Anathema (The Eating Woods, #1)

by Keri Lake

I wanted to scream into the void. To throttle fate with both hands for having dipped its poison-tipped fingers into our lives.

I’d learned at too early an age that the sound of a girl’s scream drew nothing more than apathy.

As a sizzling sound rose over the rustling of the trees, I frowned harder, and as I watched, curls of white smoke drifted from the bone and once-red drops of blood seared to black.

What a terrible burden to watch something die.

pendulynx.” As much as I fought

So, I played along, pretending to worship as all others, because nonbelievers were also sent to The Eating Woods.

They rarely left the temple, as socializing was undoubtedly a bit more challenging without the means to speak. I ran my tongue across my teeth, trying to imagine its absence.

fucking FUNNY 🤣

How tragic that a woman’s worth equated to the depth of a man’s pockets.

Just a curious boy and girl.

disregard. Cla-clunk. Cla-clunk. Cla-clunk. Frustrated

How could I have not known that I’d died?

duoculos,

The bundle shifted, movement pulling the blankets away to reveal a face that snapped his spine straight. Long, black hair lay strewn about her pillow and plastered to her sweaty brow. Porcelain skin that carried the soft pink of a fever. Full, bow-shaped lips, slightly parted. Fucking beautiful.

As he pulled back the flames, he tipped his head, staring down at her. What a pity.

Something about the girl stoked the fire in his veins, and were he not there to sear her blood to stone, he might’ve taken an interest in what she hid beneath that loose gown.

Jaw clenched hard enough to crack his teeth, he tried for the half-dozenth time. Muscles steeled, he concentrated on the flames working their way through her veins. Boiling and hardening to stone. Nothing came forth. As if his power refused to follow his command. It’d never failed him before.

He looked down to see one of his scorpions stinging him. Retaliating on him. The cursed flame attacking him, instead!

She held such a purity and innocence about her, a vibrancy that taunted the darkest corners of his soul. And seven hells, he wanted to tear his own eyeballs out for noticing.

hahaha 🤣

The symbol on her hand had seared itself into my mind, though. What could it have possibly meant?

Fireflies danced about the archway, the sight so beautiful after all the macabre I’d seen.

It made no sense that she’d be so close to freedom, yet crouched there. “I … I couldn’t leave you,” she said, tears filling her eyes. “I wanted to run through, but I couldn’t bear the thought that you were trapped with the monster.”

An arm banded around her throat, dragging her backward. “No! Aleysia! No!”

“I want to eat the fucking air, it’s delicious.”

BawHawHahahaaa 🤣

“It is as I said, Zevander. She must be protected at all costs. If she should perish, we lose not just a bloodline but an entire ethnicity.” “I did not ask to take on a ward.” “Then you will be complicit in mortalicide.”

Bring her here. We’ll see if she carries the sigil on her flesh. In the meantime, I promise you I am working on another means to temper your curse. Do me this favor, and I will put forth every effort to rid you of this insufferable sablefyre.” “If you don’t, I will put forth every effort to see that you suffer for eternity.”

I hadn’t seen her die, though. And because of that, however small, there remained a sliver of hope. A reason. The will to fight.

My body fell into hysterics, and I couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. Could only stare at the creature in mute horror.

“Oh, god,” I whispered. “Oh, miserable, wretched god, make it quick and painless.”

As much as I didn’t want anything to do with him, I also didn’t want to be abandoned by him, either.

🤣

Well, you’re free to go, if you’d like.”

“Can I at least ask your name? So that I’m not mentally calling you angry eyes?”

No need to stoke his headache with another young woman that he could already tell would get along swimmingly with Rykaia.

That he welcomed such sensations, when his entire bloodline hinged on breaking this curse, a curse that required her sacrifice, infuriated him.

“If the girl has any power, she certainly doesn’t know a thing about it.” Zevander stepped past him, heading back toward the cells, and Dolion followed after. “She will need to learn how to tap into it. Which will require training.” An irritating, expectant lift of his brows suggested he wanted Zevander to train her. “No.” Zevander snorted

Kazhimyr

While I loathed my irascible captor, in spite of his grumpy demeanor, he’d spoken some measure of truth.

You have a nice back.”

I turned away, covering my eyes and the humiliating blush that crawled over my face. “Bath. I meant you have a nice bath.”

Before he wordlessly strode from the room, closing the door behind him, I caught a distinct dimple in his cheek.

What was it about the man that turned me into a blundering idiot?

I’d never stood before a man so virile, so wildly masculine, in my life. There was something dangerously seductive about him, leaving me feeling too warm beneath the tunic.

Lunamiszka.”

Lord Rydainn regarded me like a mole on his ass that he hoped to burn off at some point.

He was darkly handsome. The kind who’d have been sought by the women in Foxglove while accused of sorcery by the men there.

It irritated me, the way he consumed my attention. I didn’t even have to be skilled in fighting to know it was already a weakness.

“Not even the bones of the creature that took your sister?” Zevander crossed his arms, and I had to look away. I’d never seen so many muscles flex at once, and the urge to ogle him only infuriated me, especially after I’d made a fool out of myself a moment ago.

The logical side of my brain told me to leave it alone and return to my cell, because nothing good ever came from chasing after enormous spiders.

He no longer looked terrifying to me. In that moment, he reminded me of a child. A sad and desperate child who longed for contact.

I was no longer afraid. I was furious at whoever had hurt him.

Lunamiszka