AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Well, well, it appeared you did have something to trade. You are not to be underestimated.” He firmly clasped my hand. “I will remember that.”
“No need.” I looked him in the eyes. “We will never see each other again after today.”
He laughed. “So it is.”
I broke free, ignoring the odd tingling going through my fingers and up my arm. “You can stop the carriage here.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it. You have no food, water, or proper clothing. You’d never make it.” Alisdair pounded the roof of the carriage. “I will bring you back to Lyrica, and you will tell your lies. As agreed.”
The carriage jolted, nearly throwing me off the seat again, because we were turning. We were going home.
A happy noise burst from my throat—warped from a stolen voice, but still real and true. I couldn’t contain my happiness. Beaming, I said, “As agreed.”
Relaxing for the first time in over a week, I sank back into the cushion, settling in for a long silent ride.
After a spell, I closed the curtain myself. It made it easier to stare at him without him noticing.
He wasn’t what I was expecting in so many ways. His anger at discovering Emiana’s father hit her seemed genuine, but with the same breath he’d sworn to slaughter his Lyrican spies for relaying incorrect information. How did one who disregards life as casually as he did turn around and threaten someone else for their treatment of women?
Was he more than what I’d been raised to believe? Was there a side to him that wanted his war to end, peace to reign, and the violence to stop?
He shifted and his tunic fell open, flicking my gaze to his hard, shadow-dusted chest. All those men who came back from the battlefield speaking of yellowed eyes, a foaming maw, fur and scales where none should be, and a face so hideous it made you weep—I cursed them all as kakkas for telling such terrible lies.
Alisdair was dawn breaking over the horizon. A rare flower blooming under a midnight moon. Rainbow eels dancing in a clear, placid lake. No matter who you were or what you were doing, you simply had to stop, stare, and bask in the sight of him. Although, sunrises and rainbow eels were bright, joyous sights. Alisdair was different.
There was something dark and feral about his beauty. More like the inherent fear clinging to your shivering spine when you ventured deep into a dark cave glistening with silk worms. To be in that wondrous, quiet space was beautiful, but you’d never shake the sense that something was lurking in the dark—waiting.
Even so, it did not make him any less gorgeous. I said I wanted to stop thinking of Kirwan as handsome. My wish was granted for all faemen were the hideous, bloated hindquarters of askletmaccacompared to Shadowsoul.
“So soon?” he said, startling me. He breathed deep. “Already you’re on the edge of begging.”
It took my last blissful, ignorant second to realize what he was talking about, and what he was scenting.
My face lit on fire. “I can assure you, Shadowsoul. One way or another, if that thing comes near me, it will be bitten off.”
“Oh? Shall we make another bargain? You do so enjoy those.”
“What kind of—?”
He ripped his tunic clean off his body.
“What are you doing!” My scream was two octaves louder than it needed to be. I couldn’t help it. Of all the things I anticipated he’d do—and slaughtering me and drinking the blood from my corpse was high on the list—I never expected him to do that.
“Nothing that should concern you.” Those claws moved down and found his waistband. “You do not want me. You do not ache for me. Your arousal does not hang heavy in the air, betraying your flushed skin and quivering lips.” He sliced through his pants, his claws a knife through butter— No, a blade through fabric, revealing him from top to tail.
My jaw clenched tight, clamping down on a high-pitched squeak before it left my lips. The remains of his trousers hit the carriage floor, leaving nothing behind but every bare, breath-stealing inch of him.
Roaring sounded in my ears. Bright lights blinded me—impossible for we were in a darkened carriage, but I was blinded all the same. I had no experience of being alone with a naked man, and this was the worst of all men to be alone with.
Losing one’s maidenhood was a risky prospect for girls from the Galley. All a devious suitor had to do was lie and say they paid me for our evening together, and just like that, I was branded a war wife for the rest of my life. Of course, I could saythey were lying, but the word of a poor woman from the gutter didn’t amount to much.
Two of my childhood friends had been caught in that very trap. After months and years fighting it, and starving, they both now lived in the homes of the noblemen who tricked them—circumstances left them little choice.
I swore that would never be me. No sweet words, muscled arms, charming grin, or promise of forever would tempt me to bed a man I didn’t trust absolutely. No man was that handsome. No man was that alluring. No man... was Alisdair Shadowsoul.
There wasn’t an ounce of fat on sculpted thighs, or indeed anywhere else. All of him was lean, hard muscle. Inky-black runes covered him from neck to shin, finding a home on every part of his body—including the part I was doing everything in my power not to look at.
“Resist me, little bird.” His words washed over me—spell-binding. Head-scrambling. “Deny what your body screams for even now, and I will not give it to you.”
