Page 16 of Monster's Reward

I wanted to deny it.

Because despite his claim that my secrets didn’t matter, that our mating was solid, I could sense thateverythingwas about to change.

“Just say it,” he growled.

“Yes. I’m a shadow monster.”

He shuddered, then gave me a look of such horror, I actually felt my heart crack in two.

“You said nothing would change,” I whispered. “You said we were mates forever and nothing would change that.”

“You should have told me,” he said.

“When? When, Jahrdran? When would have been the right time for you to discover your mate is a shadow monster?”

“When we first met,” he growled. “Immediately.”

“You mated me the minute we met! Was I supposed to just blurt it out in the middle of our mating?” My heart pounded in my chest and I could barely catch my breath. “Would it really have made a difference?”

What I really wanted to know was whether it would have stopped him from mating me, but I was afraid to ask.

“Of course, it would have. You’re a shadow monster and I’m—”

“What? You’re what?”

He glared at me. “How can you ask me that? How can you not know what you’ve done?”

I shook my head. “I’m in the dark here, Jahrdran. I never knew about the supernatural world until right before arriving here. I’ve lived in the human world my entire life. The professors tell me nothing, just what I am and that I have to keep it a secret. They don’t even tell me why.”

“Because once upon a time, a shadow monster wreaked hell upon the earth, trapping humans and supernaturals alike within the shadow realm. No matter how hard the other shadow monsters worked to save those trapped there, millions died.Millions.”

I blanched. Here were the answers I’d been seeking all this time and my mate had known them all along.

How was it that he could know my entire history, yet the professors at the Academy dictated that I could not?

“Do you know what it’s like for someone not of the shadow realm to be trapped there? To die there?”

I shook my head mutely.

“The shadows wrap around them, fill them up, then consume them from the inside out. It’s a terribly slow death. It takes time for the darkness to fully digest them. And those who were saved from death weren’t actually saved at all because they were never the same. They came back different, full of darkness that ate them from the inside out. They turned into serial killers and worse until it was accepted that anyone trapped in the shadow realm had to stay there.

“So then, instead of sending shadow monsters into the shadows to rescue those trapped, they became executioners, sent to end their suffering.”

“I don’t understand,” I said quietly. “How does this story end with theshadow monstersbeing hunted and executed? They were just trying to help, right?”

“Yes, after one of them caused the problem in the first place.”

“So the entire race was punished?”

“You have to understand, Kasi. No one knew which shadow monster it was who went rogue. It could have been any of them, or even many of them. And the worst part was that once it got out that the shadow realm was twisting its victims into something dark, those same rogue monsters were setting them free.

“Imagine it. Hordes of darkened creatures, serial killers all of them, being pulled into the other realms, causing death and destruction everywhere. In the end, it was decided that every single shadow monster presented a clear and present danger to all of civilization, and so, the entire race was put under a death order.”

“So one shadow monster—or several,” I amended at the look on his face, “did truly horrific things and my entire race gets exterminated for it?”

He sighed. “I know it sounds harsh, but trust me, it was necessary.”

The problem was I didn’t trust him.

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