Page 26 of The Blood of Gods and Monsters

“Our little liar isn’t so cowardly as to run from the Gods, not when she’s trod upon their territory, right under their noses for so long.” Kalix’s words aren’t a compliment, but a challenge. He tips his head back, continuing to stare at me down the bridge of his long aristocratic nose. “Is she?”

I grit my teeth and take the first step down the stairs. Ruen and Theos’ heads whip towards me as I scowl at Kalix. “No, she isn’t,” I snap.

Damn him.

I descend the length of the staircase with my skirts swishing around my thighs, calves, and ankles. When Theos reaches out to offer his hand, I shake my head and bypass both him and Ruen until I’m standing before Kalix. His lips twitch. My heart pounds an irregular beat in my breast. I glare at him. He doesn’t look perturbed. In fact, whatever he sees on my face has him bending, his fingers come up and capture my hand as he lifts it. Up and up some more until his mouth presses a close-mouthed kiss to my cold knuckles.

“The Gods are waiting,” he murmurs, his lips still pressed to my skin. “What will you do now? Face them? Run? Make them pay?”

I scoff and yank my fingers away from his. “Must you always suggest killing and violence?” I demand, unwilling to look deeper into the way his mouth on me reminds me of other parts of him. Parts that hadn’t just been on me, but in me as well. Beneath my dress, my stomach muscles contract.

“There are a thousand reasons to kill. I don’t need any of them. I just want to,” Kalix responds, his voice cold despite the fire burning in the depths of his eyes. “If any of them attempt to steal you from me—take you away from my brothers and me—then I will simply add another name to my list of kills.”

“You can’t—” I stop talking. I’d just been about to tell him that he couldn’t kill a God, but that’s not true. By the lies of Tryphone, Mortal Gods can kill Gods. By the supposed truths of Caedmon, it wouldn’t matter Kalix’s background or blood, he could still kill a God. Staring at him now, with his muscles tensed beneath his borrowed suit, I suspect he wants to.

His hand comes up and a lone finger strokes over my lower lip. I jolt at the sudden electrifying sensation that pours into me from that single touch. “I can do many things, little liar,” he says, completely ignoring the fact that we aren’t alone in this room. Either he’s forgetting or, I suspect, he simply doesn’t care that his brothers are also here. “And regardless of how I’ve held myself back for my brothers these last several years, if they try to take you from us, I will kill them. All of them.”

In that terrifying moment, I believe him. If the Gods try to take me from the Darkhavens, Kalix will keep his promise. He will kill them even if it means his own death.

Chapter 12

Kiera

It’s neither dawn nor dusk as the Darkhavens and I leave the North Tower, but perhaps somewhere in the late afternoon. I try to recall what day it’d been when we’d left the Academy to go to Madam Brione’s, counting backward from the three days Maeryn had told me it’d been. Still, I don’t know what day that makes today, but what I do know is that classes most certainly are not in session.

No one lingers in the corridors or the courtyards. I can’t exactly blame them since one look up to the skies is enough to assume that rain will soon fall and no one enjoys getting wet in a thunderstorm. But why not the inner corridors?

I glance up one way and down another as Ruen takes the lead, directing our group through the Academy hallways towards the Gods’ wing. The closer we get, the more sweat beads pop up along my spine.

Theos walks next to me, casting worried glances my way every few minutes. I offer him a small smile that I know doesn’t reach my eyes, but I can’t help it. It’s difficult to offer a genuine smile if you’re not sure what you’re walking towards—death or … acceptance.

The burning attention of Kalix’s eyes on the back of my head keeps my gaze mostly straight. I don’t bother to glance over my shoulder at him, sure that he’ll merely offer me another of his sardonic and threatening smiles. I swallow roughly, my throat bobbing with the action, when I see the painted windows and murals of the Gods’ corridors. I know the Gods of the Mortal Gods Academy of Riviere live and work in these places, but surely the God Council would have even better accommodations. Wouldn’t they?

My silent question is answered a moment later as Ruen leads us past the offices—including the door to Dolos’ office that I remember from my sentencing several weeks back—to a staircase. We ascend the stairs, one after another with Kalix, once more, bringing up the rear. When we reach the next floor, something slithers over the top of my foot and I bite down a scream, jolting to a halt as I grip my skirts and look down to spy the smallest snake I’ve ever seen slip over my foot and around my ankle.

The creature’s little black scaled head tips back gazing up at me briefly before it closes its eyes and settles against my skin as if it means to fall asleep like that, wrapped around my leg.

“Leave him,” Kalix orders at my back, finally forcing me to turn and look at him.

“He’s yours?” I clarify. Though I’ve never minded my own familiars crawling over my arms and legs—it had felt natural to let them do so—this creature is not mine. I cannot meld their mind with my own or reach out and sense their feelings.

Kalix nods in response. “Should the Gods wish to separate us and talk to you alone, I will be able to see and listen to everything.”

He likely won’t be able to see everything, I think with a grimace, not with the snake’s body and head covered by my skirts. Another thought occurs to me. Will he be able to see up my skirt with the snake’s presence? I whip my head around to glare at him and for a moment, I part my lips to tell him to take back his perverted familiar when a hand reaches out and latches on to my wrist, stopping me.

“Kiera.” Theos’ choked voice has me turning back to face whatever it is he’s trying to capture my attention for. When I do see it, my whole body goes cold.

Caedmon stands outside a set of crimson double doors with similar carvings to the painted scenes on the first level of the building etched into the wood. His hands are clasped behind his back, but his face is tight with concern and tension. One of the beads of sweat on my spine pops and sends the liquid sliding down my back.

“Thank you for coming,” Caedmon begins. The doors crack open and the sound of voices exits as a familiar face appears, quickly slipping free of the room and closing the door behind them.

Dauphine stands next to Caedmon, her face paler than usual. My gaze pans down to her dress. Gone is the plain gray of the Academy Terra attire and in its place is a more ornate gown of pale yellow muslin. A little detail decorates the front and bottom of the skirt and her puffy short sleeves make her shoulders look a bit more mannish than ever before. The only thing that does anything to accentuate her body is the thin ribbon tied around her torso just under her breasts. The color does nothing for her countenance, but the dress itself is pretty and far more expensive than I’d expect any human Terra to be able to afford.

“Th-they are ready, Your Divinity,” Dauphine says without looking in our direction.

“Thank you, Dauphine.” Caedmon nods to her. “You may return to your regular duties.”

Dauphine doesn’t need to be told twice; as soon as Caedmon’s dismissal has left his lips, she practically sprints down the corridor. She keeps her head down, not even bothering to glance up as if she doesn’t want to know who’s been called to the God Council as she bypasses the Darkhavens and me on her way to take the stairs down to the ground floor.

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