But it is not Renault who walks in. My eyes falter in the low candlelight, but I know it is not him—nor is it Sergio. The stranger moves with a lithe, predatory grace neither of those men have, and knowledge descends on me, quick and many-toothed. Before she steps into the light of the lamp flickering on the bedside table, I already know it is the Lupa Nox.
She moves toward the bed like it is an island and she is shipwrecked. I find I cannot move, cannot pull the linens upover my body or tumble off the side of the bed or do anything at all. Or, if I am honest, perhaps I simply do not want to.
The knight is dressed in a bride’s pale silks, though it’s unlike any matrimonial gown I’ve ever seen. The whisper-thin fabric clings to her powerful body, baring muscular arms, dipping low on the bust. Chainmail adorns her broad shoulders. Her long locks are braided into a crown encircling her head, the shaved portions of her skull exposed, looking soft as downy feathers.
“Ophelia?” She says my name like a question, and for a moment I falter, not knowing precisely what it is she seeks. My heart careens in my chest, like all the arteries and tissue chaining it in place have been severed, leaving me unmoored.
The word comes to my lips before I truly understand, I think, or perhaps it is just the answer all sinners give when their last shred of morality fails.
“Yes.”
And then the Sepulchyre’s deadliest weapon is sliding into my marital bed, her thighs caging my hips, her hands gripping the pillows on either side of my head. I have no choice but to look up—to gaze into her thunderstorm eyes, to examine the slope of her fine, sharp features, the curve of her dangerous lips.
She brushes her mouth over mine—the simplest of movements, and yet she leaves me devastated in her wake. My chest heaves against the bodice of the silk nightgown, and her eyes slip to my bust, her lips quirked in amusement, though something heavier and darker sits on her brow like a stormfront.
That deft mouth meets my sternum, and heat erupts between my legs. The knight trails soft kisses across my exposed skin, one hand sliding to cup my breast. The warmth of her palm draws a strangled cry from my mouth, and hereyes glide back to me, amusement burning in their depths like torchlight.
“Ophelia?” she asks again, a dark eyebrow arched, her expression inquisitive and ravenous and yet still impossibly kind.
“Yes,” I gasp without a shred of restraint, without even a moment’s pause. I am tumbling further and further into her abyss, and not a single part of me is even trying to stop.
In response, the knight slips her thigh between my legs at the same moment her fingers ghost the tip of my breast, which has escaped the trappings of the silk nightgown’s bodice. Undeniable pleasure soars through me, and I cry out, my hips arching of their own accord, bringing that secret place at the apex of my legs to her thigh. Just that slight contact, the barest of friction, sends more pleasure rippling through my body like sacrilege.
“Nyatrix,” I gasp, her name dripping from my mouth before I can stop it. I dare to look up and meet her gaze again.
But there is no tall, lithe knight, no column of her flesh against my most intimate place, no thunderstorm eyes or arched eyebrows. Instead, there is only the yawning void of a mouth, a maw lined with teeth, and the terrifying weight of a predator’s gaze.
An enormous black wolf pins me to the bed now, its lips curled in a snarl, every muscle standing out from beneath its dark hide. And I know without a shred of doubt that it will devour me whole.
With a strangled gasp, I awaken—sitting straight up in my bed, hands clasped to my chest. I am feverish, my nightclothes sticking to my skin, a damp warmth between my thighs. My room is empty; it is no bridal chamber, and no wolf prowls the chipped tile in front of the hearth. Instead, sunlight presses gentle fingers against my window’s dressings, the light warmand natural. And too bright—fartoo bright—considering the bell I usually arise. Panic shoots through me, and I toss the bed linens aside.
For a long moment, I cannot quite make sense of what I’m seeing. There are my legs—one of even, pale gold flesh, the other a withered, discolored thing. There are the linens, a soft cream flannel to ward off the incoming chill of autumn.
And there, impossibly and unfathomably, is dark soil. Spread evenly across the linens, as if I had prepared my bed for planting. Within the black earth, tiny violets rise like purple diamonds—much as they do when spring is inbound, when the light is returning.
I dream of an unforgivable sin, and yet I awaken to a miracle.
Chapter 14
Istare at the violets, my mind tumbling tide-like, and pray I am mistaken. The longer I look, the more I realize this is no miracle.
This can be nothing but goetia.
The Catechisma teaches us that the power to create is vast and dangerous, dark powers only the Creatrixes and their diaboli can grant. My chest heaves—with terror this time, not twisted pleasure—as I brush one hand against the soil.
It is moist and rich between my fingers, smelling of damp spring mornings. The violets, too, are impossibly lifelike, their petals thin as the finest silk.
“What am I?” I whisper, choking on the words.
I am no Saint. I have no Mysterium. I am not the kind of person chosen to work a miracle. I yank my good leg away from the violet-studded soil, running through the Catechisma verses I’ve memorized, desperately trying to find something that can explain what’s happening to me. Something that might say I am not doomed.
In a panicked flurry, I pull myself up to stand beside my bed, grabbing dirty linens from the woven basket tucked into the corner. Breathing far too heavily for such a simple task, mymind blank with panic, I use my hands to shovel the soil into the pockets of a dirtied work skirt. I feel like a tiny creature, digging and digging and digging, hoping to find some kind of sanctuary down in the earth, a place safe from snapping teeth and prowling hunters.
Once the evidence of my sin is hidden away in my hamper, I force myself to dress quickly. I need a copy of the Catechisma. All bound manuscripts are kept in the Libris Sanctum for the safety of the texts. My thoughts are too scattered to find answers in memorized passages. I need the full truth of our Lord if I am to find an answer.
I slip out of my chambers, the handle of my cane in a death-grip. With hot needles prickling every inch of my skin, nausea gathering low in my stomach, I force myself to walk to the Libris Sanctum. I’m unsteady on my feet, my heart in my throat. I’ll be early, I realize as I cross the Spine. Renault won’t have arrived just yet. I tell myself it’s all right—that I’ll request a copy of the Catechisma from one of the junior scribes, sit at our researcher’s alcove and try to breathe.
The man at the front desk glances at me, his brows furrowing for a moment, but I just keep going. If I stop to answer his questions or try to make up a reason for why I’m early, I fear I’ll pass out on the cold marble floor. And I would very much like to avoid making a spectacle of myself. A good Host wife, after all, is always seen but rarely heard. A good Host wife does not dream of another woman, does not awaken to black soil and violet petals tangled up in her bedsheets.
