Total pages in book: 169
Estimated words: 156210 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 781(@200wpm)___ 625(@250wpm)___ 521(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 156210 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 781(@200wpm)___ 625(@250wpm)___ 521(@300wpm)
I’m left standing on my own, and now I kind of miss being held. Even if it hurt where they dug into my back, at least I felt… secured.
“And that happens tomorrow? Our bond?” I whisper, unable to look into his eyes. My dating life consists of hookups. And now I’m supposed to get married?
Kyranis opens his mouth, but then his gaze slides down to my chest, and he sighs. “How about I tell you more as I clean those cuts? It would be a shame for such beautiful skin to scar.”
I glance at the few cuts at the front of my polo shirt with a sigh. Me? Beautiful? I’m a strong six in Maine, if you’re into goths. And yet my toes curl in my boots where he can’t see them, because Kyranis is most definitely next-level gorgeous and knows it. But I appreciate the flattery nevertheless.
“I’d like to know more, please.” I take a deep breath and wipe away any remaining tears as he leads me to the bathroom.
What I didn’t have the time to take in, is the sheer scale of this interior.
It’s bigger than my mom’s living room, with a massive stained glass window that fills the space with a blueish glow. The green carpet feels soft under my feet, and the tub is a massive spiral seashell tugged by a horse with the hindquarters of a fish. A merhorse? Just like the one in the prince’s crest. Polished to perfection, the pale figure is frozen mid-stride, with its mouth wide.
“I have just the thing for those wounds,” Kyranis tells me, approaching a black cabinet on dainty legs.
I wonder if I should be taking any drugs from him, but I’ve already eaten his food. It’s not like he wants to poison me.
I take the opportunity to have a better look at him from the back. The leather he’s wearing leaves little to the imagination, and I’m not complaining, because he’s simply exquisite. Evil, yes, but that doesn’t make his wide shoulders any less enticing.
But do I want to marry him? That’s a step too far.
My polo shirt is ripped to shreds at the back, and I’ll have to take it off if he’s to apply any cream or magical lotion, so I get it over with and drop the uniform to the floor. The years in boarding school taught me that being self-conscious about nakedness is pointless, but Kyranis is not just any guy.
He’s an elf, a prince, and the way he held my hand made it clear his intentions don’t include a platonic wedding.
“Is that what you used for my wrists, years ago?”
Kyranis stills, but then faces me with a small box covered in mother of pearl. “Among other things. Since you’re still here, I assume you changed your mind?”
I hug myself, self-conscious of my stiffening nipples. “We don’t need to talk about it,” I mumble. It’s a memory I buried so deep that until tonight I really made myself believe it never happened. “I’d rather know why I’m so important to you. Can’t you get any other human’s shadow?”
Kyranis shakes his head and settles in a black throne in the corner with the box still in hand. He snaps his fingers, and I stiffen when water starts flowing in the bathtub behind me. “No, it cannot be just any human. The shadows of those drowning in the River of Souls are the most potent, soaked with dread or misery, so very close to death or dying already. It’s a dangerous feat to pull a human out of there. Many of those who try end up dying.”
I scoot to unlace my boots, but then realize I’m pretty much kneeling in front of his throne. Oh well, it’s too late to take that back now, so I glance up as if all of this is perfectly normal.
“But what am I for? Why do you need my shadow in the first place?”
“It becomes mine. It’s... like a resource I can use for shadowcraft, and it never runs out, for as long as you live. Shadows of humans like you are stronger than ours, because you are the children of the sun yet stood at the precipice of eternal darkness. When you are mine, I will be able to dip my ancestral sword in your shadow to give it sharpness no beast can withstand.”
Why does it sound so dirty when he talks about dipping his sword in me?
Kyran continues, watching me as if he wants to flay me with his gaze alone. “When you drowned in the River because of your… condition, your shadow was untethered. That’s when I was able to bargain with you for it. Most humans don’t resist the bond when they are presented with the choice between life and death. It’s getting you out of there that is the feat.”