AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I forced a smile as Preston’s cold hand grasped mine and led me onto the floor. That smile remained firmly in place as he set his other on my waist and I forced myself to step closer, glancing to the other couples to see how this fae dance went. Unlike back home, where we never stood so near to one another in a dance, this one seemed to require me to be face-to-face with the king, keeping one hand in his and the other on his shoulder.
Aspen’s words echoed in my mind:Their magic is, quite literally,death. I’ve seen them peel the skin off a victim’s bones with a simple touch.
With Preston’s icy hand in mine, I glanced demurely down, pretending I was shy rather than too horrified to look into his eyes. Maybe the burden of carrying death magic was to forever have the likeness of death, with his pale skin, bony hands, and bloody eyes.
“Enjoyed your wine?” Preston asked. “I’ve always heard that to mortal tongues, it tastes of ashes.”
“It was quite delicious,” I answered tightly, forcing myself to lift my chin and briefly meet his eyes. I didn’t want him to think I was afraid. I was only disgusted.
He snorted, as if he didn’t believe me.
“I suppose I have my Silverfrost blood to thank for that,” I went on, emboldened. Let him be reminded of who I was too. Let him feel the threat to his throne.
For a moment, he stared at me silently, and in that wordless glare, I thought maybe he understood what words ran through my mind.You can’t trap me forever. You can’t cage my magic by drugging me. You can’t deny my heritage when I can flaunt it with my power.
“I suppose it must be nice for a mortal to have the chance to feel significant,” he said at last, dismissively. “To be able to taste the wine and magic of immortals. How colorful it must make your drab, brief existence.”
Ignoring his jab, I focused on the steps of the dance as we spun across the floor. I tried to ignore the eyes on us both, assessing, critical, interested. I tried not to notice Garrick’s impassive expression as he watched us from his seat on the other side of the room. And I especially tried to pretend I wasn’t dancing with a man who made my skin crawl.
Instead, I pretended I was dancing under a starry sky in Garrick’s arms. Imagined we were free and safe. Daydreamed I was anywhere but here.
Startled shrieks and the twang of a string jolted me from my reverie. The musicians’ song crashed to a discordant halt. An arrow slammed into Preston’s shoulder, knocking him backward and out of my arms.
I choked on my cry as courtiers dashed off the dance floor and guards rushed to Preston’s side. Pure rage hardened his features, turning his eyes a brighter red as he lifted his face toward the wooden beams of the ceiling high above us. I turned and followed his gaze to find an archer perched on one of the beams, a heavy bow clutched in his arms. He was already stringing another arrow, perhaps realizing he was caught and doomed but determined to take his victim down with him.
Preston lifted an arm and twisted his hand in a strange motion. There was an awful cracking sound, and the man screamed as his arm fell limp and twisted at his side. He dropped the bow, the arrow collapsing to my feet before the weapon crashed to the polished floor after it. And then the assassin himself lost his balance, teetering and falling.
Heart in my throat, I staggered backward to avoid him.
“Seize him!” Preston shouted, and several guards surged forward, catching the man before he could strike the floor. “Take him to the dungeons.”
As the guards filed out with their captive, Preston settled a hand on my arm. Startling, I turned back in time to watch him lift his free hand and carelessly wrench the arrow from his shoulder. The arrow bounced across the floor, the sound loud in the all-consuming stillness that had overtaken the room. Everyone was still, lost in shock, in horror. Blood soaked Preston’s torn sleeve before men and women that I assumed were gifted in healing converged upon him, wasting no time inpulling gauze from the bags they carried and binding his wound to staunch the flow.
And then Preston was moving, shoving his attendants away as if the injury was a mere nuisance. “Come with me,” he snapped, his fingers curling painfully around my upper arm as he dragged me from the room.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
The castle dungeon was similar to the one in the bowels of the fortress. Torchlight flickered eerily off damp stone walls, and a permanent stench of decay, blood, human waste, and despair filled the air. Rusty stains that looked suspiciously like old blood decorated many of the uninhabited cells we passed, while distant moans and whimpered pleas haunted me with every step.
Not far behind us, Nerissa trailed with Garrick on her arm, his eyes vacant.
Bile soured my mouth as I recalled the torment she’d inflicted on Garrick, and I feared I was about to witness something equally as vile enacted on the would-be assassin. Worse still, I was terrified that Preston blamedmefor the failed attempt somehow. That Garrick and I would soon be suffering down here as well.
Preston drew me to a halt before a cell just as the guards were throwing the prisoner inside and locking the door. “Leave us,” he snapped, and the guards dispersed with quick salutes.
