Page 8 of Of Blood and Banes
And yet, Gods…looking at him crosses that line of morality in me?—
Darian lunges at me, taking full advantage of my hesitation. He raises his fists to wrap the chain connecting his shackles around my neck and shoves me backward in one swift motion.
I stumble, nearly tripping over my own feet as he glides us to the stone wall and pins me against it. The chain from his shackles squeezes the breath out of my throat.
I search his eyes, digging for a hint of mercy, but he’s back to his signature glare. I’m not sure what happened between now and those soft moments with him at Windmere: sweeping me off to his room, wrapping me in his jacket, and tucking me into his bed. Even teasing he was going to bring me breakfast in bed. Perhaps it was all a game. Or a fever dream.
Darian presses himself into my chest as he lowers his face closer to mine. His laboring breath stirs my hair. “Let. Me. Free.”
“Darian…s-stop…” I wheeze out as I arch my back against the wall and push up onto my toes, searching for a meager inch of space so I might catch a breath. I sink my fingers into the chain and attempt to pull it away from my throat. But my grip is slippery, and my strength is waning by the second. He doesn’t shift his grasp. If anything, he pushes harder. My vision sparkles in black, and when my eyes roll back into my head from the lack of oxygen, he pauses.
Slightly.
Lifting the chain off my throat, he then loops it behind my head to pull at the nape of my neck. I suck in a strangled breath through my burning throat as the haze of asphyxiation lifts.
“You so much as make a move to escape, or try to fight me, and I’ll fucking kill you. Do you understand?” he growls, and tugs me hard enough my face bumps into his bare chest.
“Yes…” I rasp out, still struggling to steady my breath. A dizzying sensation wracks my head, and I rest my forehead on his pecs before I black out. I run through all the possible scenarios of how to get out of this. Even in his disadvantageous state, I’m no match for him. Especially considering my wounded side—any hard twist will easily split the stitches open again.Besides, he’ll catch me long before I can slip out of his grasp and run.
“Put your hands on my chest,” he barks.
I hesitate.
“Don’t fucking make me ask again.”
I skip a breath and shakily rest my palms on his bare chest, sticky with blood. His muscles flex underneath his skin as he pats down my sleeves, shoulders, back, and sides. I wince when he brushes my injured ribs. His assessment moves on to my waist, my hips, my…rear.
I flick a glare up at him. “The fuck you think I’m hiding in myass?”
He uses the tip of his boot to tap against the insides of my ankles, ignoring my question completely. Repositioning the chain back behind my head, he growls in my ear, “Turn around. Away from me.”
I obey, slipping my hands off his chest and slowly turning in his arms until I’m facing away from him. He collars my throat with the chain once more, pulling me back with him a half-step until my shoulder blades press into his chest.
“Move,” he grunts in my ear, and then shoves his groin into my ass so I step toward the staircase.
If I wasn’t still dazed from the air he squeezed out of my lungs or the aching pain in my ribs, I might have even blushed.
“You…f-fucking…idiot…” I gasp as we edge up the stairs.
He tightens the chain on my throat, silencing me. My boots slip off the steps, the edges of my vision bleed into black. I lean back harder into him for support.
We ascend the rest of the stairs, step by painful step, as I hold on to the chain around my throat for dear life. At the top of the staircase, he commands me to open the door. I push it open slowly, and after he scans the quiet cobblestone streets, he slipsus out into the cold. His pace doesn’t quicken until we leave the outskirts of Midkeep and head south into the forest.
In the back of my mind, I know he won’t hurt me. Ithink.
He would have easily killed me in the dungeon if he really wanted to. He had me right there—all he had to do was strangle me a second or two longer. And yet, he didn’t.
I still have no idea what he’s playing at, or why he wants me alive. He can’t possibly think he’ll walk to Arterias from here. He’d be caught before he got halfway. And given his hands are shackled, he wouldn’t be much of a fight. But a terror looms over me like a shadow as I consider all the wild possibilities that might run through someone like Darian’s head. There’s no telling what he’s planning.
“Let…me…go…” I wriggle against him as we tread deeper into the forest.
The chain against my throat is far too tight, and my face grows unbearably hot.
Tight.
Tighter.
My lungs scream in withered protests. All the pine trees around us blur into a single mass. My thoughts dull to a whisper as I begin to wink out of consciousness. I overestimated his mercy.
