On my knees, I stared up at Hawke, hearing his words and seeing what was happening, but it was like my brain couldn’t process any of it.
Or my brain was processing it and my heart…my heart was denying it.
We need her. Alive.
We.
“You’re no fun,” Jericho muttered. “Have I told you that before?”
“A time or a dozen,” Hawke answered, and I flinched. My entire body recoiled. His jaw tightened, and he looked away, scanning the barn. “This mess needs to be cleaned up.”
Beside him, the wolven shook itself, a lot like a dog after coming in from the rain. And then it rose on its hind legs and shifted, fur curling inward to reveal skin that was thickening. Legs straightened, and fingers returned to their normal sizes. The jaw snapped back into place. Shirt lost somewhere, Kieran stood in torn breeches, the wound in his stomach from Phillips’ sword nothing more than a pink mark.
I sat back.
Kieran twisted his neck from left to right, cracking it. “This isn’t the only mess that needs to be cleaned up.”
A muscle flexed in Hawke’s jaw as he looked at me. “You and I need to talk.”
“Talk?” A laugh escaped me, and it sounded all wrong.
“I’m sure you have a lot of questions,” he replied, and I heard a shade of the teasing tone I was familiar with.
It caused me to flinch again. “Where…where are the other two guards?”
“Dead,” he answered without an ounce of hesitation as he rested the bow on his shoulder. “It was an unfortunate necessity.”
“I’m good at what I do.”
“And what is that?” “Killing.”
I knew without a doubt that when he’d left the room, that was what he’d done. There was a buzzing in my ears as I became aware of others gathering behind him in the yard, their bodies still in the filtered morning sun.
He took a step toward me. “Let’s—”
“No.” I popped to my feet, surprisingly steady. “Tell me what’s going on here.”
Hawke stopped. When he spoke, his voice had softened just a fraction. “You know what’s going on here.”
The next breath I took scorched my throat and lungs because I realized that I did. Oh, gods, I did know what was going on here. The buzzing increased as I saw Elijah standing outside, arms folded across his barrel chest. I saw Magda, one hand protectively cradling her baby bump as she stared into the barn, her face pinched with…with sympathy and pity.
You deserve so much more than what awaits you.
That’s what he’d said to me last night. And me, stupid, naive me, thought he’d meant my Ascension. No. He’d meant this.
Magda turned, brushing past Elijah as she walked back to the keep. “Phillips was right,” I said, my voice trembling as I said it, as I gave
life to what I already knew.
“He was?” questioned Hawke, handing the strange bow to one of the men who’d appeared behind him.
“I do believe Phillips had begun to figure things out,” Kieran answered as he stared down at his stomach. The faint pink marks were already gone. “They were coming out of the room when I went up to check on her. She didn’t seem to believe whatever it was he’d told her, though.”
I hadn’t.
I hadn’t believed Phillips at all because I believed Hawke. I trusted him—trusted him with my life, and with…
There was a sudden pain in my chest that felt as if someone had shoved a dagger through me. I looked down because it felt too real, but there was no blade, no bloody wound that equaled the agony radiating through me. When I looked up, a muscle flexed in Hawke’s jaw.
“Well, he’s not going to be figuring anything out again.” Jericho gripped the bolt, tearing it free. Phillips slumped over. Jericho nudged the
guard’s body with his boot. “That’s for sure.”
I turned back to Hawke, feeling as if the ground were splitting and shifting beneath me.
“You’re a Descenter.”
“A Descenter?” Elijah laughed deeply, causing me to jerk. Kieran smiled.
“And here I said you were smart,” Jericho said.
I ignored them. “You’re working against the Ascended.” Hawke nodded.
Another fissure formed in my chest. “You…you knew this…this thing that killed Rylan?”
“Thing?” chuffed Jericho. “I’m insulted.” Hawke said nothing.
“That sounds like your problem, not mine.” I fully faced Hawke. “I thought the wolven were extinct.”
Hawke gave a casual shrug. “There are many things that you thought to be true that are not. However, while the wolven aren’t extinct, there aren’t many left.”
“Did you know he killed Rylan?” I shouted.
“I thought I could speed this up and grab you, but we know how that turned out,” Jericho chimed in.
My head snapped in Jericho’s direction. “Yes, I clearly remember how that turned out for you.”
His upper lip curled as a snarl of warning sent a wave of goosebumps through me.
“I knew he was going to create an opening,” Hawke answered, drawing my gaze back to him.
“For you…to become my personal Royal Guard?” “I needed to get close to you.”
I sucked in a shuddering breath as my heart seemed to split open. “Well, you succeeded at that, didn’t you?”
That muscle in his jaw flexed again. “What you’re thinking…you could not be further from the truth.”
“You have no idea what I’m thinking,” I shot back, my hand tightening painfully around the dagger. “And all of this was…what? A trick? You were sent here to get close to me?”
Kieran’s brows lifted. “Sent—”
Hawke quieted him with a look, and Kieran rolled his eyes.
I knew what he was going to say. “You were sent by the Dark One.”
“I came to Masadonia with one goal in mind,” Hawke answered. “And that was you.”
I shuddered. “How? Why?”
“You’d be surprised how many of those close to you support Atlantia, who want to see the kingdom restored. Many who paved the way for me.”
“Commander Jansen?” I suspected.
“She is smart,” Hawke said. “Like I told you all.”
The backs of my eyes burned, along with my throat and chest. “Did you even work in the capital?” Then something hit me as my gaze darted to Kieran. “The night at the…” I couldn’t bring myself to say “the Red Pearl.”
“You knew who I was from the beginning.”
“I was watching you as long as you were watching me,” he said softly. “Even longer.”
That blow nearly killed me. It was like my chest had shattered. I started to turn away, but I saw Jericho, who’d created a space for Hawke to gain more personal, intimate access to me.
It clicked into place with a tremor that almost caused me to drop my dagger. “You…you were planning this for a while.”
“For a very long time.”
“Hannes.” My voice was thick, hoarse. “He didn’t die of a heart ailment, did he?”
“I do believe his heart did give out on him,” Hawke answered. “The poison he drank in his ale that night at the Red Pearl surely had something to do with it.”
The buzzing was almost too much. “Did a certain woman there help him with his drink? The same one that sent me upstairs?”
Hawke didn’t answer. Delano, on the other hand, said, “I feel like I’m missing vital pieces here.”
“I’ll fill you in later,” Kieran commented.
I was shaking. I could feel it. Just like I could feel the walls of the barn closing in on me. I was so incredibly naive. “Vikter?”
Hawke shook his head.
“Don’t lie to me!” I screamed. “Did you know there’d be an attack on the Rite? Is that why you disappeared? Why you weren’t there when Vikter was killed?”
The hollows of his cheeks became sharper. “What I know is that you’re upset. I don’t blame you, but I’ve also seen what happens when you get really angry,” he said, taking a step toward me, lifting his hands. “There is a lot I need to tell—”
The pain erupted out of me like it had the night of the Rite when I turned on Lord Mazeen. I had no control over myself. I moved out of instinct, cocking back my arm and throwing the dagger.
This time, I aimed for his chest.
Hawke let out a curse as he stepped to the side, snatching the dagger out of the air. Someone behind him let out a low whistle as Hawke whirled on me, the look of disbelief on his face almost comical. But in the back of my mind, I’d known he would catch it. All I’d needed was a distraction so I could dip down and pick up Phillips’ fallen sword. I swung out, aiming for the bastard who’d killed Rylan. Jericho jumped back, but he wasn’t entirely fast enough. I cut him again, across the stomach this time.
“Bitch,” Jericho cried out, clamping his remaining hand down on the gushing wound.
I spun just as someone crashed into me from one side and then the other. My arm was twisted around. Something hot sliced across my stomach as I reared back, using my attacker’s weight against them. They fell, arms still around me. I snapped my head, cracking my skull into their face. There was a yelp, and the hold loosened enough for me to tear free. I grabbed the sword from the straw and thrust it out blindly. I only saw a flicker of shock in the brown eyes of a male not too much older than me as he looked down. I yanked the sword free and spun, coming face to face with Hawke.
I hesitated.
Like a complete idiot, I hesitated, even though I knew he was working for the Dark One. He was a Descenter. Because of him, so very many innocent people were dead. Hannes. Rylan. Loren. Dafina. Malessa—gods, had he killed her?
Vikter.
“That was very naughty,” Hawke chided, snatching the sword out of my hand as if I hadn’t been holding onto it. “You are so incredibly violent.” He dipped his chin and whispered, “It still turns me on.”
A scream of fury tore out of me as I jabbed my elbow out and up, snapping Hawke’s head back. “Dammit,” he said, coughing—no, laughing. He was laughing. “Didn’t change what I just said.”
I spun and started for the doors but skidded to a stop as Elijah appeared in front of me, having moved in a blink of an eye. He shook his head no, tsking softly under his breath.
Turning, I saw Kieran, who looked bored, and I whirled, seeing an opening between the poles. I took off—
Arms caught me around the waist, and I’d recognize the scent anywhere. Pine. Dark spice. Hawke. And the hard, earthen floor raced up toward my face. This was going to hurt. Bad.
The impact never came.
As agile as a cat, Hawke twisted so he took the brunt of the fall, but the landing still stunned me. For a moment, I couldn’t move.
“You’re welcome,” grunted Hawke.
Shrieking, I slammed the heel of my booted foot into his shin. His gasp of pain brought a savage smile to my face as I rolled, twisting until my stomach screamed in protest, but I was able to turn in his loosened hold. I straddled him—
Hawke grinned up at me, the dimple in his right cheek appearing. “I’m liking where this is headed.”
I punched him in the face, right in the godsdamn dimple. Pain lanced across my knuckles, but I drew my arm back.
Hawke caught my wrist and yanked me down until my body was almost flush with his. “You hit like you’re angry with me.”
I shifted, jamming my knee down between his legs and aiming for a very sensitive area. He anticipated the move, and my knee hit him in the thigh.
“That would’ve done some damage,” he told me. “Good,” I growled.
“Now, now. You’d be disappointed later if I couldn’t use it.”
For a moment, I couldn’t believe he’d actually said that, but he had. He totally had. “I would rather cut it from your body.”
“Liar,” he whispered.
The sound that came from inside me would’ve scared me if it had come from anyone else. I jumped up, breaking his hold. I went to bring my foot down on his throat, but Hawke caught it and pulled. I went down, landing on my side. Pain flared, but I ignored it as I slammed my fist into his side.
“Damn,” Kieran drew the word out.
“Should we intervene?” Delano asked, sounding concerned.
“No,” Elijah answered with a chuckle. “This is the best thing I’ve seen in a while. Who would’ve thought the Maiden could throw down?”
“This is why you don’t mix business with pleasure,” Kieran commented.
“Is that the case?” Elijah whistled. “My money is on her then.” “Traitors,” gasped Hawke, rolling me until he was on top. I went for
his face, but he caught my wrists. “Stop it.”
I tried to lift my hips, and when that didn’t work, I pushed my upper body up. It took everything in me, and he simply pinned my wrists to the straw.
“Get off me!”
“Stop it,” he repeated. “Poppy. Stop—”
“I hate you!” I screamed at the sound of my name, ripping one hand free in my rage. I slammed my fist into his face. “I hate you!”
Hawke caught my hand, jerking it back to the ground as his bloodied lips peeled back. “Stop it!”
I stopped.
I went completely still as I stared up at him, the shock robbing me of my ability to speak for several moments. I saw him—saw him for what he really was.
He wasn’t just any Descenter following the Dark One. “That’s why you never really smiled,” I whispered.
Because, how could he?
He had to hide the sharp, sharp teeth. Two of them.
Fangs.
I remembered the feel of them against my lips, my neck—recalling how oddly sharp they’d felt.
Gods.
Now I understood how he could move so fast, why he seemed to have better hearing and eyesight than anyone I’d ever met, and why he sometimes sounded as if he’d lived decades longer than I had. It was why he was quick to break a kiss whenever I came close to feeling his canines.
I’d been so blind. He wasn’t mortal. He wasn’t a wolven.
Hawke was an Atlantian.
I shuddered as something deep inside me withered. “You’re a monster.”
Hawke’s eyes flared an intense gold, and they weren’t normal. They’d never been natural. “You finally see me for what I am.”
I did.
He was a thing of nightmares hidden in the guise of a dream, and I had fallen for it. I fell so hard.
The fight went out of me.
Him being a Descenter was bad enough, but an Atlantian? His people created the creatures who’d taken my mother and father from me, who’d almost killed me.
Hawke seemed to sense it because he moved swiftly, hauling me to my feet. “Delano,” he called. “Take her.”
I was handed over like a bag of potatoes, and Delano kept my arms clamped to my sides.
“Where should I put her?” Delano asked.
Hawke’s chest rose sharply. “Somewhere where she can’t escape and can’t hurt herself.” He paused. “Or hurt anyone else, which is more likely than the former.”
“Are we holding her prisoner?” someone demanded. “We’re keeping her alive? Will we feed and shelter that.”
That.
As if I were the monster, the one who supported the Dark One and could create Craven. These people were beyond help.
“She’s the Maiden,” another yelled. “She needs to die!”
A round of agreement sounded, and someone else said, “Send her back to their counterfeit Queen and King. Just her head so they know what is coming for them.”
“From blood and ash!” shouted a young boy as he pushed to the front of the group. It was the kid from the day before, the one who had run from house to house.
My legs weakened.
Several voices answered, “We will rise!”
“No one touches her.” Hawke scanned the group in the yard, silencing them. “No one,” he repeated as he turned back. “No one but me.”
 |
The moment I saw the dank and gloomy cells under the keep, and the twisted, white mass of bones that covered the entire length of the ceiling, the fight in me came back. There was no way I would just allow myself to be placed somewhere it appeared people never left. Not even when they died.
Delano hadn’t been prepared.
I broke his hold and made it to the end of the hall only to realize the sole exit was the entrance. I squared off with him but was cornered, and with backup in the form of another who had eyes that were almost as gold as Hawke’s, I was dragged into the cell that had a thin mattress on the floor and then shackled, the cold iron snapping over my wrists.
And then I was alone.
I turned around, seeing no way out. The gaps in the bars were too narrow, and when I pulled on the chains, the hook they were connected to didn’t budge.
Panic bubbled up as I took a step back. How had this happened? How did I go from anticipating a future that would be all mine, where I controlled what I did and what happened to me, to this? To being chained in a cell, surrounded by people who wanted to chop me into pieces?
I knew the answer. Hawke.
The slice of agony cutting through my chest overshadowed the pain in my stomach. My throat and eyes burned. Hawke…he wasn’t even mortal. He was an Atlantian, His people had created the Cravens that had become an unstoppable plague upon this land, the very same creatures who’d murdered my parents and almost killed me. He supported the Dark One, who had killed the last Maiden and was after me. Hawke and the wolven were the embodiment of anything the gods had turned against and the humans had rose up against. They were why the Ascended had been Blessed by the gods.
How had I not seen him for what he was? Could I be that foolish? Or was he simply that clever?
Or a mixture of both?
Because Hawke had been good. He’d said and done all the right things, and I’d been so desperate to make a real connection with someone, to experience life and feel alive. So desperate that anything that may have served as a warning wasn’t even acknowledged. He’d come to Masadonia with one order: gain access to me. He had done that and more. Gained my friendship, my trust, my…
A pulsing, pounding anger and sorrow swept through me. I wanted to scream, but the sound couldn’t make it past the knot of emotion in my throat.
Why did he have to…do what he had? Everything he’d said and done was nothing more than clever artifice. When he told me that I was brave and strong. When he said I was beautiful. His seemingly single-minded focus hadn’t been based on duty but on orders. And I’d believed it. I’d fallen for it.
Was anything true? His pain was.
That much I knew, but the source of it? I could no longer be sure.
Lifting trembling hands to my face, I tucked back the hair that had escaped my braid. Why did he have to go so far, though? Why did he have to get under my skin and into my heart? I didn’t just trust him. I’d given myself to him. All of me.
And it had been a lie.
He’d known from the beginning who I was, from the very first night in the Red Pearl, and I’d unknowingly exposed so much about myself to him.
Moving to the corner of the cell, I sat on the mattress and slowly leaned against the wall, breathing out a slow, measured breath as a fiery ache sliced over my stomach. I glanced down at my right hand. The knuckles were bruised and swollen from the punch I’d delivered. My smile was quick to fade. I doubted Hawke showed any sign of injury. He was an Atlantian.
My stomach tumbled.
A part of me couldn’t believe it. He seemed so…mortal, but why should that surprise me? Atlantians could pass for mortals, just as the wolven could. I’d kissed an Atlantian.
I’d slept with an Atlantian.
I squeezed my eyes shut as bile climbed up my throat. I couldn’t think about that. It made screams echo in my mind. I needed to focus.
What was I going to do?
This whole town was full of Descenters and Atlantians who wanted me dead, and I couldn’t be more grateful that Tawny had remained behind. Obviously, I was being held until the Dark One either arrived or sent orders. The Dark One had killed the last Maiden, and here I was, captured and ready for him. I needed to get out of here, but there was no way out.
I looked up, shuddering. The ropey, twining bones reminded me of the roots in the Blood Forest. They climbed and overlapped one another, ribcages and femurs, spines and skulls. Anyone held here had this to look at, most likely a reminder of what had happened to the prisoners housed here. Who would create such a thing? Who kept their grasp on sanity staring at that?
I didn’t know how much time had passed before the door opened, and footsteps approached. It had to be hours based on how empty my stomach felt. I tensed, only relaxing minutely when I saw that it was Delano.
He stepped up to the bars, holding out a small pouch. “Hungry?” Yes. I was, but I didn’t answer.
Tossing the sack in, it landed by my feet with a soft thunk. I stared at
it.
“It’s some cheese and bread,” Delano explained. “I would’ve brought
you some stew, but I feared you would’ve thrown it in my face, and the stew is too good to waste.”
I looked over at him.
“There’s nothing wrong with it. It’s not poisoned or anything.” “Why would I trust anything you say?”
“He said no one touches you.” He leaned against the bars. “No leap of logic to assume that would also include harming you.”
My lip curled. “Why wait? The Dark One is going to kill me eventually.”
Those pale eyes met mine. “If the Prince wanted you dead, you’d already be dead. You should eat.”
The Prince. Just because the Descenters believed Casteel was the rightful heir, didn’t make it true.
My gaze fell to the sack. I was hungry, and I needed my strength…and possibly a Healer because while the wound had stopped bleeding, it would probably get infected down here.
I moved gingerly, picking up the sack. “Are you going to stand there and watch me eat?”
“Wouldn’t want you to choke.”
I had the strangest urge to laugh, but I opened the pouch and ate the cheese and bread. The food settled in my empty stomach like clumps of stone.
Delano didn’t speak after that. Neither did I, and I returned to leaning against the wall. Some time later, the door opened once more, and I looked out even though I didn’t want to. I saw the tall, too-recognizable form garbed in black, looking so much like the…like the guard who’d teased me over Miss Willa Colyns’ diary. My heart squeezed as if it were captured in a fist.
Hawke stopped in front of the barred door, his striking face both familiar and that of a stranger.
“Leave,” Hawke commanded, and Delano hesitated for only a moment before he issued a curt nod and was gone. Then there was just us, separated by bars.
“Poppy,” Hawke sighed, and I shuddered. “What am I to do with you?”
