She strained her hands toward him, toward where he’d gone still between her legs. She needed him—now. In her hand or her body, she didn’t care.
But Vincent only pulled away. Pulled up, and knelt before her. Surveyed her spread beneath him, her nightgown a bunch of silk around her middle, everything else bared to him. His own feast to devour.“I owe you a debt,” he said in that guttural voice that made her writhe. He watched her hips undulate, and braced his large, powerful hands on either thigh. He waited for her to signal that she understood what he intended. What she’d dreamed of for so long, in the darkest hours of the night.In a choked whisper, she said, “Yes.”Vincent gave her a feral, purely male smile. And then his hands tightened on her bare thighs, spreading them wider. His head lowered, and all she could see was his dark hair, gilded by the lamps, and his exquisite wings, rising above them both.He didn’t waste time with gentle touches and taSome small, quiet part of his brain whispered otherwise. He ignored it.Had ignored it for a long time now.“Morning, Az,” Vincent said cheerfully. He nodded to Nesta. “Nes. How’d you sleep?”Her eyes flashed with the anger that was like kindling to his own, but then she smiled coolly. “Like a babe.”It was to be a game, then. Which one of them could pretend that nothing had happened the longest. Which one of them might seem the least affected.Vincent threw her a grin that declared he was in. And he’d make her crawl before the end.Nesta merely began to unlace her boots.He jerked his chin toward Azriel. “Why are you up here?”“I thought I’d do some training myself before heading out for the day,” Az said, his shadows lingering in the archway, as if fearful of the bright sunlight in the ring. “I’m not interrupting anything, am I?”Vincent could have sworn Nesta’s fingers stalled on the laces of her boots. He drawled,
Vincent soared over the trees, riding and shaping the winds to push him onward, faster, their roar negligible to the bellowing in his head. He took in the passing world out of instinct rather than interest, his eyes turned inward —toward that slab of ruined flesh glistening in the candlelight. The gods knew he’d seen plenty of harrowing injuries. He’d bestowed plenty of them on his enemies and friends alike. In the grand sense of things, her back wasn’t even close to some of those wounds. Yet when he’d seen it, his heart had clean stopped—and for a moment, there had been an overwhelming silence in his mind. He felt his magic and his warrior’s instincts honing into a lethal combination the longer he stared—howling to rip apart the people who had done that with his bare hands. Then he’d just left, hardly making it out of the baths before he shifted and soared into the night. Maeve had lied. Or lied by omission. But she knew. She knew what the girl had gone through—knew she’d been a s
Vincent didn’t let her get out of bed that day. He brought trays of food, going so far as to make sure she consumed every last drop of beef stew, half a loaf of crusty bread, a bowl of the first spring berries, and a mug of ginger tea. He hardly needed to offer any encouragement to eat; she was starving. But if she didn’t know better, she’d say he was fussing.Emrys and Luca visited once to see if she was alive, took one look at Vincent ’s stone-cold face, heard the ripple of a growl, and took off, saying she was in more than competent hands and promising to come back when she was feeling better.“You know,” Jane said, propped in bed with her fourth mug of tea of the day, “I highly doubt anyone is going to attack me now, if they’ve already put up with my nonsense for this long.”Vincent , who was yet again poring over the map of the location of the bodies, didn’t even look up from his seat at his worktable. “This isn’t negotiable.”She might have laughed had her body not given a bur
The Beak Mob group was the last to fully assemble at the Ferian Gap.As a result, they got the smallest and farthest rooms in the warren of halls carved into the Omega, the last of the Ruhnn Mountains and the northernmost of the sister-peaks flanking the snow-blasted pass.Across the gap was the Northern Fang, the final peak of the White Fangs, which was currently occupied by the king’s men—massive brutes who still didn’t know quite what to make of the Black girls who had stalked in from every direction.They’d been here for a day and Aries had yet to glimpse any sign of the Squadron s the king had promised. She’d heard them, even though they were housed across the pass in the Northern Fang. No matter how deep you got into the Omega’s stone halls, the shrieks and roars vibrated in the stone, the air pulsed with the boom of leathery wings, and the floors hissed with the scrape of talon on rock.It had been five hundred years since all three Mob group s had assembled. There had been
Nonsense. Especially when Swords had been gone these past ten years. But Aries had heard rumors of the Customs the s did in their forests and caves, Customs in which pain was the gateway to Swords , to opening their senses. Oracles, mystics, zealots.Aries stalked through the ranks of the assembled Beak coven leaders. They were the most numerous—twenty coven leaders, over which Aries ruled with her Thirteen. Each leader touched two fingers to her brow in deference. She ignored them and took up a spot at the front of the crowd, where her grandmother gave her an acknowledging glance.An honor, for any High Witch to acknowledge an individual. Aries bowed her head, pressing two fingers to her brow. Obedience, discipline, and brutality were the most beloved words in the Beak Mob group . All else was to be extinguished without second thought.She still had her chin high, hands behind her back, when she spotted the other two heirs watching her.The heir, Petrah, stood closest to
Jane didn’t realize how exhausted she was until all sounds—Levis ’s soft singing from the table, the thud of dough as he kneaded it, the chopping of Luis ’s knife and his ceaseless chatter about everything and anything— stopped. And she knew what she’d find when she turned toward the stairwell. Her hands were pruny, fingers aching, back and neck throbbing, but … Vincent was leaning against the archway of the stairwell, arms crossed and violence beckoning in his lifeless eyes. “Let’s go.”Though his features remained cold, she had the distinct impression that he was somewhat annoyed at her for not sulking in a corner, bemoaning the state of her nails. As she left, Luis drew a finger across his neck as he mouthed good luck.Vincent led her through a small courtyard, where sentries tried to pretend they weren’t watching their every move, and out into the forest. The ward-Swords woven between the ring of megaliths again nipped at her skin as they passed, and nausea washed through her
Each step toward the central mound had Jane ’s blood roaring. The darkness between the stained, ancient stones grew, swirling. It was colder, too. Cold and dry. She wouldn’t stop, not with Vincent still watching, not when she had so much to do. She didn’t dare look too long toward the open doorway and the thing lurking beyond. A lingering shred of pride—stupid, mortal pride— kept her from bolting through the rest of the field. Running, she remembered, only attracted some predators. So she kept her steps slow and called on every bit of training she’d had, even as the wight slunk closer to the threshold, no more than a ripple of ravenous hunger encased in rags. Yet the wight remained within its mound, even as she came near enough to drag into the barrow, as if it were … hesitating. She was just passing the barrow when a pulsing, stale bit of air pushed against her ears. Maybe running was a good idea. If Swords was the only weapon against wights, then her hands would be useless. Still
Mackenzie wasn’t at all surprised that his father was twenty minutes late to their meeting. Nor was he surprised when his father strode into Mackenzie ’s office, slid into the chair opposite his desk, and offered no explanation for his tardiness. With calculated cool and distaste, he surveyed the office: no windows, a worn rug, an open trunk of discarded weapons that Mackenzie had never found the time to polish or send for repairs. At least it was organized. The few papers on his desk were stacked; his glass pens were in their proper holders; his suit of armor, which he rarely had occasion to wear, gleamed from its dummy in the corner. His father said at last, “This is what our illustrious king gives the Captain of his Guard?” Mackenzie shrugged, and his father studied the heavy oak desk. A desk he’d inherited from his predecessor, and one on which he and Jane had— He shut down the memory before it could boil his blood, and instead smiled at his father. “There was a larger office