Page 27 of Prince of Never

‘I don’t much enjoy licking walls, so yes.’I turned my back on her and peeled off my pants, kicking them over to the shirt into a stinking pile that was good for nothing but burning now.

There was silence behind me as I sat at the pool and dangled my legs over the edge.Slowly, I lowered myself into the warm water, hissing as it met the multitude of throbbing bites and cuts all over my skin, the pain flaring brighter for a moment before it drained away into numbness.It wasn’t much deeper than waist-height, though there was a place in the far corner that dipped away into a bottomless void.

I moved to the point where the water gushed over a ledge above and into the pool.Submerging my head beneath, I let the water run over me, rinsing away the bog and leeching out the tension in my shoulders along with the toxin.When I turned back to Imogen, she stood in the exact same position, staring at me with wide eyes, a slight flush in her cheeks.

‘So, what’s it going to be, little librarian?A bath, or a set of shackles?’I called over the sound of the water.

She pinned her eyes to the ground as she inched closer to the pool and knelt at the edge, where she bent low and began splashing water up her arms.

‘How is that going to work?’I asked as I watched her.‘You won’t reach them all.And you’ll still stink.’

She straightened up and sighed angrily.Then she seemed to square her shoulders, and the expression in her eyes when she looked back at me was set.‘Can you at least turn away?’

‘I thought humanity had moved beyond fussing about modesty,’ I said.But I did as she asked, focusing my attention on scrubbing the mud from me.Pretending I wasn’t hyper aware of the sound of her dress dropping to the floor, couldn’t feel the moment she slipped a foot into the water like she’d trailed a finger across my skin.That slumbering, feral compulsion stirred, sharpening my senses, raising the hairs on the back of my neck as she slid into the water.She sighed in relief as the pain must have begun to ebb.

And I suddenly knew this had been a bad idea.

‘I don’t think anything could have prepared me for this place,’ she said, prompting me to keep moving my hands, to stop holding so still, like I was a wolf scenting a deer.‘I’ve always thought there are echoes of truth to every myth, but this is a lot more than an echo.I don’t know how I’m going to go back to pretending none of it is real.’

So she still thought there was some way that she could go home, back to her old life.The creature in my chest bristled at the idea.‘You talk a lot of myths.Is that what you study at that school?’I asked, giving in to a curiosity I could hardly admit to.I wanted to know things about her.I wanted to know what life had created her, this woman who scaled poisonous vines and flicked bubbles at housemaids and went traipsing into the dark in a world she knew nothing about.

‘It’s more of a hobby,’ she admitted almost sheepishly, as if it was something to be embarrassed about.

‘Why?Humanity used to be fascinated with us when you lived closer to the divide and still believed in old gods.But your world is too noisy and busy and all-knowing for that now.’I could focus on the words while I washed the toxin away, could feed my curiosity a few pieces of her.And then I could find a way to get out of there as quickly as possible.

‘Maybe I’ve never really felt at home in that noisy, busy world.’She was drawing closer as she spoke, and in my peripheral vision, I saw her reach her hands out to the waterfall a few paces away.She was in her underwear, some simple pink bra trimmed with white lace, and my blood began to pound as she splashed water on her face.She smoothed back her hair, caught me looking, inhaled sharply and fixed her eyes on the water again.‘I was also attacked.’She spoke the words abruptly, but she didn’t move away like I’d expected her to.

‘Attacked?’My throat was tight.The scent of her was magnified by the water.Wild instincts were pulsing beneath my skin, hammering away at me, demanding I touch.Hold.Take.Like starvation demands food, or suffocation demands air, this compulsiondemandedher.

‘By a vampire,’ she said, unaware of the fight I was losing, of the fact that I’d drifted closer to her.‘I think it was, anyway.Everyone thought I was crazy, but see, here.I still have the bite scar.’She swept her hair back, exposing her neck, and the shiny pink memory of fangs marring her golden skin.

‘Looks like it,’ I murmured, and without consciously deciding to, I brushed my fingers lightly over the scar.She didn’t flinch.Take her,the thing inside me snarled.Protect her.And kill the fucking leech that dared to touch her.

She looked up at me, a strange expression in her eyes.‘You can see it?’she asked.Demanded.‘No one else ever has.’

‘I can see it.’

She nodded to herself, licked her lips.‘Then at least I won’t let my parents convince me I’m crazy anymore when I go home.’

That, the idea of her leaving, decided the battle.

It only took one moment.One slip in that iron self-control I’d thought was indomitable.The instincts consumed me, and as she looked up at me from under her lashes, I captured her against the wall, a hand either side of her, caging her in.The water crashed down against my back as I stood over her in the close space between the wall and the water, my heart pounding.Her chest heaved as she panted, looking up at me with something that might have been shock or fear.Or maybe something else.

‘What are you doing?’she gasped.I dug my fingers into the rock, trying to keep myself from touching her, from kissing that full mouth, from lifting her and wrapping her legs around me, from claiming her as mine.

‘You think there’s any going back after this?’I growled.‘That you can just flit between worlds without consequences?’

‘I’m not flitting between anything.Youdraggedme here.’She held my angry, wild gaze.‘Why are you keeping me here, Tarian?’

I stared into her dauntless face for a long moment, my pulse thundering, the heat of desire burning low inside me.And I realised that, whatever this thing between us was, she felt it too.I could see it in her eyes.If I were to kiss her, to part her legs and fuck her right here against the wall, she would let me.

I unclenched one of my hands from the rock, pulled back my arm.‘Go,’ I snarled.

She hesitated for a moment before slipping out of the cage of my arms and quickly retreating through the wall of water.I closed my eyes and let her leave.I waited a long time before moving, standing beneath the water with my hands braced against the wall.Once I’d finally mustered enough control to turn around, there was nothing left of her but a muddy dress and a fading scent in the air.

When I’d dressed, I found my way to the third floor, walking along a corridor lined with windows offering a view over the front grounds of Dreadhold, where neatly groomed gardens sat alongside the sprawling jungles of plants that wouldn’t fall easily beneath the control of a gardener.They spilled over any restraints, magic or otherwise, put in place by the team of brownies charged with their tending, and crawled up the sides of the castle like they were hoping to one day overcome it.I was sure one day they would.

Arun was still in his office when I reached it, his head bent low over his desk as he read a report of some kind.Likely from one of his network of informants.He looked up as I slumped into the chair opposite him, folding my arms and scowling at the floor like I’d so often done when he’d tried to reprimand me growing up.Not an easy charge to take on, trying to guide an angry prince with no father, a disinterested mother, and a power that no one really understood.

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