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I simper when he freezes. I don’t need his mask off to recognize this was thelastthing he expected. For me to call his bluff. For me to wear no shame as I stand with my hands on my hips and stare him down in all my glorious, bare flesh. The Isle oil bathes my skin as if I’ve swallowed moonbeams. Gratified by the King’s breath increasing its tempo, I grin from a telltale bulge beneath his form-fitting breeches prodding his robe.
“Well?” I tap one finger to my hip in a subtle challenge. Wicked, I thrust out my generous bosom, nipples peaking from the room’s chill. “The Death-maidens rouged them with pomegranate juice if you’d care totaste.” Oh yes, two can play this game.
Allysteir growls. But I beam when the skull-mark hums, when shadows breed around my body as if Kryach wishes to stoke the King’s jealousy. Or desire.
He grunts. Advances to offer me one goblet, the mask descending till his icy breath unravels upon my face. “Or perhaps I will simply bite a chunk from yourbelly...” His gloved fingers stroke my navel, pinching the tender flesh. I stiffen, narrowing my suspicious eyes as he finishes, “...since you obviously have more plump meat to spare.”
Accepting the wine, I trace my tempting tongue around the goblet line and lower my lashes, seductive, and hum a taunt, “At least I have flesh to spare unlike your bag of bones.”
“Oh, you naughty buxom bride,” Allysteir chastises me, clicking his tongue behind the mask. I grin because I hint his amused tone, “Perhaps I shall turn you over my lap and give your ample bottom the rich spanking it deserves.”
I thrill and tip the goblet, savoring the wine as it stings my throat with its heated spice before remarking, “You could try, but I’d hate for an extremity to fall off.”
Spinning on a heel, I laugh at his stunned silence and wag my hips to jiggle my ample bottom in a double-downed insult. Despite my bare feet, I feel two heads taller. The shadows trail me, flirting with my corpus roses growing out of the stone floor cracks. This time, Allysteir has no choice but to follow when I tug on his tether.
“What are you doing?” wonders Allysteir, voice grim as I take full satisfying breaths.
I throw open his wardrobe wide. “Well, ifyourmeat is too timid, I’ll be seeking some proper nightwear. The gown was perfect but far too heavy for sleeping.”
“Your belongings have not been transferred yet.”
I wave a hand in dismissal and retrieve one of his many spider-silk robes, shrug into it, and slide my hair from beyond the fabric. The cord’s magic allows for these menial purposes but snaps into place following.
“And now, she wears my Death robe,” the King grumbles behind me.
I giggle and angle my neck to him, batting my eyes. “Something you wish to say, dear husband?” I sing-song, wondering how long he will put up with this game.
The robe swims on me, trailing to the floor. The barest slopes of my breasts peek from the center gaps but don’t expose my buds. Finished with my wine, I swing to Allysteir where he’s pouring himself his second goblet. Before he may lift it, I snatch it away, reveling in his clenched fist, laugh, and down the wine in one full draught. Careless of how it burns my throat.
“That wasmine!” Allysteir protests as I lick my lips.
“There’s a bit leftover right here if you want some,” I mention, gesturing to the corner of my mouth where a droplet or two trickles down my chin.
“What are you doing?” he closes the distance between us, the shadows multiplying.
“Come now, Allysteir, it’s common for married couples to share everything, isn’t it?”
I tilt my neck to the side, exposing my throat to him. Rock back on my heels, perhaps a little too smug. The wine pulses more warmth through me and charges it into the spaces between my thighs. They grow hot with desire. Can the King, my husband, scent my arousal?
Before the urge may grow, Allysteir seizes me and thrusts me against the wall. My stomach grows heavy. A stab of icy breath arrests my ear from the King’s voice, but it sinks into my core most, into my veins as if he is controlling the shadow-mark.
“You dare test the Corpse King in his chambers?” Allysteir warns deeply, and I shiver. I tremble when his tongue flicks beyond the mask to steal the wine droplet upon my chin. “You dare test the God of Death himself?”
“Allyste?” I struggle against him, but he presses me harder to the wall. Adrenaline pumps more blood to my heart. Responding to my emotions, thorny vines grow, bearing black death roses. But Allysteir thwarts my floral defenders with his shadows. The shades devour them, shred their petals. Tears brew behind my eyes.
“My sweet, dark rose...you believe you have wooed me, captivated me, tantalized me with your flesh, your blood, your beauty, your gifts?”
My eyes roll to their ceilings. Fingers lose feeling as I battle his shadow hold, thisDeathgrip.
The only way to survive him is to permit him to rape your soul, to not ever fight back, to allow him to pillage you again and again until not one shred of your heart remains.
No! I can’t believe this is the same Corpse King who saved me in the Skull Ruins. The one who remained at my side during the virginity test, shared Skathyck, and defended me to his mother. The King who sung his shadow lullaby over the dying in the Hollows. Allysteir who offered me Isle fruit and savored my flesh and blood. Who adored me with his kiss. And shared nearly every waking moment with me, shared secrets and history over pomegranates, laughed with me, loved...
I gasp when he grips my jaw, jerking my face to his. Tremors assault my body. I strain with his hands. The rope has become a prison chain.
Allysteir rips off his mask to bare the full weight of the withered side of his corpse face, this haggard ruin?deathly and macabre with teeth exposed in a perma-leering grin. I scream and scream until he wrenches my face closer and growls, “You long to play with Death? Now, I will show you what you will look forward to!”
A tempest of shadows bombards us. They surround my body in irresistible folds as if to snuff me out. Will they reap my very heart and soul?
