Page 28 of The Horde King of Shadow

“I need to get bandages,” I informed her.

“For what?” she whispered, her eyes wide and glassy. She was in shock.

“For your wounds,” I replied, trying to keep my voice gentle. Her blood wasred. Not black. Like human blood? I didn’t know why that fact fascinated me.

“I was dreaming,” she said quietly. “I never…I never saw the edge.”

“I know,” I said, restlessness eating away inside my chest. I left to retrieve a healing pack from my washroom.

With my newfound privacy, I let out a deep, rattling breath, striking the wall repeatedly with one of my fists until the dull ache of it helped to calm the maelstrom in my chest. The bones throbbed. I never should have left her alone. It had been anoversight. One that had almost gotten her killed. My pride had almost cost her her life.

And I wouldn’t allow it to happen again.

Despite the desire to keep her at arm’s length, she wasmyresponsibility.And the moment we sealed the bond in the Arsadia, she would be my damnedwife.

The fear in her eyes when she’d tumbled over the edge…I would never be able to shake that. It was my punishment. It was forever imprinted in my mind, like so many terrible, unshakeable memories. Like Haden getting thrown off his Elthika, rejected after the first flight. Like Tyzar’s mournful roar when my father had sent him away. Like Kyavor with his grim expression as he’d told me my parents were dead.

When I returned to Klara, I observed her sitting on the edge of the table, and my guilt only tripled. Her body was bruised not only from the fall but from riding. I’d pushed her too hard coming here. I’d been a young rider myself once, long ago. I remembered the pain so intense I couldn’t sleep no matter how exhausted I was. I remembered the brokenness.

This wasn’t me. Where was the honor in punishing her like this? And was that what I’d been doing? Punishing her for a decisionIhad made?

When I stepped up to her once more, I cupped her face in my palms, forcing her to meet my eyes.

“Are you all right?” I asked softly.

To my surprise, she nodded. “Yes.”

She’d seemed to have calmed when I’d been retrieving the kit, whereas my restlessness had only amplified.

“Do you have a blanket?” she asked.

My gaze trailed down her body. It was no time to admire her curved lines, the fullness of her breasts, and her soft belly and hips…but I would’ve had to be blind or dead not to.

“Let me tend to this first,” I informed her, controlling my physical reaction to her. It had been much too long since I’d had a female underneath me, I decided. She was soft and warm. She smelled likenaroblossoms on a hot harvest day, and I gritted my teeth, swallowing down the sudden need I felt. I wasn’t surprised by my reaction. Adrenaline and frustration were often coupled with lust. But finding this maddening Dakkari princess beautiful was entirely inconvenient. It would pose its own set of problems.

The gash along her side wasn’t too deep, but she didn’t even hiss when I cleaned it with a cloth.

“Why are you naked?” I rasped.

I caught a flush of redness of her cheeks. Fascinating.

“I was too tired after my bath. I went right to bed,” she answered. Her arm came up to shield her breasts, the other falling in her lap. She had no hair between her thighs, and my nostrils flared. I forced my gaze away. “Why areyou?”

Thatbrought out a small huff from me. When I looked down, I saw that I was, indeed, naked. I’d forgotten. Which made my half-hard cock all the more alarming.

“I was asleep,” I answered, watching the way her eyes flickered everywherebutme. “Does it bother you?”

She didn’t answer. Perhaps the Dakkari were shy about such things, whereas the Karag were not. I had to remember that my new bride was not of my kind. We couldn’t be more different.

I stepped away, snagging blankets off the bed. One I tied around my waist in a neat knot. The other I handed to her, which she spread over her lap quickly. I watched as her long, graceful fingers caressed the soft fur, and I cleared my throat, hunching down to inspect the gash above her ribs.

Once it was clean, I applied salve and a clean bandage. I’d patched up my own wounds more times than I could count, so I worked quickly. When I finished, she wrapped the blanket moretightly around her body, and I took her bloodied palm in mine, blotting it.

It was quiet between us, the energy in the room charged.

“Heartstones are like seeds, aren’t they?” she asked softly. I paused, casting a long, assessing look at her. Her eyes flicked back and forth between mine. “Or maybe not like seeds. More like…fruit of a tree.”

“They are both,” I murmured. “They used to grow in a place called the Arsadia. Heartstones were planted to growthalaratrees. And then the trees created more heartstones at their root systems.”

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