers of it, like a shield.
He slips from bed, still fully naked, and saunters over to the fireplace. I can feel the warmth of the flames kissing his bare skin. Can feel the cold lurking beneath his flesh.
“I don’t know why you insist on that stupid fire,” Inara says. “Doesn’t the heat bother you?”
“I like looking at it,” he answers in a distorted voice. Being inside his head, his words sound like they come from underwater.
“You like looking at it?” The derision in her tone annoys him, but she sounds oblivious. “You’re so weird sometimes.”
“Get out.”
“Excuse me?”
“Leave.”
Inara huffs as she hunts around the bed for her clothes. When she’s zipped back into her dress—a silver, sequined thing that looks gorgeous on her—she glides over to him, making sure he notices the way the slippery fabric hugs her hips.
He does. I can feel his desire rise along with his disgust.
“Didn’t you like what we did earlier?” she purrs, stroking a hand down his shoulder.
“I did,” he admits coldly. “And now I would like for you to leave.”
Anger flashes in her eyes, and she bares her teeth at him. “You’re a dick.”
He turns and stares into the fire as she leaves. I can feel his mind calm as he watches the flames dance and shiver, even as the heat repulses him. There’s a mirror just above the mantle, and I desperately try to will him to move into a position where I can make out who’s head I’m in.
Instead, he reaches up and retrieves something hidden inside a silver heart-shaped box. Little foxes and deer are engraved on the sides, the inside red velvet.
As he peers down at what he took, I see it’s a picture. Of a girl . . .
I gasp when I make out the long, wavy blonde-white hair tumbling over one shoulder. The hazel eyes that can’t quite hide their sadness. The wide nose I hate and lips one might call kissable. A little scar indents the skin just above my mouth.
Me. He’s looking at a picture of me. A school portrait taken my sophomore year. My heart spikes into my throat as I recall how it just went missing one day. I looked everywhere for it because my hair actually cooperated, for once, and my skin was clear. Making it my best school photo ever. tedly, he looks hot in his portrait. A crown of jagged ice sits atop a mop of blue-black hair, a few dark curls falling around sharp ears. Dark lashes frame serious blue eyes ringed with silver, and a snow-white owl, similar to the one that shadows me on the other side, perches on his shoulder.
