Page 9 of Bride of the Midnight Prince

Those eyes, I decide, are by far the most terrifying thing about him.

It seems I am going to die.

I know who he is. I’ve never been this close to him, but anytime I come to the Nothril Court, he is my biggest fear. It is because of him that I covered myself in soot to hide my true scent. It is because of his piercing gaze, now, that I am endlessly relieved that my face is almost entirely covered in bandages.

Prince Rahk.

I stare up at him, frozen.

The tailor was right. Going back in, even for something as valuable as theolleathat clinks against my teeth, was a stupid decision.

I’ve always known I would die at the hand of a fae. I deserve to. One doesn’t run raids of Fae Courts for years and get away with it forever. I just didn’t want to dietoday.

“What are you doing?” Prince Rahk demands again.

Wait—does he buy my disguise? I fling myself to the ground in a prostrated bow. Theolleain my mouth prevents me from speaking.

“Answer me.”

My hand trembles as I point to my mouth and shake my head.

“You cannot speak?”

I nod quickly, keeping my head bowed.

“Do you know you’re not supposed to be here? Human slaves aren’t to be in my chambers.”

He thinks we’re so far beneath him that we cannot even have the honor of scrubbing his floors? I rein in the sudden flare of my temper. I shake my head in answer to his question—and then point at the tray of goblets I brought. Can I make him believe I’ve made a mistake, and that I thought I was supposed to deliver drinks to him?

Prince Rahk sniffs in the direction of the goblets. He winces. “Great Kings, what possessed you to bring such a violation to me? What is that, a mix of nectar and wine?”

I give him my best doe-eyed look of innocence and confusion.

“Did someone tell you to bring me that?” he asks.

I nod eagerly.

“A human slave?”

I shake my head. If wrath must fall, it will not be on one of my fellow humans.

“A fae?”

I nod.

“Slave or master?”

I lift my shoulders in a simpleI don’t know. Maybe I will survive this. Maybe he will forget that I was under his bed and let me leave.

Maybe I won’t die today, after all.

He shifts his weight to one foot and narrows his frosty eyes in suspicion. “Show me what you were doing under my bed.”

Curse it all.

I cast desperately for an excuse. The goblets are all infuriatingly upright and unspilled, so I cannot use that as an excuse. That is when I become aware of the lost button that was under the bed next to theollea. Slowly, I lift my hand and uncurl my fingers, holding up the button to him.

“You were getting this,” he states in a monotone of pure skepticism.

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