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Her mind spun. Hands twitched at her side, but she could not move. Elarian tried to breathe, but the overwhelming aroma of rosewater and iron clouded her senses.

Lucan took a step forward with an outstretched hand. His long, pointed nails gently lifted a strand of silvery-black hair from Elarian’s cheek. Fury rose faster than her words, a swift current that made her tremble.

“It’s been nearly a century of this dance, Elarian,” the vampire whispered. His gaze flicked to her ears, pausing for just a moment on the golden dagger hanging from her right lobe. “A century, and still full of surprises.”

The sound of her name on Lucan’s tongue made her skin crawl as if a clutch of newborn spiders skittered across her arms. Elarian tried to twist away, but Lucan twined his fingers in her hair and held her in place. His grip pulled at her scalp, but the easy smile on his face remained.

“How many times have we made each other bleed, darling?”

Why was he doing this? What the hells was happening?

“Do you know what I remember the most?” Lucan asked softly as he brushed an eyelash from her cheek.

Her mind screamed fight, fight, you fool, but she could not deny the curiosity rising in her chest. That Lucan thought of killing her as much as she did him was a given, but what could a creature who had lived such a long, twisted life deem worthy of remembering?

“You looked different then,” he said slowly, eyes following the long curve of her pointed ears. “Your eyes were redder, you know.”

Elarian shivered. She tried to close her eyes—those pale crimson reminders that she never truly belonged with the moon elves—but something stronger willed them to remain open.

“You hesitated.”

Elarian’s heart stumbled.

“You’d buried a dagger in my thigh, another just below my heart.” Lucan’s smile grew, fangs flashing in the dim moonlight. “I was on my knees, gagging on the taste of my own rot. You could have easily slit my throat. Instead…”

Lucan wrenched her chin upward, forcing her gaze to meet his crimson eyes blazing with life.

“Instead, you watched. You stood there and watched, biting your lip until it bled.”

“No,” Elarian whispered.

“The illustrious Ashen Blade stayed her hand. For what? Was it pity? Guilt? Understanding?”

She gulped at his words. Lucan’s eyes immediately flicked to her throat, tongue running over the tip of one fang.

“I was only relishing the kill.” And let myself get distracted.

Laughter echoed through the billowing shadows. “I could hear your heart even as my own burned. You crave pain, not the kill.”

Elarian had prepared herself for every possibility; knew how to hold her tongue, where to stick her blade between a rib, and when to slip away and live to see another day.

Nothing in her training—indeed, nothing in her life—could have ever prepared her to hold a conversation with Lucan without silver at his neck, much less with his touch against her skin.

Yet here she was.

Alone.

Deep in the enemy’s territory.

Standing there with his legs pressed against hers, hand at the back of her head as if she were his lover.

For a heartbeat, Elarian nearly forgot to breathe.

“Perhaps you’d hoped to come and see a different side of me. To find something to harden your heart enough for the kill. Is that why you came here, Elarian?”

Lucan dropped one hand to her neck, nails grazing down to her collarbone, dipping below the loose fabric of her stolen tunic. Her skin puckered at his touch. Cold radiated from her heart, each pulse stealing her memories of warmth. Those roving fingers kept searching, skimming over her flesh, drawing ever closer to the fullness of her breasts.

“Always so tense,” he whispered. “Don’t you wish to relax after all this time?”