Page 36 of On Brutal Thrones

He looks at me too quickly. “What?”

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“You keep saying that.”

“Because nothing is wrong.”

His tone is clipped enough that Fenric’s head turns. Talon seems to realize it too, because he drags a hand over his face and exhales.

“Sorry.”

That worries me more than the sharpness did. Talon rarely apologizes for being Talon.

“It’s fine,” I say carefully. “Just tell us what you’re sensing. And why you’re acting so strangely.”

His gaze slides past me toward the path ahead. “I don’t know yet.”

I don’t believe that either.

We walk another several minutes before I notice anything. At first, it’s so faint I think I’m imagining it. It smells sweet, but not pleasantly so. It’s heavy.

I breathe through my nose again. There it is. Beneath the moss and damp soil is a metallic edge that makes my stomach turn before my mind can supply the word.

Blood.

I stop. “Oh.”

Fenric takes another breath and immediately recoils, yanking the neck of his shirt over his nose. “Ugh. That’s fucking foul.”

Thorian’s expression hardens as he looks at Talon. “That’s what you were smelling.”

Talon only nods.

A cold sensation crawls down my spine. He’s been smelling blood for at least ten minutes. Probably longer.

I study him more carefully now, and I realize he isn’t simply uncomfortable. He’s struggling. His mouth is pressed into a hard line, his shoulders tight, his eyes carrying a faint redness that wasn’t there when we left the cabin. He keeps swallowing, and suddenly that movement has a different meaning.

Hunger.

“Talon?”

“I’m fine.”

The response comes too quickly.

We continue walking, but the smell grows stronger with every step. Soon, breathing through my mouth doesn’t help because I can almost taste it there too. Sweetness coats the back of my tongue. Copper seems to linger against my teeth. The air itself feels thicker, humidity gathering against my skin until sweat dampens the hair at the back of my neck.

A fly buzzes past my face.

Then another.

I swat one away. “I hate this.”

“Noted,” Talon says.

The attempt at humor should reassure me, but his voice is too flat. I move closer and slip my hand into his, searching his face. “Talon? Talk to me. What’s wrong?”