Page 97 of Craved By a Wolf

He kept his head down as his group passed the guards and didn’t look up until he was deep inside the palace. White stone walls threaded with pure gold and turquoise lined the wide hallway, and there were alcoves at intervals with solid gold statues of nymphs in them. Former kings, he presumed.

The excited chatter grew louder as the movement of the crowd slowed where it reached a towering set of gold doors.

Kin found himself taking in what he could see of the palace, including the painted ceiling that depicted nymphs and females in very compromising positions, all of them in the throes of ecstasy. Gold columns stretched down from it and he was tempted to touch one to see if it was paint or the real deal. He bet it was the real thing. Probably solid too.

Everything about this place screamed wealth.

It made his cottage look like a shithole.

He wasn’t sure Hella was going to want to trade this for his home, but then she wasn’t here by choice.

This king wanted to own her.

Enslave her.

Kin couldn’t let that happen. His blood boiled at the thought of her being treated like that—treated as he had been.

A murmur swept through the crowd, rolling towards him, and he looked at the doors in time to see them open. The room beyond them was vast, with a curving glass ceiling. He followed the crowd as they slowly filed into the room, his gaze darting over what he could see of it as he ventured closer. White walls with golden columns ran the length of the room, and a strip of turquoise carpet edged with gold led the eye to the raised blue stone dais at the far end.

He grew twitchy again as he stepped into the room, his eyes fixed on the golden throne.

The only seat in the house.

The places for guests were marked by gold railings and everyone was standing.

A power play on the nymph’s part.

The king wanted to be different to those he viewed as beneath him.

A female dressed in very little held her hand out to Kin’s right, her head bent, and he filed in behind several other males, close to the back of the room. He scanned the crowd. There had to be close to five hundred people. Not only that, but in front of every gold column on either side of the room stood a guard and there were a dozen of them lining the far wall, flanking the throne. He glanced back over his shoulder to see the same there. Six guards on either side of the door.

Getting Hella out of this was going to be difficult.

He faced forwards again and his gaze caught on something that threatened to ignite his anger and make him explode.

There was a gold cushion on the floor just in front and slightly to the left of the throne.

A place for Hella to kneel beside her king.

Like an animal.

Kin couldn’t hold back his growl, didn’t care that it drew a few curious gazes as he glared at the throne, silently making a vow he intended to keep even if it killed him.

The king’s death was going to be slow and painful.

And the music started.

Chapter 29

It hadn’t taken Hella long to realise that the women Ethyrian had summoned to take care of her weren’t servants.

They were part of his harem.

And they hated her.

They hadn’t said as much with words, but then actions always spoke loudest.

Hella grimaced and gritted her teeth as the one she assumed was the head mistress, a curvy and elegant white-haired female who might be a seelie, tugged the brush through her hair, yanking on her head and probably pulling great hanks out.

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