Page 21 of Monster's Pretty Bride

NARANUS

“Take her back to her chamber.”

The command leaves my lips without hesitation, sharp and final.

The crowd is still thrumming with the high of the fight, their voices ringing in my ears as I watch two of my warriors lift her unconscious body from the sand. Eryss sags between them, her limbs limp, her hair spilling like ink over her bruised shoulders.

Blood stains the corners of her temple where the final strike landed, trailing in a slow, sluggish curve down her cheek.

She fought well.

She lost.

She should have stayed down.

I turn away, ignoring the way my skin pulls tight, the way my claws twitch at my sides. This was necessary. They needed to see her break. Needed proof that their warlord did not favor a purna, that she was not an equal, that she was nothing more than a tool meant to serve her purpose and be discarded.

Why does my jaw lock as I watch them drag her away?

Why does my pulse hammer harder with every step I take in the opposite direction?

I exhale, forcing the thoughts down. This is nothing. A moment of weakness. She deserved the pain—earned it with her defiance, her stubbornness. It should not matter to me if she suffered.

It should not matter if she,

The thought frays before it can fully form.

I curse and pivot sharply on my heel.

I take the back corridors, the ones the sentries do not guard, the ones only I use. My wings drag at my sides, restless as I move, my claws flexing as the tension coils tight in my ribs.

This is not about her.

This is about control.

I will not lose control.

Her chamber is dark when I enter.

The bed is untouched. The furs have been thrown back, the stone floors smeared with streaks of blood from where the warriors left her.

She hasn’t moved.

Her breathing is slow, shallow. One arm is curled against her ribs, her bruises stark against the golden hue of her skin. The wound at her temple has already begun to clot, but it is ugly, a swollen mark that taunts me more than it should.

I exhale sharply.

“Fix her.”

The healer flinches at the command but does not hesitate, kneeling at her side. He does not question why he was summoned here in secret, why his warlord ordered the purna to be healed rather than left to rot. He knows better than to ask.

I stand at the corner of the room, arms crossed, watching as the healer works. His hands move with practiced ease, grinding herbs into a thick, pungent paste, spreading it carefully over the worst of her wounds. A soft glow pulses from his palms, sealing the cuts along her skin, knitting the bruised flesh together.

She shifts, a slow inhale passing her lips, but she does not wake.

Good.

The healer finishes quickly, the tension in his shoulders evident as he steps back. He bows once before retreating without a word, the heavy door closing behind him.

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