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I slide my hand around her waist, coasting to settle my glove beneath her bust, longing to palm her generous, warm flesh. Her moans are a seductive symphony. Once I trespass on the boundary of drinking beyond my fill, I retract my teeth. The menders move in, but I don’t forsake her. Isla whimpers as I rub my lips dripping with the juice of her blood along her lily-white skin until I arrive at her lips. To my astonishment, she accepts my kiss. She welcomes my taste, the taste of her own blood, her flesh.
The God of Death feasts on her blood while I feast on her succulent lips. Once he moans?his first ever moan?I break from her flesh with her blood trickling from my keen teeth, and gaze through the mask at her eyes of royal wine, of deep violet.
She whispers, “I am yours, Corpse King!”
Damn it, I descend! I return to her flesh, savoring her scream as I dive deeper, harder than ever because she is my breath, my blood, my flesh, my home, my fucking bones.
Above all, she ismine...
I would bea fool to deny the pain.
It’s like a thousand burning corpus rose thorns have burrowed into my neck. With the shadows of Kryach’s spirit winnowing along my curves in a bare brush of Death, it triggers countless memories from my childhood, from the night I fled the orphanage and carried myself to the Void border. In the greatest of ironies, I felt safe there.
Allysteir’s teeth do not bite like refters. Not animalistic instinct razing my flesh and bone. No, the King savors, lapping my blood, my flesh caught between his teeth as he devours longer and deeper; he craves, demands, and entreats me.
I am the corpus rose who follows him, who haunts him.
When he penetrates me raw and hard, I scream but wage a siege against my rising tears because the last thing I want is for him to pull away. Not with his hand embracing my waist on the undersides of my breasts and rousing the heat between my thighs. Not with his sharp, breathless pants and quickening pulse nearly thundering in my ears.
Hundreds of eyes rivet their gaze upon us, but the King’s cadaverous face clouds my vision?the face in the Skull Ruins. Someday, I will tell himafterI’ve earned his trust. My flesh tingles with the thought.
Dizzy from his feasting, I crumble in his arms, knees buckling, vision blurring. Still, I smile because his teeth linger, mouth sucking and culling as much as he dares because he understands my strength. And it must mean one thing: he trusts me.
Oh, gods!
The moment Kryach’s dark spirit shrouds my body in shadowy ice, Allysteir jerks back and thrusts me toward the closest mender. Unlike the rest, it requires more than one to heal my flesh. While the other Ith retreat with their healed human-chosens, including Prince Aydon and Franzy, Allysteir remains close while menders tend to me. They rub bone powder into my wounds, speak healing rites upon my flesh, but their words are distant and subdued as gray fog.
Kryach’s spirit whispers upon my body?a dark caress of a lullaby. Despite his voicelessness, his deathly stroke assures me of how pleased he is with my blood and flesh. How he longs for more. A hollowness invades my stomach.
He’ll eat your soul until you’re all but dead...
For the first time, I whimper and shed a tear because Allysteir has become his mask. He does not look at me. He stands with his side facing me. My heart plummets to my stomach.
Look at me!I want to plead, but my breath is faint?winded from the bone powder knitting my flesh, sealing the wound until a cold eternity of teeth-scar remains.
* * *
Once the Bite Offering concludes, soldiers usher me into the secondary hall where Allysteir, Aydon and Franzy, Queen Gryzelda, and the elders wait, discussing political matters involving the other races. Allysteir barely acknowledges me, and I wish I could say the same for his mother whose sharpened eyes scrutinize me along with the elders, including Kanat. His eyes linger on my fresh scar and my lips.
Aydon steps toward me. I struggle to contain myself because Franzy lingers on his right-hand side, leaning on him for support with her raw bite mark. Her face is more blanched than usual, but her eyes have not lost their amber luster. My gut clenches in remorse and guilt because I promised her we would never become Feyal-brides. And now, we are brides to brothers. One who is the most powerful in Talahn-Feyal. My fingers quiver to touch her, to embrace her. But my knees are too weak from fatigue after the first bite.
Before I fall, the Prince assumes my hand and brushes his mouth across my knuckles, his eyes as blue as Wisp-Shee jewels shimmering across mine. “Well met and welcome, Lady Isla Adayra of Cock Cross to our Underworld. I wish you prosperity and many fruitful years as Queen of Talahn-Feyal.” Yes, because my lifespan will be longer now as a Feyal-bride.
I nod, accepting his formality. I may not be well-versed in history, but it’s common knowledge the last volunteering tribute was a well-bred girl from a noble court family.
“Thank you, Lord Aydon, but if you will excuse me...” I bow my head to him before turning to Franzy. And however untraditional, I can’t help but throw my arms around my friend and press my lips to her cheek while fresh tears glisten in my eyes. “Franzy, I’m so?”
The last thing I expect is for her to shove me away. I taper my brows, confused because she lifts her chin, eyes tightening as her lips flatten before she acknowledges, “A pleasure to see you again, my friend. It will be an honor to attend your impending nuptials,” she finishes, eyes roaming to Allysteir’s mask.
I understand. She doesn’t know what happened after she fled the Hollows. She doesn’t know what happened in the Skull Ruins. I can’t fault Franzy for feeling betrayed after all our years of planning, all our dreams and goals which have turned to cold ash. Soon, I must get her alone and explain. She will understand. I must find a way to get her out of the Citadel of Bones to escape this fate. I purse my lips because a fleeting thought has me wondering if she desires this, considering she volunteered. She remains close to Aydon’s side. After all, the Feyal-bride of a Prince is far better than wedding a Cock-Cross girl with no dowry apart from a mountain of debt.
A sudden thought has my chest lurching. My family, Mathyr and Fathyr...I glance at Allysteir, yearning to ask what will become of them, but all he does is waver near the blackwood table where he snatches a flask of Shee-wine and downs it in one gulp.
While stroking Franzy’s curls, Aydon continues where my friend left off, “Yes, we all await the wedding of the first common girl who has ever volunteered. The wedding will commence by the next full moon with the Adayra family in attendance, but we will have the royal supper within the next hour as the festivities continue. Until then, our Feyal-maids will accompany you to the bridal chambers and prepare you for the feast.” He gestures to the nearby maids garbed in the Citadel skull insignia.
My heart leaps at the chance to be alone with Franzy until Queen Gryzelda steps toward me to announce, “I will accompany Allysteir’s bride-to-be to her chambers and preside over her preparation. There is much I wish to discuss with her.”
The color drains from my face, but when I turn to the King, he grunts and downs more wine. Remembering my last encounter with Gryzelda, I fortify myself. I wear the King’s mark. She will not discover a mere Cock-Cross girl.
