Page 34 of The Princess's Chosen

I was surprised he didn't move. No man was quiet enough to sneak up on me like this, and it was clear that he was only waiting, listening, heart starting to hammer.

I growled as I reached the door, and Daniel's breath hitched. He was by a set of shelves, his shirt untucked and sleeves rolled up, collar unbuttoned. He wasn't his usual polished self, but his eyes weren't red and puffy like Bryony's either, so I felt justified in the snarl I delivered from the doorway.

"I knew it," he breathed. He held a book in one hand, his perusal interrupted by my intrusion, and the hand lowered, his shoulders dropping as I moved into the room.

He didn't call for the guards, and though I could sense his terror and hear the jerk and whine of his breath in his chest, he didn't move away as I approached.

"I—I didn't… Fuck," Daniel breathed, the blood rushing out of his face as I rose up to my hind legs, towered over him, and snarled down into his face, the hair over his forehead ruffling with my breath. There was white all around his eyes until he squeezed them shut. He flinched and braced himself, speaking again. "I had no intention of upsetting her."

It was a whisper, half thrown to the floor as if he thought the words were useless but wanted to speak them anyway. He wasn't pleading for his life, and he seemed to knowwhyI was here.

He thought she'd blame him, my man's brain offered.

I flexed my claws and then shifted back to Cresswell the man, my sword in my grip, raised between us and poised to take Daniel's throat.

"Do it again and I'll rip your throat out, in one form or another," I growled, some of the animal still in my throat.

"I'm not here to hurt her," Daniel hissed, face still turned away but eyes open and on the floor.

"Do you even know why you're here?" I asked, reaching into my coat, pulling out the letter Aric had shared with me, the one that left me sleepless since the night of the festival. I swatted Daniel's cheek with it. "Did youaskwhy you're here? Do you know what your orders will be, or do you just wait to follow them when they come?"

I had the words memorized by now. I dropped the letter to the floor and left the room.

12

Bryony

Isat up in the tub, and Wendell lifted a scoop of soapy water up as I closed my eyes, his hand lifting to shield my face as he rinsed my hair. Thao sat by the tub on the tile floor, holding one of my hands, working oil meticulously into every digit, every nail, every crease of skin. Cosmo did the same with my feet as Owen washed me.

In spite of the care, the touch, and the painful amount of love and affection I was feeling for my Chosen in the moment, the Hunger was nowhere to be found. I was beginning to think of my magic as another woman living inside of me, some feminine force that was all appetite until it was time to fess up to wrongdoings. Then suddenly she was happy to slink away and hide while I tried to manage the mess.

"I'm so sorry," I murmured, eyes starting to sting again.

I'd confessed the whole story from Sam's entrance in the library to falling asleep against Cresswell's bear. I'd started over my dinner plate, shifting the food from one spot to the next, unable to stomach the idea of eating. Pretty quickly, the second I'd started to sob out the Hunger taking over during the argument with Daniel, I'd been moved to the bedroom.

"I think we should kill him," Thao said mildly, pausing his massage to frown at a fingernail, picking dirt away and going back to his work as the rest of us gaped at him.

"No," I said.

Thao glanced up, head tilting in curiosity. "He knew better."

"So did I!"

"Stop," Wendell murmured, and I wasn't sure if he was speaking to Thao or to me, but we both settled. "I don't think killing Daniel is the solution for the moment. Bryony, you feel certain he didn't force you?"

"Positive. If anything I might've forced him—"

"No," Cosmo, Thao, and Owen all said at once.

"We allknowthe Hunger is capable of forcing," I said.

"Yes, and you know how it looks, how it feels," Owen murmured, hands stroking my shoulders back into their soft slump as Wendell worked a silky lather through my strands. "Was that what happened?"

I sighed and my eyes shut. "No."

"Now we know something new, which is that it isn't safe foryouto ignore the Hunger forever," Cosmo said gently. "I'm sorry it cost you. We're not killing Daniel, but you're well within your rights to dismiss him."

I nodded. "I know. I'm considering it."

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