KANE HAULED CRAWFORD UP BY HIS TUNIC AND THREW HIM DEEPER INTO
the room with a grunt. Then he turned to Rhett and Trevyn, the latterโs collar trembling at his bobbing throat. โDo not call for help.
Do not alert anyone that we are here or neither of you, nor your employer, will live to see daybreak.โ
โNow, wait one moment,โ Rhett began, voice weakโ
Kane slammed the door shut with only that vicious split of shadowed mist, shaking the thin walls around us and producing a yelp from Trevyn. He crawled on all fours to the door, wrenched it open with quivering hands, and dashed out the other side.
โAnd you?โ
Rhett wasted no time abandoning Crawford as well, even going so far as to close the door politely behind him. Kane smirked.
โYouโre demented.โ Crawfordโs eyes shimmered with the first hint of fear as Kane stalked toward him, small tendrils of wicked power unfurling around his feet as he moved.
The burly noble didnโt waste a second to see what Kane had planned. He threw himself against the wall at the back of the room, sending two paintings in antique frames clattering down to the floor. Bathed in the dim candlelight, he tried to climb toward the window above like a scurrying rodent. But it was too tall, just barely out of reach even for a man of his stature, and his feet couldnโt find purchase against the wood.
Kane closed in on him with ease and turned Crawford to face us, wrapping a large hand around his throat and holding him high against the wall he had tried to scamper up, his feet jolting uselessly in the air.
โYouโll regret this,โ Crawford swore. โIโll keep your eyes in a jar in my villa.โ He scraped and clawed, trying to grasp at Kaneโs face, but Kane had the more significant arm span. Even Crawfordโs kicks barely connected.
โThe Blade of the Sun,โ Kane said. โImmediately. Before this cafรฉ becomes a pitiful pile of stone and playing cards.โ
โIโve never heard of such a weapon.โ
โBullshit,โ Kane thundered, bashing Crawfordโs head into the wall. I couldnโt help my flinch.
But the rest of his words were lost on me. Kaneโs violence had dislodged a few paintings and debris from the walls, and something was poking through shattered glass on the floor. It lookedโ
No, that couldnโt be possible. It looked like a drawing.
A drawing of me.
The sound of wet pummeling echoed through the room as I knelt to examine the paper clipping. Sure enough, the parchment in my hands read Have You Seen This Woman? and below that, Wanted for Treason alongside a near-identical drawing of my face.
No, no, noโ
A chill pumped into my veins.
โFine, fineโโ Crawford spit, heaving after another round of Kaneโs blows. โI may know of the thing, but I donโt have it. I never did.โ
โWho does?โ
โIf I knew, why would I tell you?โ
Kane reared his fist back, thorns and shadow twining along his palm and up his forearm, before crashing it into Crawfordโs jaw with force. Enough to break the bones, but not enough to knock him out. Or kill him.
Crawford bit back a groan. Coughing, he spit blood onto Kaneโs other hand, still clenched around his neck.
Under my breath, and turning my face from Crawfordโs bloodied, pulpy one, I whispered to Kane, โHe has a wanted poster of me. It was framed on his wall.โ
When Kaneโs quicksilver eyes met mine, it wasnโt anger that simmered in them. It was fear. And that fear laced into his voice like poison as he turned back to Crawford and said, โUnfortunately, youโve just become worth more to me dead than alive.โ
Undiluted terror pooled in the manโs beady eyes. The realization that he would die this evening. That there would be no narrowly escaping with his life, no respite from the pain, the dread.
That it was over.
Crawford thrashed against Kaneโs hold and his grim eyes cut to mine, pleading. I winced as Kane let his fist loose again, slamming into Crawfordโs gut and then his kidney. He sputtered, unable to breathe, until he sucked in a lungful to moan in agony.
โWhy?โ he asked between breaths, bright red coating his teeth and lips. โBecause of her?โ
He spat again, but Kaneโs choke hold only tightened. Gasping, he tore at the hand around his throat.
Kane was going to kill him before we learned anything. And all because he knew that I wasโ
Maybe . . . maybe that was it.
I moved toward them, skin tingling with fear and . . . anticipation. Some kind of grisly exhilaration. โYou know who I am?โ
โArwenโโ
I shot Kane a look in an effort to convey the new ruse we were playing. No longer subservient healer and dark king, but instead, powerful Fae outlaw and human brute.
Though he remained silent, there was an uncanny interest in Crawfordโs beady eyes I had missed before. How could I have been so oblivious? He had looked at me just as Lieutenant Bert had. He had known I was Fae all along.
Kane tightened his grip.
โYou knew all night.โ
โYes,โ Crawford spat. โI have a dignitary friend in Garnet. He told me that youโre . . . different.โ
โMy king wasnโt lying. Heโll strangle you to death.โ โItโll be easy,โ Kane swore, โlike juicing a lemonโโ
โBut what Iโll do to you will be far, far worse. Give us the location of the Blade of the Sun, and leave with your life.โ
Crawford studied me, and despite my racing heart, I suppressed the urge to fidget. Then his eyes landed on Kane. โTell your animal to release me.โ
I motioned for him to do so, and Kane only hesitated a moment before dropping the criminal without pretense. Crawford fell to the floor like a deflated ball, face slamming into the moth-ravaged rug, sputtering and puckering for air.
Kane wiped his bloodied hands on his pants.
โA year ago I heard it was in Reaperโs Cavern,โ Crawford said when he had caught his breath. โNobody was ever going to retrieve the thing without dying. So I said it was in my possession. People believed me. It was good for my image. Thatโs it.โ He spat blood onto the floor and rubbed his jaw and throat.
Kane paced across the room to lean against the carved desk, and it creaked under his weight. โI thought Reaperโs Cavern was a myth.โ
I prowled closer to Crawfordโs hunched form. โIf youโre trying to trick usโโ
โNo!โ He cowered. โIโm not! Itโs not.โ
Playing with Kane had been one thing. The thrill, the hunger in itโbut this was something I had never felt before. Crawfordโs wide-eyed expression sent a wave of pleasurable sickness through my system.
He feared me.
Me.
He feared what I could do to him. I had never felt less like a victim in twenty years of being alive. No, I felt like a nightmare. A dangerous, tantalizing nightmare.
โThe cave sits outside the town of Frog Eye, in the Peridot Provinces. I watched thirty of my men walk in there to recover the treasure. Not one made it back to Azurine.โ
โIโm getting very bored, Crawford.โ The raw dominance in Kaneโs voice nearly bowed me into submission. โHow do we get there?โ
โHow should I know? My men had the only map, and like I said, they all died.โ
Kane pushed himself off the scarred desk, stalking over to us as he rolled his sleeves, and drove his foot into Crawfordโs gut with enough force to send the man back into the wall. โWhere do we find a fucking map?โ
Crawford doubled over, retching onto the ground below us, putrid ale and stomach acid seeping into dark threads. Kane seethed at him, disgusted. โYouโll never know,โ he croaked. โThe Garnet dignitary I spoke of, the
one who told me what you are . . . Theyโre onto you. Unnatural abomination . . . Even when Iโm gone, they promised me a piece of the Fae girl would live on in my collection.โ Crawfordโs eyes pinned mine. Fury, fear, and . . . acceptance.
No, no, noโ
โThey promised me her heart.โ His grin, pinned on Kane, split his face in dripping red and pearly white.
I wasnโt breathing. My eyes shot to Kane. โWait, donโtโโ
But Kane snarled as he unleashed the power that had been so fiercely fighting to escape all evening, a thin rope of smoke ripping from his wrist and looping around Crawfordโs neck. He foughtโlimbs spasming in every direction, reaching for Kane, for me, gripping at the rug. But it was useless. Kane bared his teeth in feral pleasure as the wisp of pure, black night tightened and tightened and tightenedโ
Until Crawford slumped over, gray and cold, his coin leaking out of his pockets like a greedy pool of golden blood.
Palpable silence rippled through the room. I wanted to look elsewhere.
Anywhere but those vulgar, blood-filled, vacant eyes.
But Kaneโs expression was even worse. Crawford was vile, and surely deserved death. But it was Kane who looked . . . alive. More invigorated than he had in weeks. All because he had snuffed the life out of someone. Exiled them into nothingness.
Something that had destroyed me, shredded and shattered my soul so intensely that I was now a walking shell, Kane did effortlessly and without remorse.
And then, he grinned.
A wild, heartless smile that crept into his jaw and lips as his lighte receded up his forearms and back into his body.
I had run in here after a man like this? After all he had done to me? Out of some revolting need to make sure he wouldnโt be in danger?
โHow . . . how could you have done that?โ I wasnโt sure which of us I was talking to.
Kane sucked in a steady lungful of air. โSave your lecture. The mapโs in here. He kept looking around the room.โ
In a daze I swept the space. โMaybe the walls . . . theyโre covered inโโ
But Kane prowled over to that ornate, creaking desk. I watched, waiting for him to scavenge through the drawers, the papers crowding its face, the inkwell in its corner. Instead, he nudged it a few times. Tentative, studying
โlooking for something. He prodded it again and I realized he was hunting for the source of the wobble. The weak leg that couldnโt sustain the weight of the hefty wood. When he found it, he knelt and yanked the thing clean off, toppling the desk altogether with a loud crunch.
I jumped at the soundโthe papers floating across the floor, the ink that soaked into the carpet below.
Kane returned to me with the desk legโan intricately engraved wooden stakeโand held it out for me like a dog with a bone. His hand was shaking.
Before I could breathe a word, the door behind us flung open.
Trevyn rushed in, raising a silver machete that glinted in the candlelight. โLeave him alone!โ he sputtered, red in the face and sweating furiously.
โFuck,โ Kane swore, unsheathing his own sword.
But Trevyn froze, eyes not on Kane, but rather on Crawfordโs slumped body. He gasped, the machete now pointed out as if to keep us at bay rather than to attack, panic worming its way through his slender face and quaking limbs.
โTrevyn,โ I cautioned. โYou tell everyone Crawford choked to death on his dinner. All right? You found him like this. Live the rest of your life with that secret, and weโll spare you.โ
โWe wonโt be doing that,โ Kane said, more tired than anything.
Guilt slid through my chest. Even a seedily employed man like Trevyn had a life he cared to live. Hopes and dreams and possibly those whom he loved. Those who loved him. And I didnโt want to see Kane murder another man. Especially not one who had only tried to protect his patron.
โIf Trevyn swears to never tell a soul what he saw,โ I said to Kane with as much severity as I could muster, โthen we can.โ
โWhy should we?โ Kaneโs eyes were predatory on the crook. โBecause I said so.โ
I was placing a lot of faith in Crawfordโs big mouth. In the hope that he had told his underling what I was. What I was capable of.
โI swear it,โ Trevyn stammered. โWhatever you say.โ The machete clanged to the tattered rug.
I stalked even closer to him, my hair beginning to feel a bit like static. โI will know if youโre lying. I know everything.โ
โI believe you,โ he whispered.
โIf we find out you betrayed us, I will come to your home and drench all whom you love in blood. Youโll be cleaning them out from under your fingernails for weeks.โ
โI think you proved your point, oh powerful one,โ Kane said with irritation. โItโs time to leave.โ