Page 80 of Kingdom of the Two Moons

What the hell is wrong with me?

I look down to the floor quickly, my eyes tracking the patterns of wood.

“You are shaking,” he says.

I bite my swollen lip so hard it hurts, but fight for the strength to ask, “You’re going to punish me, right?”

Better to have it out. He knows anyway, can senseeverythingabout me. My treacherous, feverish heartbeat, the rush of adrenaline, the heat coming off me. All the confusion, my thoughtsrunning so wild and in despair. And all those other things that make no sense to me.

Better to focus on the brutal part.

I need to get it over with.I will survive.I keep telling myself that, over and over, like a mantra.

When he doesn’t answer, I glance up again, only to find him scrutinizing my face, the red in his eyes streaked with hues of midnight blue now. He’s so utterly beautiful, no matter how cruel he is, I will always find him beautiful, I know.

But to my surprise, he asks almost gently, “I am?”

“You are angry with me.” My voice is no more than a hush.

“I am?”

I cringe. This is a game. A cruel joke, like Lyrian played so many times on me. Telling me he was not angry and then making Hunter and Kayne pay me back for weeks.

I feel Caryan’s anger too keenly, see it in his aura. Something pulsing under the midnight veil of fog, ready to break free. Something red and violet and violent, burning in dark flames.

When I dare to look up at him again, I find his eyes resting on my split, swollen lip before they flick up to mine. I whisper, “Sorry,” and look down again, chastising myself, wondering when I will ever get used to this—to being a slave. Or to his eyes, to the golden veins that have started to leak back in, mingling with the red and blue.

He retorts, “I am not.”

“You are. I can see it all over you, in your aura,” I say too quickly. I bite the inside of my cheek.Stupid.Maybe I’m just utterly damn stupid.

“I didn’t know you had that gift,” he admits. “Well, then let me be precise: I am angry. But notatyou.”

I want to askwho else are you angry with. Instead, I say, “I tried to stab a high lord.”

“With his own dagger. After he slapped you. I don’t know the last time anyone managed to cut Kyrith’s skin open. In front of my whole court, that is.” His voice is genuinely admiring, almost surprised. “I’m sure he won’t forget that anytime soon.”

“That’s exactly what I’m afraid of.”

“You don’t have to be. He won’t touch you again, I made sure of that.”

My heart stops at the sudden darkness in his tone. In his aura. I remember how Caryan said that Kyrith would find himself without a head the next time he so much as touched me.

Next time you decide to speak like that to your king, or touch something that’s mine for that matter, you’ll find yourself without a head. Isn’t that what he said last night? That he wouldkillhim. Kill Kyrith, because he touchedme. Something that ismine. That’s what I am, hispropertyand nothing more, I remind myself.

But it doesn’t match the gentleness, still in his voice when he asks, “How do you feel?”

Lost. Hurt. Helpless. Angry. Confused.

I recoil at the sudden movement of Caryan’s arm. And just as in the dungeon, I hate myself for it.

I hold my breath as tender fingers probe over my raw skin a moment later.

“Look at me,” he demands, and I do, feeling the strange rush of sensation when looking into his eyes, of being, for once, allowed to see what I long to see. More blue, more gold, but subtle, just a little gleam of red in the background like a sunset in a dream.

I can’t help but think that there’s something vaguely familiar in his features. As if I’ve seen him before. Somewhere. Itwasin a dream. Hewas in a dream.But before I can grasp that thought, that revelation fully, it slips away again.

I swallow at the way his eyes drink in my face. Resist the strange urge to lean into his touch.

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