Page 62 of The Pureblood Princess
Before he can slip into the black, she kneels and plunges the dagger into his heart. He jerks up, blood spurting from his mouth and across Nadia’s face.
And then he falls back, his head striking the tile, and Konrád Kazamir is well and truly dead.
This time, there’s no moment of wondering if she should feel shame for what she’s done.
He deserved death, and he deserved it at her hands.
Nadia reaches into the pocket on his vest, and her fingers wrap around the cold metal key—her key to freedom.
There’s a movement in Nadia’s peripherals, and she whirls to find Marek standing at the bottom of the stairs. Pain creases his brow and tugs at his lips, which are parted in a look of shock.
A moment is all it would take for Nadia to give herself to the darkness again, but she hesitates.
Marek makes no move to approach. He turns his head, and his gaze finds her.
They don’t speak.
Blood still streams from Nadia’s nose from Konrád’s attack, and it drips from her lips and plinks softly upon the tiled floor. Overhead, snow patters delicately upon the roof, blissfully unaware of the horror that has unfolded this night.
“Go,” Marek whispers. “But know they will find you. They will make you suffer for this.”
Nadia stands and backs toward the door, keeping Marek in her sights. He walks slowly toward his fallen brother, and a trembling sigh falls from his lips as Nadia slips the key into the lock. She twists, and the tumbler clunks loudly, the sound echoing in the silent space.
The last thing she sees is Marek kneeling in the pool of Konrád’s blood, and then she throws the door open and dashes into the frigid night.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
The cold lashes her faceas the wind rakes its fingers through her long soiled hair. She heaves in the freezing air, and it stings her throat and lungs.
Snow blankets the ground and crunches underfoot as Nadia sprints through the courtyard, her enhanced power lending her incredible speed. In moments she’s at the iron gate surrounding the manor, tearing free the padlock that dares try to keep her here.
The metal falls heavily into the snow at her feet, and then she shoves the gate open, and the grating creak sends a murder of crows flying into the air from a nearby stand of pines. Their raucous cries fill the night as she calls once more on her shadows.
They embrace her like an old friend.
Formless, she moves through the night like sun cutting through the sky as it rises over the horizon. She whispers through tree branches and across the earth, keeping to the shadows to which she is bound. The moonlight pierces through her, and only when it becomes obscured by gray clouds is she able to dart across frozen fields and wild landscapes.
This place is unknown to her, and yet she continues. The only way to freedom is forward, and so she speeds forth with all her might.
Time slips away, and the moon is sinking toward the horizon when Nadia can travel no farther. The power granted to her by Honora’s pure lifeblood has been extinguished, used to the last drop, and finally, Nadia can maintain her shadow form no longer.
She tumbles into the snow, falling hard and rolling multiple times before coming to a stop.
Cold grips her in unforgiving hands, and blood stains the white around her. The demi-train of her gown is tangled about her legs, and its lovely cream color is stained with mud and blood. She sits up slowly, trying to shake the exhaustion from her mind as she blinks into the falling snow.
There, in the distance, is a warm flickering light—a candle burning in a window.
Perhaps she’ll find refuge there.
Nadia scoops up handfuls of snow and uses it to scrub the blood from her face and neck. It leaves icy water in its wake, and her body trembles fiercely as she finally climbs to her feet and begins to make her way toward the town.
The innkeeper seemed equally frightened and intrigued by her. Nadia ensured the woman that her fiancé would soon arrive and heap her in coin, and that seemed to do the trick.
Now she sits in a warm bath, the blood that stained her hair turning the water a murky rust color. The innkeeper sent a young girl up with food and drink, and tears stream down Nadia’s face as she gulps down another glass of wine.
Theodore is on his way; she asked the innkeeper where she was, then told Theodore where to find her: Henwood, a small hamlet many miles away from Graystone.
Knowing he’s making his way to her at this very moment, facing the storm just to reach her, makes the tears stream more fiercely down her cheeks. She’ll be reunited with him soon, will look upon his face and hold him in her arms once more.
