Page 49 of Tell Them That I’m Coming

He reaches toward my face, intent on touching me.

I twist away, spitting. “Touch me and I’ll bite your fingers off.”

He laughs. “Play with me, demoness. You won’t like how I play back.”

Now that he’s not complaining over how Binx attacked him, the second slaver stalks over, nudging my hip with his boot. “What do you think? Should we gag her before bringing her to the caravan?”

“We can.” That’s the third slaver, the one holding the chains. “Though there’s something else I’d rather use her mouth for.”

My stomach flips so hard, I nearly vomit. I may be an innocent when it comes to mating, but I’m not that innocent. I know the mechanics of the act… and I know how much pleasure a female can give her male when she takes his cock in between her lips.

Screw that. If he tries putting his cock anywhere near me, I’ll bite that off instead.

First, I try bluffing. Best thing about being in a world of fae who can’t tell an untruth? They never know when I’m lying. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m not who you think I am.”

One of the slaver’s leans in, as if he can’t resist sharing a secret with me. “Yeah? Well, the queen says you are. That the seer’s have foretold it. And, know this: the prophecy doesn’t lie, demoness.”

There’s goes any of my bravado. Just hearing that word… prophecy… no. What? Prophecy? No.

“You don’t know what you’re saying,” I whisper. “There is no prophecy about me.”

No. There’s two.

“Oh, I do know.” The first slaver straightens, giving the third one a signal to tug my chain so that I’m hauled to my feet while he still holds his sword. “We’ve brought enough cursed things to the Court to recognize the stink of fate. Besides, everyone in Noctavara knows about the Prophecy of the Gilded Throne.”

As they force me to get up, I stumble, boots catching in roots, breath ragged, arms aching—and none of that matters because if everyone knows about the Prophecy of the Gilded Throne, then Thane knows about it, and if he thinks it has something to do with me…

“If she fights,” the second slaver says, oblivious to the fact that I’m too busy thinking… brooding… to even put up much of a resistance at the moment, “we put her down until we have her secured in the caravan. Right, Finch?”

“Whatever you do, don’t damage the horns,” the first slaver—Finch—replies. “The queen likes her trophies intact.”

Bile rises up in my throat as, suddenly, I’m not only worried about my own sorry rear. Rafe… this is exactly what happened to Rafe, isn’t it? Slavers, whether it was this trio or not, must have dragged him from Brille Rouge, bringing him to Noctavara, putting him in chains of his owns and carrying him off to the queen.

They don’t tell me. Obviously, I don’t ask. But I know, and, at that moment, I’m so close to offering to go with them willingly if that means I’ll end up where I should’ve been all along: with Rafe.

I almost, but before I can, a sound cuts through the woods. We all turn to look for the source of it: a piercing whistle, followed by a soft thunk of something solid meeting flesh.

The third slaver—the one with the chains—makes a confused noise. He sway, the chains going slack a moment before he crumples to the ground, a shining, silver knife embedded in his throat.

It won’t kill him. If he gets that out, allowing his immortal body the opportunity to heal, he will. As long as a tiny piece of sinew keeps his head attached to his body, the slaver will live, but the shock of the injury is enough to keep him out of it for the next minute or two.

The first two slavers whirl right as Thane stalks out of the trees, jaw tight, sword out, and his belt minus his eating knife.

Binx pads at his heels, tail flicking back and forth. He chirps at me, telling me that he’s back, that they’ll save me, and I realize how ridiculous I would’ve been to let these slavers take me. I want to rescue Rafe. I don’t want to join him in a gilded cage.

The two upright slavers both still as Thane turns his gaze on one, then the other.

“What,” Thane he says, his voice low and dangerous, “do you think you’re doing?”

Finch’s eyes widen in recognition. “Aurex. You shouldn’t be here. This isn’t your business.”

Thane’s gaze locks on the chains keeping my wrists connected.

His voice is still calm, but no less dangerous than before. Not when the soft lilt of his accent hides the calm of a predator ready to finish a hunt.

“Isn’t it? She’s with me.”

The second slaver’s tone turns nervous. “With you? She can’t be.”