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My hand shot out and grabbed the man by his glowing lapels. “She is not going anywhere.” I spat through gritted teeth.
His eyes widened, but he managed to plaster a smile on his pale face. “Oh, your brother will not take no for an answer.” Sinsorias cringed back, his hand flying to his lapel to draw something out from beneath his vest. A thin gold chain held a long charm at the end.
A bone whistle.
Hector cursed. I stared hard at the whistle in his hand, ignoring the sinking feeling in my chest. Talia’s hand linked with mine once more, and this time, I squeezed back.
“I for one will not sleep out here,” Sinsorias announced, tucking the wretched whistle back into his vest. “I request that my host and his bride join me for dinner. In your home, as it were.” He waved his wrist about and marched up the steps behind us.
We walked up the wide stone steps, over unruly ivy, to the twin front doors half-covered in cobwebs. At the top, I hung back, allowing Talia to enter first. As she glanced back at me, I tried to memorize her face and the way she looked at me like she wanted me to stay beside her.
Curse the sun and all his court! I stomped up the rest of the steps, keeping my chin high as I brushed past her. Hector’s quirked brow said he knew exactly what was on my mind as I stormed through the forgotten entryway, through a hallway that led into a second, larger entrance hall, different only in that it was lit with blazing chandeliers.
Our footsteps echoed in the vaulted space.
Sinsorias peered up at the ceiling crisscrossed with beams. “And I thought you lived in a cave.” He cackled. “Where are all your servants, Romero?” He covered an obviously fake gasp. “Oh, that’s right. No one wants to work for a—”
“Say another word, and I’ll rip your throat out.”
“With what, your claws?” He tilted his head.
“Get out of my house.”
Talia glanced between us in wide-eyed confusion.
“Ah, see there,” Sinsorias said, snapping in my direction. “Your wife disapproves of your lack of hospitality.”
“She’s not…” My tongue grew heavy and thick, forbidding the lie.
“Ah, ah, ah.” Sinsorias wagged a finger at me. “Your marriage was binding, of course. Your lovely brother, I assume, was the witness? Well, then, our sovereign thanks you for your hand in this, as he never misses the report on all binding marriage vows. His crows are always watching.”
Hector’s knuckles cracked as he fisted his hands. “I can kill him for you, if you’d like.”
I lifted a hand to stay him. “Not tonight.”
Sinsorias smiled. “That’s right. I have the power to call all hell down upon your home.” He patted the chain at his chest. “Like I was saying, you cannot deny that you ran off to the mortal world and brought back a wife so you could—”
The roar that ripped from my throat drowned out the man’s next words. Talia shrank away from me, and while I wanted her to hate me, the fear in her eyes stabbed me with pain.
21
Rafael
I pressed a hand to Talia’s back and rushed her from the entryway.
That fool of a fae didn’t know hell from a dark closet. If I still possessed the powers I was born with, I would have lit the man on fire from the top of his well-groomed head. The man was teetering on madness, either from too much borrowed power in his unprepared and untested body or because of fear—or both. And a fearful man brimming with unmastered power was dangerous.
My footsteps thundered on the hardwood, and Talia had to skitter along beside me to keep up. Hell was not a pack of hounds nor was it the wicked fae who rode them. And while the Wild Hunt could unleash death, even that wasn’t entirely a bad thing, considering the misery I’d been forced to live with. No, death could be a mercy.
But Talia wouldn’t be given death. The Hunt, if summoned, would only carry out what Sinsorias himself had been commanded: to take her to my brother. And I had no doubt he would treat her in much the way he had his own twin—with suffering.
No matter the cost, I could not allow that slavering servant of my brother’s to use that whistle. And I would do everything in my power to delay our departure for the Sun Palace. Perhaps if the month expired, and Talia no longer posed any threat to Fabian, he would let her pass back into the mortal world, unharmed. But for that to happen, I had to keep Talia from showing any signs of affection for me.
Talia stepped away from my guiding hand.
“Stop!” She fisted her hands at her hips. Her cheeks held a rosy flush and sweat dotted her hairline.
I wasn’t used to the way mortals experienced exertion, and it fascinated me. We were only walking, after all. With my thumb, I smeared away a drop of sweat, tracing the lines of her face perhaps a little too slowly. Stars, what was that? I clasped my hands behind my back and frowned.
