38
Instead of a feast downstairs, trays of food are delivered to our chambers.
It’s almost as if the attendants saw us snooping and are encouraging us to stay in our quarters. I eat my dinner quickly, anticipation building in my bones. I marvel at my blade, the metal glistening.
“What secrets do you hold, Stellaris?” I say, running my finger down her metal. Her glimmer is like a wink.
The drawers are full of useful clothing, like pants and long-sleeved shirts better suited for the rest of the journey, which is good because I can barely breathe in this dress, especially after dinner.
“Fuck,” I say, after my third try at getting it off. Raker tied it unreasonably tight. I could ask an attendant for help, I guess.
I peek my head out into the hall, but it’s empty. Even if it wasn’t … they all seem terrified. I doubt anyone will help me. My gaze drifts to the door beside mine.
This is a bad idea. I know it is. Still, the lack of air in my lungs wins out against my better judgment.
My knock echoes through the hall. My hand is still raised when it swings
open, surprise forcing me still.
There he is. Hoodless.
Shirtless.
I swallow. I try very hard not to drop my gaze from his face.
He doesn’t try at all. Raker’s eyes slip down to my dress, and the way the top is hanging down from the few unraveled ties I was able to reach. He blinks slowly.
“I need help,” I explain hastily. I turn around and show him the back, looking at him from over my shoulder. “You tied it so tight I can barely breathe.”
With a sigh, he drags his massive hand down his face. That hand. Why am I admiring a hand? It’s like a work of art, though. Callused in all the right places. Strong. Perfect for wielding a sword. Perfect … for other tasks
… I need to fucking get it together.
He shakes his head. I am clearly the biggest inconvenience he has ever come across. But instead of telling me to find someone else to help, or somewhere else to be entirely, he opens his door the slightest bit. An invitation.
I slip inside before he can slam the door in my face.
“Your quarters are much smaller than mine,” I say, looking around.
“Are they,” he says, not sounding shocked by that fact at all.
Raker’s eyes drift across my neck, as if marking the absence of the diamond necklace currently on my bedside table. Something about his air
seems entirely too pleased.
I give my back to him.
For a moment, he doesn’t move at all. I wonder if I’ll just stand here like a fool, waiting. But just when I’m going to look over my shoulder to see what’s taking him so long, I feel his warm hands against my skin.
I go very still.
My entire awareness narrows to that one place. His moves are careful, like he’s trying to touch as little of me as possible, but when his callused fingers finally scrape against my spine, all my nerves ignite in a rush. I hold my breath. Then, I hear the first stitch come undone.
Air kisses my back as the bodice is opened slowly, slowly. His fingers are long, battle-hewn, but featherlight across my skin. I’m breathing again, and it sounds too loud. Too labored. The fabric is brushing against my all-too- sensitive chest. This room feels smaller than it did moments ago.
His rough knuckles gently graze my back as he works intently on one spot. “It’s caught,” he says harshly, as if to explain why it’s taking so long.
And I’ve never been so damned grateful for a caught thread.
Carefully, he tries to undo it, every time his skin scraping mine. I can hear his breathing now. It’s almost as loud as my own. He ducks to get a
better view, and I feel the heat of his exhale on the back of my neck. My skin prickles everywhere.
He growls in irritation, and in a quick, frustrated movement— Fabric tears. My lips part in a gasp. I look over my shoulder to see him glaring at the corset like it’s an enemy across a battlefield. He ripped it by accident. I wonder if it was his strength or his temper that did it.
“It’s ruined now,” I say lightly, knowing I have little use for this dress during the rest of our travels. “Might as well rip the rest.”
I didn’t mean for my words to be so heavy, or to come out so breathy, but slowly, Raker’s gaze slides up the bare expanse of my back, before crashing into mine.
And there’s something in that look—something half crazed. Something dangerous. Something wanting.
This is just another duel. Another test of wills—of testing limits. Of seeing who will bend first, who will concede, who will win. But neither of
us looks away. Neither backs down.
His hands grip the fabric.
Then, eyes never leaving mine, he tears the bodice right down the middle.
I suck in air. My hands fly up to catch the front, barely managing to cover my breasts.
That’s where Raker’s gaze goes, to the parts the fabric doesn’t conceal.
At the heat in his look, I let the fabric slip.
And his eyes go wholly black as he studies me hungrily, with a focus that leaves me breathless, until they finally meet mine—and they are blazing, brimming with emotions I can’t even name. Slowly, achingly slowly, his knuckles slide down every inch of my spine, lingering, scraping, and my skin is on fire. My nipples are straining beneath my fingers. The want within me has turned into a wildfire.
Then, just when that heat has reached the center of me, just when I wonder how far he will go and how far I will let him, his hand stops. His brow creases.
He drops my gaze to look down at my skin. My awareness flares to life once more as he goes deathly still.
He stops breathing. The air seems sucked out of this entire room.
My scars. He’s seen the twisted, mangled mess of them. I stare straight ahead, refusing to look at him.
His voice is hard as steel. “Who did this to you?”
So is mine. “You did.”
Those two words sit between us, and I feel the air shift. I feel his confusion and wrath. His voice is pure fury. “I did not.”
I whirl around to face him. “You might as well have.” Rage pounds through my blood as I tilt my head. “You don’t remember, do you?”
He says nothing. He’s just looking at me, and the tear that has slipped down my cheek, and he has the nerve to look outraged.
He might not remember, but I do. I remember so well, I can practically taste the bitterness of the moment on my tongue.
“That day, it was raining. I climbed the fence to train, to use the guards’ practice sets while they were inside. So that I would even … so that I would even have a chance.” A chance at the Questral. A chance at my revenge.
My hands are trembling with resentment, remembering.
I was about to jump off the wall, to test my landing, when a hand fisted the back of my shirt and pulled me back.
My breath nearly left me as I was shoved back into a wall. A sword was at my throat. That glittering, beautiful blade.
“You’re not supposed to be here,” a brutal voice said.
I looked up and through the rain I saw two gray eyes set in a battle helmet, staring down at me with nothing short of hatred.
I remember being struck by the depths of that hatred.
He didn’t know me at all. He didn’t know me enough to hate me.
“I—I’ll leave,” I said, my voice barely making any sound. I knew what happened to trespassers. They were imprisoned—or worse. Stellan couldn’t know what I was up to. If he suspected at all that I was training for the Questral, he would find a way to stop me.
His grip on my shoulder tightened, even as he sheathed his sword. He turned toward the training camp to alert his knights.
My hand jutted out in desperation and wrapped around his wrist. He jolted, as if truly shocked anyone would dare touch him.
“Please,” I said, willing to beg. “Please. Let me go. You’ll never see me again, I promise.”
His eyes locked onto mine for just a moment, and that hatred … it seemed to grow. I knew what he was about to do. I could feel it.
In one last attempt to stop him, I said. “Please. Have mercy.”
Mercy. That simple word seemed to seal my fate. His eyes hardened of any emotion at all. He dragged me to the other guards himself.
They hauled me away kicking and screaming, the tips of my boots cutting lines through the mud.
I was thrown in a cell for two days without food or water. Then, on the third day, after I refused to take off my shirt for punishment, knowing what they would find … they sliced me through my clothing, with rusted knives.
They pinned me down on my stomach as I screamed …. and carved me up like an animal. The only reason they didn’t see my markings is by the time they got through the fabric, they were covered by my blood.
All their names. Their names. They carved them there, on the lowest point of my spine, saying something about wanting to see them while they had me the next day.
The only reason the next day didn’t arrive was because Stellan did first.
He found me half dead, offered new weapons for the guards in exchange for my release, and carried me home in his arms. I made some excuse about having been caught stealing. He never asked about it again.
I’ve never forgotten the hatred in Harlan Raker’s eyes. The
mercilessness.
It’s the same hatred I see now.
I get the sense it isn’t directed toward me. I wonder if he recognizes the names. He was head of the king’s guard, even then, two years ago. They were his warriors. He backs away from me a step, expression shifting. “I—I didn’t know they would do that to you.”
No. I’m not letting him retreat. I’m not letting him not face this. I take a step forward. “Really? What did you think they would do?” Another step.
“You knew you were leading me to my death. You knew, and you refused to have mercy. You refused to let me go.”
I grit my teeth. My hands are shaking, so I curl them into fists.
I don’t allow my voice to tremble. I don’t allow any more tears to fall as I say, “So now you know. You know and you never won’t. I hate you just as much as you hate me. And if for any moment, any second, I forget”—I slide my fingers across the raised markings, the names—“I have all these scars to remind me.”
I don’t even look at him as I gather my dress to my chest and leave his room.
That night, lying in my bed in the shreds of my dress, my mind replays those memories long buried. The laughs echo through my mind. The men jeering as I screamed, like every letter carved into my skin was an accomplishment. They cheered as they branded me, claimed me. As they planned to claim me further. I remember when the pain became too much and I lost consciousness, face against the dirt my blood had turned to mud.
He’s the reason I was sent there in the first place. Even if he didn’t mean for it to happen, it did.
If by any miracle this does not kill me, I will find those men, I think. I never saw their faces … but I have their names.
Carved right into my skin.
Midnight arrives, and I shed the tatters of my dress, replacing them with simple black pants and a long-sleeved shirt from the wardrobe. Then I open my door carefully, bones bracing as it creaks. I wait. But Raker’s room is silent. Good.
I slip into the hallway. The castle is empty. With every step down the stairs, anticipation builds in my bones. What will I learn? What is this great sword that decided to save me?
I know it doesn’t matter. Stellaris will not be mine for long. But part of me wonders at what I was able to claim.
Part of me wants to know that during this brief and brutal time in this world, maybe I have been more than my all-encompassing rage.
The iron door swings open at my approach, as if the blacksmith was listening for my steps. He looks behind me. “Are you alone?”
I nod.
He opens the door a sliver. The moment I’m inside, it clicks closed
behind me.
And I see that he is not.
Traitorous asshole.
The forge is full of knights, wearing the crest of House Rodin. In the center of them stands their lord.
He smiles good-naturedly, as if we’re meeting in the middle of a ballroom.
“I thought you were at Heartfall,” I say smoothly, not willing to let him see anything but calm and confidence, though inside panic surges through me.
“And miss this? Never.”
My eyes roam across the warriors. “Miss what?” I ask, my tone casual, my heart hammering.
His smile only grows. He looks at me like I’m a caged animal that hasn’t realized it will never see the sun again. “Did you really think I would betray the gods for you? When they’ve been so good to me?” He shakes his head.
“Oh, no. I’ve already alerted my patron god. He’s on his way. I’ll be looking forward to being rewarded.”
My jaw locks. Vander was wrong. It seems House Rodin hasn’t abandoned its god after all.
The blood drains from my face, and with it, any desire to pretend. “The God of Death … is coming here?”
“For you,” he says. “He seems quite interested in you … perhaps more than the other gods.” He smiles. “I’m sure he’ll make great use of you.”
Use. I don’t plan to be used by anyone.
The blacksmith bows before his lord and—with a regretful look at me— exits the room. He leaves the door behind me open. The snake. The Great Betrayer. He’s certainly fucking earned that name. Why did I think he would help me? Why did I trust him at all?
A shred of empathy breaks through the fury, though. He’s protecting his son. Stellan would have done the same for me.
And maybe he’s allowed me a chance at an exit.
I stare at the open door with a flint of hope. I could make a run for it … but they’ll just follow.
No, I won’t run. And I won’t sit around and wait for the God of Death to arrive.
This is what I’ve been training for. Why I’ve been strengthening my muscles and working on my form and practicing with Raker. I unsheathe my sword in a flash of sparkling silver. Lord Rodin’s eyes glimmer with greed as he studies it.
“An unmatched blade. Perhaps he’ll let me keep it.”
I don’t even waste my breath on a response as I swing my metal at his head, using another position I’ve practiced countless times before.
He doesn’t move. He doesn’t reach with immortal speed toward his own weapon. He just … smiles.
And my steel stops just short of his neck.
What? It froze, without my order. I lurch forward, arms straining, hands gripping the hilt, trying to move, groaning with the effort— But my blade doesn’t give an inch.
Lord Rodin’s laugh echoes through the forge. His voice is dripping in superiority. “You took an oath on your sword, stupid human. You can’t kill me.” He turns to motion toward his knights. “You can’t hurt any of my men.
Not while you’re a guest.”
It doesn’t seem like that safety measure extends in the opposite direction.
Those knights inch forward, blades drawn. Lord Rodin’s own freshly sharpened sword glimmers beside him.
My arms tremble, trying to break free from the oath’s iron hold. But they can’t.
And that’s when I realize how fucked I am. I’m deep below an ancient Great House on Starside. I’m standing in front of an heir, surrounded by a dozen immortal warriors, each outfitted with massive swords that I can’t even attempt to deflect. The God of Death is on his way here, to collect my head himself.
There’s nowhere to run. No escape. No getting out of this.
The immortal warriors have me cornered. I’m surrounded.
And I might as well be weaponless.
“Your sword is useless here,” the immortal lord confirms, eyes lit with nothing short of smug delight as a dozen blades close in around me. Then— “Mine isn’t.”
That voice, dark and unyielding as this castle’s obsidian walls, comes from right behind me. The immortal’s eyes widen. His army turns with their
immortal speed toward a new target.
They’re too late.
As if time has slowed to a crawl, I watch as Raker hurls his glorious sword into the air.
And that blade spins, starting at the first guard that has me surrounded, then cutting off immortal head after immortal head, body after body dropping at my feet. One after the other, in rapid succession, they fall. They
all fall.
He kills every single one of them.
I turn in a circle, eyes wide, watching as a dozen immortal warriors are cut down in seconds, until I face Raker himself.
His eyes are sharpened steel. His body is taut with rage. Gaze locked on mine, his arm juts out—and his sword slams back into his palm with a force
I feel in my bones.
I swallow.
“Nice trick,” I say, breathless.
He gives me a look that says, Idiot.
I give him one that says, I fucking know it.
Then, eyes still on mine, he throws his sword right at my neck.
No. Not my neck. His blade misses the side of my throat by less than a quarter of an inch, striking right behind me, where Lord Rodin is standing, his blade nearly to my pulse.
Raker takes a step forward. Another. I feel the whisper of his sword as he retrieves it, quick as lightning. I hear the body collapse behind me.
Raker has just killed an heir. He’s just killed everyone in this room except for me, with half a thought. I look around at the bodies surrounding us in a
circle, their heads lying next to them.
Then I fall to my knees and retch.
Raker watches me. He waits. When I’m done, he offers his hand. I spit at his feet, still angry. He frowns.
But the next time he offers his hand, I take it.