Anathema (The Eating Woods, #1)

by Keri Lake

You must truly want me out of Eidolon.” “I don’t.” He dipped me backward, his masked face low to my throat.

“But you’re angry with me.” Palm to palm, we circled each other, and he paused to dip me again. “I can feel it.”

When I came back around front, he dragged me into him, just as the other men did. Unlike the others, he dug his fingers into me, pressing me hard against his solid chest. “I am angry at you.” The deep timber of his voice rumbled in my ear, and he spun me around, keeping in time with the other couples. “For wearing this dress. For looking so painfully exquisite, you’ve managed to draw everyone’s attention. Including mine.”

AAAAAAH

“Yes, she did. I can hardly smell you, and yet, I still knew it was you.” He gripped me with both hands that time and dipped his head to the crook of my neck. “You’re incapable of blending, Maevyth.”

“I curse Rykaia for bringing you here. And yet, the thought of never seeing you in this dress is a torment in itself.”

The corner of his lips curved, as if he wanted to smile and pulled me closer, the possession in his grasp becoming ever apparent as he held me against him with both hands.

FOLD

“Doing so would mean I’d have to kill him.” “What? Why?” “Because asking him about her would inspire him to think of you.”

“Imagine your body insisting on fucking more hours of the day than not. All Lunasier men suffer the dreaded moon cycle,

AHA

“I should hope he wouldn’t kill someone just for looking at me.” Rykaia snorted and turned back toward the crowd. “Be grateful he didn’t inherit our mother’s gift for reading minds. I suspect half the guests here would be lying in a pool of blood.”

“I believe it’s called lust and a severely besetting attraction, but what do I know? I’m just his annoying little sister who’s lived with him for nearly two centuries.”

Gods blood, the dress that Maevyth wore stirred something dark inside of him.

She was chaos wrapped in fine silk. The embodiment of trouble that’d nearly brought him to his fucking knees when he’d first laid eyes on her across the ballroom. So achingly beautiful, his chest hurt.

And those words she’d whispered earlier … asking him to take her and essentially ravish her, though the Primyrian word didn’t translate quite the same.

Rykaia LMFAO

“Yes. Cadavros lives. And he knows of the vein.” “The Magestroli lied about his death. Why?”

Oh SHIT

“Look at her one more time, and from this night forward, the only thing you’ll be staring at is the endless, black void of remorse.”

A voice inside my head told me to stay with him. That I was safest with him.

“She will burn in sablefyre. And her blood shall turn to stone. And the stone shall grant us immunity from the blight!”

Well fuck

“He searches for me.” She lifted her gaze, as if something hovered above us, but when I looked, there was only the fading rays of light and blackness beyond them. “He wants to destroy you.” “What do I do?” “You command the flame. Remember that.”

Something dark and scaly moved through me, stirring inside my chest. A white haze slipped across my eyes, as a cold and numb sensation burrowed into my skin and bones. I pursed my lips and blew a torrent of black flame at the Magelord’s face.

OH HELL YEAH

Let the flame do your bidding, the voice chimed inside my head.

“You can cleave up and through walls, but never down. It’s the gateway to Nethyria. The underworld.”

TeA

“Fuck it all, you stubborn bastard. She’s your mate, Zevander!”

Oh my godx

“I said she is your mate. I saw it in a vision. She wore your sigil, the mark of your scorpion. As did your son.”

YOUR SON???

“What does sablefyre have to do with this?” “Everything. But there’s no time for that. Go. Find her.”

“Some women are fire in your veins and hell between your teeth, Brother. Accept that Maevyth will never be safe. And no one will be safe from you because of it. Now, go find her, or by gods, I will make every day of your life a tribulation.”

the echo of Dolion’s words sinking beneath his muscles and bones, stirring the beast that longed to claw out of him. A possessive, vengeful creature that urged him to stake his claim.

With a sweep of his hand, Zevander drew two more of the fallen arrowheads to his palm and hurled them at his attackers on a lash of black flame. His aim proved true as two more guards collapsed into ash. The others slowed their approach as he stepped through the portal. After his mate.

“That’s where the Grymswood lies, isn’t it?” I asked, recalling the story Allura had told me. “It is.” Her eyes narrowed on me. “The priestess. Made to watch her people die, before she was turned into a tree in the middle of hell.

The priestess gave me the last rose of Morsana. The gift of the goddess herself.” She sailed a smile at me. “They only bloom in Nethyria.

“Pestilios, the God of Disease and Famine. Uncle to the goddess, Morsana.”

“Spell’s binding. Only death will reveal their true form.

Great

“Cursed gods, you are a ferociously breathtaking creature when you’re ravenous.”

“I wonder what sounds will spill from your lips when your thighs are trembling against my palms and your sweet nectar wets my tongue.”

“A thousand times I’ve fantasized this moment, and still, I failed to imagine you’d be this perfect.”

“You look like a goddess right now,” he whispered, burying his face in my neck, kissing me. He ghosted his mouth over my jaw, my cheek, until he finally crushed his lips to mine. “And you taste as divine.”

“I want you. I want you so desperately that I’d kill anything with a pulse just to have you for one night. This insatiable craving I feel …” A muscle in his jaw twitched with the tension in his words and he squeezed my hand. “I can’t fucking breathe. I ache for you, Maevyth. Believe me when I say this.”

Mates were for those who believed in fate, who gazed at the stars with a longing to capture them. He’d lived too long with the practicality of knowing the stars were too far out of reach, and yet, in his arms lay the brightest of them all. The girl with the moon in her eyes and fire in her soul.

Touch her. She’s yours. He screwed his eyes shut and shook his head. What had he ever done in his ruthless life to deserve something so innocent and good?

Crying

Everything he’d ever given a damn about had come at a tragic cost, so why would he trust that fate wouldn’t stab him in the back?

SOBBING

What a cruel destiny she’d been given, though. And, to some extent, him, as well. Having a mortal for a mate would mean suffering the agony of watching her die too soon.

The final punishment of the gods, because an eternity with her seemed as unreachable as the stars.

Maevyth radiated an irresistible warmth that he voraciously craved in his cold and calculated existence. Like scattered rays of sunlight reaching down to the darkest depths of the sea.

A turbulent gale of confusion over what he wanted and what he’d have sooner carved his own heart out to avoid. And in the center of that storm was Maevyth. The only constant. A beacon in a dark, black sea.

She was his. Lunamiszka. My little moon witch.

“Imagine you could have her freely. Without those meddling memories clouding your mind.” Cadavros continued to taunt. “Imagine you could have her, take her, as you’ve dreamed. Imagine her touch without the pain.”

Not today satan

A ravenous hunger hooked itself in his bones, thinning his restraint. Gods, he wanted her more than his next breath.

He didn’t answer immediately, but curled his fingers into me, as if I might try to get away from him. “Hell,” he finally rasped, his voice painfully dry. “I was in Hell.”

KERI LOCK YOUR DOORS

“And I am yours to touch, Maevyth. I crave your touch more than my next breath.”

“I’ll never know what in seven hells inspired the universe to send you to me, Maevyth.”

“If this is punishment, then I welcome an eternity of suffering.” The kiss that followed was gentle and teasing in the way he merely brushed his lips across mine. “You consume me entirely, little moon witch.”