Chapter 5 .

Freya

A smile  tugged at the corners of Seraphine’s mouth. “Say that to him. I would put money on his disagreeing with you. Do have some food now, please. You were out for a day and his lordship would flay me if he thought I was letting you wither.”

I let my gaze rest on the tray for some time. There were fresh apple slices, a wedge of cheese that was actually soft, none of the gray, overcooked fare one had to make do with or scavenge for. My stomach gave a traitorous growl. I knew it was a trap; when one has nothing, everything is. But I might as well go full in the stomach if I was to die.

So I ate. Put away enough to be thoroughly stuffed and took a sip of water before I let myself sink back into the fine pillows, surveying the room for any way out. The large arched window caught my eye, its thick glass set in dark iron and looking out over what must be a forested valley of some depth. Night had fallen; the moon I had made my escape under was up high and putting down a silver wash on the world outside.

I got up and went to it on quiet feet. No pain in the ankle, not after the serpent king’s antidote. From where the palace sat on the cliff, the view was vertiginous, a sheer drop of hundreds of feet to a river that roared in the dark. Not an option for leaving.

“Please, my lady, come back from the window. The ledge is no place to be, however secure the King’s chambers are.”

There was a cordiality to Seraphine’s tone but I detected the steel in it. I turned and offered her a thin smile. “My apologies. One does not see a cliff such as this every day.”

She regarded me with an appraising look. She was too sharp to be fooled by my desperation.

Then the air in the room changed, grew heavy with a static charge that sent a prickle over my skin and made my heart falter. I felt him before he was in view.

King Salazar Kaan entered. In the candlelight he was more striking than he had been in the pit, all tall, broad shoulders and lean muscle beneath a long coat of dark green. His black hair fell loose to his shoulders and those eyes of his, molten gold with their vertical pupils, were on me with an intensity that stole my breath.

Seraphine made a low bow and was gone in an instant, the door closing behind her.

It left us alone. Just the serpent king and I.

He came toward me without hurry, a predator’s gait, his steps making no sound on the marble. He halted at the bed’s foot, near enough for me to catch the heat of him, the heady mix of musk and amber.

“You are better,” he rumbled. “I was concerned to see otherwise.”

“I was saved,” I whispered. “You kissed me.”

The slow, dangerous curve of his lips returned. “I did. But you may not grasp what that means.”

He moved in, and I was rooted to the spot, held by his presence as firmly as iron could hold. “With our kind, a kiss given to preserve a life is the first part of a claiming ritual,” he murmured, his voice seductive and warm against my ear as he went behind me. “It binds your soul to mine. It marks you as mine, little one, and stirs the serpent in both of us.”

When he came to a stop in front of me once more I had to throw my head back to look at him. There was a hunger in his golden eyes, a kind of fire that left my knees unsteady.

“The instant our lips met I knew,” he said, the words coming out in a husky whisper. “You are no ordinary woman, Feyra. I have never felt anything like you. You are my fated mate.”

A dryness came to my throat as I shook my head. “Fate is not something I put stock in. I have already fled one cage; I will not be so foolish as to step into another.”

He was on me before I could register the movement. From a foot away to having my face in his hands and his mouth on mine in the space of a heartbeat. It was a kiss of such ferocity, so all consuming, that the rest of the world simply fell away. He was drowning and I was the air he needed to breathe; he kissed with the certainty of a man who has found the answer to every question. A need set my blood alight and stole the breath from my lungs, born of his demanding, possessive touch.

Any sense of self preservation told me to put him off or make for the door. Yet I did nothing of the sort. My fingers went to the front of his coat and I pulled at the fabric, drawing him in. A growl, low and guttural, vibrated in his chest as he deepened it, his hand tangling in my hair to claim my mouth entirely. For a while there was no time, only the press of his body and the taste of him – honey and moonlight and something more dangerous. And the awful, inescapable truth of my own surrender to him.

When he let me go, I was shaking, my heart hammering loud enough to drown out all else. His were swollen and he could barely contain himself as he looked down at me, a primal satisfaction in his wide pupils.

“Do not try to lie to me, little one,” he murmured, his thumb caressing my lower lip. “I can feel your desire. You are mine. I will make you my Queen.”

Queen. The word was preposterous. I was a scullery maid, a girl with no family or prospects, a runaway. And yet, held in his arms and breathing in his scent, it had a terrible reality to it.

“I don’t know,” I managed. “This is too much. I have only just got away from—”

“You have put an end to a life of servitude,” he interrupted, his tone leaving no room for argument. “Now comes a lifetime of power and devotion. I will provide you with wealth, with safety, with everything, Feyra. All I ask in return is your heart.” He brushed his lips to my forehead in a show of tenderness that made my chest ache. “I am patient, my love. You will come to accept your fate in time.”

Desire and fear warred within me. I had been a pawn all my life and now a crown was being put in my hands. But was a crown any different from a collar?

“I require some time to think on it,” I said quietly.

Salazar smiled, a slow, sensual thing. He let me go and I was suddenly cold without him. “Then take it. But do not mistake my patience for indifference. I will not be sharing you. I will move heaven and earth to have you.”

With that he turned toward the door, pausing at the threshold for a last look. “Seraphine will see you are properly attired for dinner at sunset. Rest and recover. Dream of me, Feyra. I shall be dreaming of you.”

He left me to it in the expanse of the room, my heart torn between the frightened girl I was and the woman who had just, for the first time, known what it was to have power.