Page 58 of Cursed Shadows 1

I step in closer to him, my lips parting around purred words, “A taste of defeat?”

That earns a growl of approval that crawls up his throat.

But the animal in him has stirred. I watch it flicker in those dark eyes, and he steps back, the black dagger in hand.

My arm lowers, bringing the knife to my side.

He confirms the bargain. “I take you down—andwhenI win, my prize will be a taste.”

My smile is as careful as my answer, “I will give that to you, dark one.”

I will be the one to offer him a taste, I will be the one to decide what and how and when he receives it. I already know all those details.

He adjusts his grip on the hilt. Doesn’t toy with it the way he’s done with the other challengers. I think fleetingly of how obvious his previous attempts have been, how easily I read it on him—how hard he fights to keep from frightening me.

He plays with me, plays a game I snared him into, but he doesn’t toy with me. And that’s a safe distinction.

But he doesn’t expect my next move in the game.

“I accept,” I whisper the words softly, the way I would whisperyes’sand his name into his ear if he was wrapped up in me.

The confirmation of the bargain strikes through us.

I lift out my hand to my side, not in front of me. I don’t aim the knife at him. My mouth parts with a soft grin as I spread my fingers, and the let the knife fall to the mat.

“Oh,” I whisper, and lower my arm back to my side. Faint laughter rumbles through the field. I tilt my head and give a practiced, slow blink of the lashes. “Seems you have another advantage, dark one.”

His chest rises with the long, deep inhale he takes through his nostrils. A feral attempt to rein in the urges lashing through him.

Need me like I need you.

It’s not my looks that have the dokkalf males disturbed with growls and hisses. All fae are pretty, some more than others, and since I’m half human, I’m not the cream of the crop.

It’s my words that snare the dark ones—that snarehim.

I know my talents. This is one them. This is art.

I paint for him.

I perform.

And he moves for me, fast.

Before I know it, I’m light as a feather. Then I smack down on the mat. The thud of my back against the padded sack is slight. He could have easily made it hurt, but all that happens as I look up at the midnight sky is that grin tugs a bit wider on my face.

He steals my view of midnight.

Stepping over me, his head tilts as he studies me. My fingers itch to sweep those dark strands of forever-damp-like hair that fall into his eyes.

But I don’t get a moment to so much as lift a finger from the mat. Not before he’s dropped to one knee, part-straddling me, and the cool kiss of his dagger graces my throat.

I blink up at him, no fight in me as the dagger glides over my neck. It’s an odd sensation, something that buzzes like a firefly trying to burrow its way between layers of my flesh. Then the faint wetness of blood. But no pain.

He speaks softly, as though only to himself, like he’s forgetting entirely that I can hear his muttered words, “Vicious one.”

I notice the change—fromvicious femaletovicious one.

I wonder if there’s something behind that slight change that I should notice.

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