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“Wake up, dammit!”
“Kiara, if you wake up right this second, I’ll tell you about my scars. I’ll tell you anything you want to know! I’ll give you all my secrets.”
Jude.
“I know you want to know. I can always see the questions in your eyes.” A choked growl rumbled in his chest. “Just wake up and open that cheeky mouth of yours. Insult me! Just saysomething,” he added with an uncharacteristic whine.
Maybe it was that final plea or how my heart ached at his tangible anguish, but my heavy lids fluttered open.
A blurry face hovered over me, pale skin framed by night-black strands. He was so close that his warm breath tickled my lips, my nose inhaling his scent of smoke and pine.
That familiar warmth spread in my belly, the same heat that was growing more and more prevalent in his presence.
“All I had to do was nearly die for you to offer me answers?” I finally rasped, my throat hoarse and raw. It felt like I’d swallowed a torch.
“Thank the gods!” Jude’s arms wrapped forcefully around my frame, his calloused hands moving to cradle my head. His unusually warm touch burned my skin on contact, and he winced as I let out a slight hiss. He removed his hands with a nearly imperceptible scowl, but I saw his reaction well enough.
“You weren’t breathing for a good two minutes!” A sudden fierceness graced his tone, underscored only by the bitterness of fear.
“Don’t worry,” I murmured, attempting to sit up. My head spun. “I’m not that easy to kill.”
Jude didn’t find me at all amusing. Sweat dripped from his forehead, dampening his unkempt hair. It hung across his scarred eye, masking some of the sinister clouds trapped inside.
“You’re the most infuriating person I’ve ever met.” His jaw ticked, all the concern he’d radiated abruptly transforming into exasperation.
“You must not have met a lot of people then,” I retorted, moving to my elbows.
Plumes of ivory pirouetted around us, my vision gradually growing less blurred. The dream world and my grandmother were far behind me, and now, the moon and its greedy shadows reigned once more.
I peered around the clearing, expecting to see the bodies of the masked men, but I found none. Only piles of ash.
A wave of sudden nausea nearly sent me doubling over, and the last thing I wanted to do was vomit on the handsome commander.
“You promised me something,” I ground out, swallowing the rising bile.
Jude cocked his head, his stormy eye sinister as he bored into my soul. He knew exactly what I meant. While I should have been more consumed with what had just happened—between the attack and my sunshine-filled dream—my mouth had a mind of its own.
“Seriously? That’s the answer you want?” Jude fumed, his teeth bared. “You practicallydied. You dropped to the ground just as those shadows devoured them. Whatever the hells they were.” He ran a hand through his hair. “Andthat’syour first priority?”
“Yep.” I popped thep. “Do tell me more of these murderous shadows, though. It all sounds quite thrilling.” While everything was hazy and blurry at the edges, I did recall some of what happened. But even that was more of afeeling, slippery around the edges. I wasn’t ready to process what had happened during the attack, let alone talk about it.
“This is no time for jokes,” Jude scolded, leaning back on his knees. “I’ve never seen anything like that before and you were…” His gaze flickered to the broken trees. “You were frozen and so pale. Kiara, you weren’tbreathing.”
What does asomewhatrational person say to that? Add in the visible exasperation painting his skin a red hue, and I couldn’t muster a single coherent word. But I knew his anger wasn’t directed at me.
Instead, I picked myself up from the dirt, ignoring Jude’s outstretched hand. I stretched my legs, still off-kilter, as Jude watched from a respectable distance. I could sense he wanted to close the gap between us, his eyes wild as his hands restlessly formed into fists at his sides.
Jude.
My grandmother’s words came back to me in a rush.
“And please be careful around the commander. History always has a way of repeating itself, no matter how hard we try to rewrite the story.”
Whatever that meant.
But Jude was…Jude. I’d trusted him thus far, and I was still alive. Why had she told me to be wary of him?
“What’s wrong?”
