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A much,muchdifferent command than any endeavor that had come before.
“Caught you, phoenix.” He grappled for her hands and pinned them on either side of her head. She tried to move, but entire sections of curls were stuck under their joined hands, pinched and burning with every tug. Her legs were equally incapacitated, locked wide by his muscled thighs. “I do like it here better. Good choice.”
Magda!Instinct produced the cry for help and killed it in the same breath. Nothing defined her relationship with her stepmother more clearly than knowing her worst troubles started and ended with the koldyna.
She shifted sideways with a desperate groan, but he was stronger. The effort sapped her burst of energy. “What’s your name?” she asked through gritted teeth, hoping to keep him talking long enough to find a way to escape.
“Varradyn.” His tongue lashed his bottom lip after he sounded then.He bucked his hips.
She dug upward along the rug in retreat.
Where was Magda? She’d always been waiting when Ana landed with a raven. Always dismissed her as soon as she delivered them, leaving her ignorant to whatever happened next. Everything about this round of endeavoring was different. Until that moment, Ana hadn’t fully believed Magda was not just dangling her as bait but offering her up as the prize.
She’s not my friend. Not my mother. She will watch from the shadows as this spelled raven does something so terrible, it will destroy both him and me.
“Varradyn,” she said, voice shaking. His hands were pinched so tight around her wrists, she’d started to lose feeling in her fingers. She’d never outlast the magic. Her only chance was to break through to the man inside. “Listen to me. I don’t know you... I don’t...” She twisted again. “But I know you’re not yourself. And I know this because—” Her breath arrested in the wake of his intense glare. “Because it’s theapple. The apple that... that turned you into... into this.” She clamped her legs against his outer thighs in an attempt to move him enough to regain ground. “Varradyn.Please. Let me go.”
Varradyn dragged his nose along her neck and up to her chin, opening her mouth with his tongue. She clenched her jaw, expelling him, and he coiled back in offense.
“You said there were more apples.” His mouth contorted into a petulant snarl. “I want them.”
Fresh hope filled Ana. “More apples. Yes! Yes, I can get you more apples. If you move... If you let me go, I’ll get you as many as you want.”
“After,” Varradyn growled and ground against her thigh again in vacant, mindless movements.
She wiggled enough to lift one of her legs over her pelvis and used it to block him from advancing any further.
Ana turned her face to the side to dodge another drugged kiss.Think, Ana. Think!If he released even one of her wrists, she was within reach of the poker. One hit was all it would take. It might be more than enough.
But she realized she didn’t want to hurt Varradyn. He wasn’t a predator. He was just a Ravenwood, who had been minding his business, lured away from his home to do Magda’s bidding. If he survived the ordeal and had any memory of it, he might never forgive himself.
It wasn’t his fault.
Thisis what Magda wants. She’s here, hiding. Watching. Waiting for it to be over. For me to be hurt, humiliated, and humbled.
Varradyn grunted and tried to force her leg back down, but in the struggle, she freed the other and used both to push him off. He went sprawling backward, but he didn’t stay down. He was already crawling over her again by the time she pulled herself up. “This is what you wanted, phoenix. You’re the one who came to me.” He shuffled forward, and she clambered back. “NowIwant what you promised.”
If I disobey her, she’ll take it out on Father. On Niko.
Maybe. But if I allow this raven to assault me, who knows where he’ll stop? What the magic has bid him to do? What if he kills me?
“Varradyn,” Ana said. Her scratchy throat buried half of the word. She cleared it. “Varradyn! Idon’twant this. Neither do you. It’s the magic... It’s the apple. The apple made you like this, and when it wears off, and you realize what you’ve done, you’ll never look at yourself the same again.”
“Too late,” he murmured, empty-eyed, and lurched forward. He would have landed atop her had she not leaped to her feet just in time.
Ana stumbled sideways into the hearth. He caught on to what she was doing, but she swung down to grab the poker before he could. She clutched it in her hands, against her chest. “I don’t want to hurt you. I really,reallydon’t.”
“How strange.” Varradyn pushed to his feet. He looked down at his hands, then back at her with a vacant stare. “I desperately want to hurt you.”
“No,” she said, shaking her head. “No, you don’t. It isn’tyouthat wants this. It’s the foul magic you consumed. It will wear off. This will pass. I promise.”
“But you gave me the apple.”
“I should not have! I didn’t know—” Ana’s shivers cut off the rest of her words.
“It’s as though I have no will of my own,” he said, a musing smile playing at his mouth. He moved closer, and she shook the poker, gripping it with both hands. “Or perhaps I’m just waking up to who I truly am. What I truly want.”
“Varradyn, not a step closer!”
