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So, one of us needs to be the responsible party.” A throaty laugh left me. “You’re the responsible one?” “Obviously.”
No matter how much I trained with weapons and my body, my waist would never be narrow, nor would my hips ever be slender like the Ladies in Wait in Solis. I liked cheese and bacon and chocolate-covered everything too much for that.
“The wolven are outside right now, patrolling.” My brows rose. “They are?” When he nodded, a sleepy frown pulled at my lips. “Why can’t I feel them, and you can?” “Because I’m special,” he replied with a smirk. I rolled my eyes. He chuckled. “I can’t feel them. I can hear them. Still makes me special,” he added, and I sighed.
“Why does everyone act like I run around stabbing people?” Casteel stared back at me and then looked pointedly at his chest.
Upon his return, I figured Casteel was relieved to learn that I hadn’t needed to stab anyone. Or maybe not. I think he liked it when I stabbed people. Especially him.
“I wonder if she still lives. If so, I also wonder if she’s planning for a volume two.”
“I dislike you.” “That’s a lie.” “I know.”
One of his father’s more aggressive ideas was to send me back to the Queen of Solis in pieces.
“All of that sounds incredibly sad and also hopeful. I mean, that if your mother did love Malec, she was still able to find love again. To open herself like that once more. I don’t know…” I held the journal close to my chest. “I don’t know if I could do that.” “I would never give you a reason to, Poppy.”
My heart melted in my chest and then froze. But what if I was immortal? It seemed utterly incomprehensible to think that I would outlive Casteel,
“Did you two forget I was here?” Kieran asked. “Holding a conversation with you two? Or trying to.” I sort of did.
I shook my head. “I hate the idea of having a babysitter, but a group of people did try to kill me earlier, and we have no idea if there are more of like mind. So I would call my quick agreement common sense.” The dimple appeared in his right cheek. “Common sense. That must be a new thing for you.”
was being polite.” “The fact that you’re being polite is also weird.” “I am always polite.”
“How often have you really had someone try to eat you upon waking up?” “You’d be surprised.” I opened my mouth to ask for details but then closed it, thinking it was probably a road I really didn’t need to travel right now.
Many of my kind are not old enough to have lived among them. Alastir was one of the only few, and well, fuck him, right?” I grinned. “Yeah. Fuck him.”
I let that sink in, and of course, my mind went to one place. “And yet I can’t shift into anything.” “You’re really hung up on that, aren’t you?”
bestie really wants to be a dragon
“I have another question for you.” He leaned back. “Of course, you do.”
“Cedar.” “What?” Kieran blinked. “You feel like cedar.” He stared at me. “I feel like a tree?” “Not really. I mean, that’s just what your…imprint or whatever feels like to me. Something rich and woodsy, connected to the land.” I shrugged. “That’s the only way I know how to explain it.” “And what did Delano feel like? A featherlight sapling?” A laugh burst from me. “No. Not a sapling. He felt like…I don’t know. Like spring.” “And I feel woodsy.” “I’m beginning to think I shouldn’t have said anything.”
that what he gets for saying she smelt like death
“To be quite honest, I’m glad I can’t. I imagine your mind to be a constant cyclone of questions, one fighting the other in a deathmatch to see which one has the honor of being asked.” I frowned at him. “That was kind of rude.”
“You sure you don’t want to find yourself staring down at the hilt of a dagger protruding from your chest?” The wolven grinned at me. “That would make it hard to test out whether you can do this on purpose or not.” I shot him a look.
You have a healthy obsession with stabbing people. Gasping, I gave a little jump. “I do not!” A wide grin broke out over Kieran’s face. “You heard, then?” “I did.” Dropping the pillow, I smacked his arm. “And I don’t have a healthy obsession with that. I’m just surrounded by people who have an unhealthy obsession with annoying me.”
“But how do you think Nyktos communicated with the kiyou? They wouldn’t have understood language. Not the spoken kind. He communicated directly with their minds.”
“Stay here.” Stay here? My nose wrinkled as I scrambled across the bed, nearly taking out the platter of leftover meat and cheese. Snatching the wolven dagger, I slipped it free from its sheath as I stood. “And, of course, you are not staying put,” Kieran muttered,
“So you expect me to hide, then? Is that what being a Queen means to the wolven?” I glared up at him, feeling the acidic burn of his anger, and the heavier press of his concern. It was a new experience to feel anything other than wry amusement from Kieran. “Then what kind of Queen would that make me?” His jaw hardened. “The kind that stays alive.”
“Do not get yourself killed.” “How about you try not to get yourself killed, huh?”
“Or would you prefer to be addressed as the Harbinger? The Bringer of Death and Destruction?” I stiffened. I had heard those titles before, but I’d forgotten. Jansen had called Nyktos something similar.
i feel like you can’t call a god that type of stuff but maybe that’s just me. it feels kinda disrespectful though
“Who are you?” “I am no one. I am everyone.” He rose slowly. “And you will be the Queen of nothing. Kill her.”
he’s clearly been waiting to make this speech
“What are these things?” I yelled, backing away from the oily stain the two had left behind. “I have no idea.” Kieran took out another as his lip curled in disgust. “Just kill them.” “Oh, well, I was thinking about keeping one.” Cold, clammy fingers grazed my arm as I whirled around. “You know, as a—” “If you say pet, I’m going to think you’re more demented than Cas.” “I was going to say friend.” Kieran looked over at me, brows arched. “That’s even worse.”
“Oh, my gods!” I shrieked as I staggered back. The thing didn’t have a face. Not really. There was no nose. No mouth. Just thin, black slits where eyes should’ve been. Everything else was smooth, thin, pale flesh. I would never unsee this. “Take it back! Here.” I flung the bronze mask back at the thing. The metal bounced off its chest and hit the ground. It cocked its head to the side. “What?” Kieran shifted toward me. “Holy shit, it’s a—I think it’s a Gyrm.” “A what?” “Something that does not belong here.” “That’s not helpful.” I pointed at it with my dagger. “It has no face!” “I can see
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that I wore nothing but Casteel’s shirt—his now-ruined shirt. Gods. Could I not meet Casteel’s family under normal circumstances?
“Did you think my strike was meant for you?” he asked. “I…” Good gods, I really had.
“One of my personal guards trained me so I could defend myself. He did it in secret at great risk to his career and possibly even his life, but Vikter was brave like that.”
yes he was
And when it came time for them to be seen and heard, they wore masks carved to resemble the wolven.” “In a way, they were mimicking what Nyktos had done,” Kieran added as he wiped the back of his hand across his face. “It was obviously a fairly lame attempt, but whatever.”
mines bigger than yours energy
“A group of men who feel emasculated by the fact that the actual Guardians of Atlantia are all female, so they desperately cling to their special, secret group?”
ladies and gents we have the Unseen - also known as the mysoginsts
“It changed before news of our Prince’s entanglement with you.” Entanglement sounded vastly less awkward than capture, so I had to give it to her. She knew how to be tactful.
“I’m sorry, but maybe faceless people is a common occurrence in Atlantia, but it’s not something I’m used to.”
“The lamaea were never real. It was just a thing really twisted parents made up.” Kieran shot his father a pointed look.
i just KNOW kieran had his fair share of nightmares about them
“I think Jansen told some truths and then made things up to sound more knowledgeable and important, just like the Unseen were often known to do.”
*cough cough* me in essays
Jansen did have an inflated sense of self-worth.
“What is her name?” I asked. “And why is this the first time I’m even hearing about her?” “No one knows her name,” he answered. “She has only ever been known as the Consort.” “Well, that sounds…sexist,” I muttered.
“How is it possible that no one figured that out?” I asked. “That no one attempted to cross the mountain or take to the sea in a ship?”
“That’s because you’re both idiots,” Jasper replied, and I blinked. Casteel took a healthy drink of his whiskey. “Can’t really argue with that.”
“Your father and your mother have killed to keep Iliseeum’s location hidden.” His voice was as quiet and cold as falling snow. “So have I.” Casteel’s head cocked slightly to the side as his hand stilled along the back of my neck. “And I’m inclined to kill to discover the truth.”
“I don’t think there needs to be any sort of killing,” I ventured. “That’s rich coming from you,” Kieran commented.
“Wait,” Casteel coughed again, eyes watering. “Wait a godsdamn second. Wilhelmina? Who is Wilhelmina?” Jasper frowned, clearly confused. “You never met Willa?” Oh, my gods. There was no way. “What is her last name?” Casteel asked. Please don’t say Colyns. Please don’t say Colyns, I repeated over and over as Kieran’s father stared at Casteel as if he’d lost his mind. “I think it’s Colyns.” My jaw was now in my lap. Godsdamnit, Casteel’s theory had been right. Miss Willa was an Atlantian. I couldn’t believe it—wait. Did that mean she was here, in Atlantia? Oh, wow, if so, I had…so many questions
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The shower felt like it cleansed more than soap, as if it were rinsing away the stickiness of confusion that prevented me from looking past the shock of everything I had discovered and learned. That could’ve been my imagination, but by the time I forced myself to turn off the faucets, I felt like I could face what today held.
“Unworthy.” “Excuse me?” “I am unworthy of you,” he stated roughly. “You are a dream.”
“Once they realized what I was, one of them asked the gods to forgive them.” A cruel, tight smile formed over the rim of his glass as he took a drink. “They won’t.” “I…I hope they do.” His brows lifted. “That is too kind of you, Poppy.” “They didn’t kill me—” “They wanted to.” “Thanks for the unnecessary reminder.” “It sounds like a very necessary reminder,” he replied flatly.
