Page 8 of Blood Curse

I closed the gap.

For a moment we listened to the lamps and the distant settling of the house.

Then she lowered the cloth. “Tell me what it felt like.”

I knew exactly what she meant. “The command?”

“Kneeling.”

There was no safe version of the answer. Offering one would make this easier for me and worse for her.

“Your voice reached my blood before I understood the words,” I said. “My body moved at once. I could think. I knew you were fighting it. None of that gave me control of my muscles.”

Her fingers tightened around the cloth. “You couldn’t stop yourself.”

“I couldn’t even slow myself. My knees hit the floor because the command owned the movement from the moment you spoke.”

“But it didn’t change what you wanted?”

“No. I wanted to stand. I wanted to reach you. I wanted to tear the Crown apart with my hands. My thoughts stayed mine while my body obeyed.”

“And when I revoked it?”

“The hold broke at once. The chains vanished because there wasn’t an order left for them to carry.” I rubbed my thumb over her knuckles. “That matters. We don’t have a command waiting between us now.”

“Did it hurt?”

“The stone didn’t. Losing my body did.”

Pain crossed her face. She didn’t look away. “Were you afraid of me?”

“I was afraid of what the Crown could force us to do to each other.”

“That isn’t quite an answer.”

“Then here’s the rest. For one fucking second, yes. Your mouth was shaping an order that could have made me open my own heart for you. I knew you hadn’t chosen it, and I was still terrified.”

Her eyes shone. “I felt that.”

“I know.”

“And you came closer anyway.”

“You released me.”

“The Crown was still on my head.”

“You were still in there.” I turned my hand under hers and laced our fingers together. “Fear doesn’t cancel love, Bryony. It tells us where the danger is. The danger was never you.”

She studied our joined hands. “You hated kneeling.”

“Yes.”

“Don’t soften it because I’m upset.”

“I hated every second. I hated hearing your voice and knowing someone else had taken it. I hated expecting Cecily’s ending before the Crown had even finished the order.”

Bryony went still.