Page 8 of The Alien's Cruel Starfrost Domain

No. Not a frog.

A toad.

With fangs.

The vendor glanced up at Roland and laughed. “I didn’t believe you’d do it.” His voice managed to be squeaky and high with a low rumble underpinning it.

“Told you I’d be here,” Roland said. “Let’s get this over with.”

The vendor’s high-pitched giggle went straight through my ear and stabbed into my head. “We need to wait for the buyer.” He paused and glanced around as if expecting his words to conjure whoever it was he waited for. “Oh, there he is.”

Toad-man tilted his chin, pointing down the winding pathway between tables in the direction opposite the one Roland and I had come from. Still uncertain about what was happening, I jerked my head around to see what he was talking about.

Ivrael Eluwyn, High Duke of the Ice Court, Lord of Starfrost Manor in the Empire of the Caix strode toward me.

Of course, at that point I didn’t know his name, any of his titles, or where he was from—the far-away planet of Trasq, I learned much later.

Nonetheless, my first glimpse of him just about stopped my heart.

The first thing I noticed about him wasthe way he moved. He didn’t simply walk. He strode through the market as if he owned the place, and the people—things—milling around the stalls scattered out of his path.

Since then, I’ve learned Ivrael never just walks anywhere. He stalks, he prowls, sometimes he pounces. He moves like a cat.

His unearthly beauty struck me next. Everything about him was gorgeous. Tall and slender, yet muscular at the same time, with blond hair brushed back from his face.

He wore dark pants molded to his hips and legs, outlining every muscle, and his shirt was a pristine white that practically glowed. Over it, he wore a white coat with gold embroidery. The effect should have been effeminate—the shirt had ruffles at the throat and sleeves. But it wasn’t effeminate at all.

No. This man could get away with wearing anything, and the sheer force of his personality would overwhelm reality, bending it to suit him rather than the other way around.

He stalked toward us, and his gaze bored into me. His eyes were ice-cold, a blue so pale they were almost white, the color of a husky dog’s or wolf’s eyes, one I didn’t think I had ever seen in people.

He drew closer, and with a start, I realized his pupils were slitted, as if he really were part cat.

Deep inside the cool silver of his eyes, bright flecks of molten gold sparked and swirled, and his eyelids flared wider for a split second as his gaze moved slowly up and down my entire body.

For an instant, I thought he'd recognized me, or maybe he—what? Thought I was attractive? My eyelashes fluttered down despite myself, and my gaze flickered across the muscular lines of his body.

As he held my gaze, heat crawled up my cheeks. When one corner of his mouth quirked up into a smile, heat coiled in my stomach, exploding into something akin to desire.

In some ways, his intent expression mirrored the vendor’s. But what had been horrific on the gray man’s face was painfully, almost unbearably handsome on Ivrael’s features.

His gaze pinned me, and I couldn’t tear my attention away from him.

One of the two men with him leaned over and whispered something in a fluid, sibilant language I didn’t understand.

“This is the one?” The duke’s voice was dark and smooth like melted chocolate, and it struck me as odd that something so warm could come from someone who otherwise seemed so cold.

“As promised, Your Lordship,” the vendor squeaked.

The duke reached out one hand, palm up, as he silently, imperiously, demanded Roland hand me over to him.

My stepfather’s grip tightened even further, and I whimpered.

“Not until I get my money,” Roland muttered.

The pleasant expression fell away from the beautiful man’s face, and the air around us chilled by several degrees. He completely ignored Roland as he continued speaking to the vendor.

“You are certain of her lineage?”

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