Page 77 of Enticing Monsters

“Kitten!” I try screaming her name again.

If I’m leaving this world, I want to do it with the taste of her on my lips.

“Our mate isn’t here,” a deep voice informs me, and I instinctively try to lash out at it. I don’t want him. I want my kitten and her sharp, sweet, little claws. “She’ll return from Faerie soon.”

FromFaerie? She went back without me?

I try to force my body to move, to head towards her. She has no idea of the dangers that await her there, or the secrets that place holds. Rather than obeying my directive, though, I sink again, another memory shredding into my mind.

“Dad?” My voice doesn’t crack, the cold that permeates me keeping me frozen and still as I watch him.

I know the look he’s wearing means he’s sad—I’ve seen it often enough.

“V,” he clips out, using the name I’ve chosen for myself.

One that he hates.

“You’re meant for more than this, you know,” he murmurs, his eyes darting around the blood-spattered room and taking in my most recent work.

I ignore him, scrubbing the remains from the tips of my fingers, but he doesn’t leave, his disappointed gaze not faltering as he watches me.

“Politics?” I finally ask, and I snort at that. “Not my speed.”

“But being a murderer is?”

“Call it public service.” The grin on my face isn’t sane. I know that.

“You’re fourteen years old!”

“And a fully recognized member of supe society, as well as the heir to the throne,” I remind him. “I take care of what needs to be done. And I’m late.”

I have another job lined up, another rebellious, evil supe acting out and needing to be put back in line. I don’t have to look at the notes my mother gave me about him, how he’s killing children, preventing them from touching the artifacts and coming into their power. I have it all memorized. Every dark, sordid piece.

The trip to find my prey is short, my ability to teleport making it easy. The fact that my father has insisted on coming along for this little escape should probably make it harder for me to focus, but I simply tune him out.

He’s not who I’m here for.

The tingle of power in the air reveals my father has shifted, and I don’t bother looking to see him stretch out in his massive, golden sphinx form. I’m only steps away from the door to the house when all hell breaks loose.

Dozens of supes come pouring from the woods, frothing and feral as they aim right for us. I don’t bother cursing, merely spreading my wings and attacking the way I’ve been taught. It means nothing to me when they cut me or stab me, only the slight pulling sensation indicating their touch. I don’t care if I bleed out. I’ll accomplish my mission.

A roar I know well rattles the air, distracting me and allowing a hippogriff to rake his claws down my face. Blood flows, covering my field of vision in a wash of red even as I stab him through the heart. My father lies on the ground, blood pooling rapidly around him, my prey kneeling above him with a manic laugh as he saws at his thick hide.

I’m on him in an instant, and his neck snaps under my hands. As though that was a sign, the few strangling warriors melt back into the trees as I press my hands against my dad’s wounds.

I may be only fourteen, but I know it isn’t going to do any good.

I teleport us anyway, yanking us from the woods with a snap and spilling us into the hall of the healers. They’re scurrying around me, but my eyes are only for my father as his lips try to form words, the blood coating his mouth making it hard to read his lips.

“Love. You. Not. Monster. Safe.”

The light fades from his eyes before the healers’ fingers touch his skin, and I know he lied.

There’s nothing about me to love, and there’s nowhere safe.

There never will be.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

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