Page 62 of Blackwarden
She struck him again.
“You know who, Blackwarden.”
“What makes you think I’d hide her from you?” His voice was so calm. Far calmer than it had any right to be. I don’t know how he managed to keep his tone so even with the way Bevgyah stepped closer to him, digging her sharp fingernails into his hair and yanking his face toward hers.
“You can try to weave around my questions, but I know your ways.” She kissed him before she slapped him again. “Try to protect her all you want. You will fail. And when I find her, I will destroy every scrap of her soul.”
Why did she treat him this way? What had he done to deserve this?
“You knew what you did when you marked her. You happily condemned her.”
A shiver writhed down my spine as my fingers reached for the mark at the base of my neck, the memory of Bevgyah’s rising anger when she’d noticed it.
“You knew what you were doing,” Bevgyah sneered as she stepped closer. “Beg me for her life on your knees, Blackwarden.”
I struggled to watch. It was the revel all over again. And again, there was nothing I could do but watch her hurt him. I was helpless. I covered my mouth to hold my anguish inside, searching half memories and foggy thoughts to find something that could save him.
He’d told me to remember. Remember what? There was nothing in my mind but fragments of another life and terror of this one.
He kneeled before Bevgyah, defeated, his arms limp at his sides as she yanked his face toward her by his horns. Why didn’t he do anything to stop her? He should have been strong enough to fight back, but he didn’t.
His wings sagged behind him revealing tight toned muscles and...from this angle I could see what looked like silver markings that snaked around where his wings met his shoulder blades.I knew those tattoos.I’d seen them before. IknewI’d seen them before. Delicate serpentine dragons that danced down his spine. A piercing headache flashed behind my eyes, and I squeezed them shut. So many things that were only half there, but I needed to remember.
“Have you lost your will to live?”
“I haven’t had it for quite some time, I assure you.”
Bevgyah leaned down closer to his ear. “I plan to make her suffer, bleed, and die before you for this,” she said with a breathy voice. “I’ll make her beg for death before I’m finished with her.”
He didn’t move, a beautiful black statue that came with a flash of a memory. Serpents on either side of stone steps. I racked my brain. There had to be something there. Something important that I could remember. The foggy edges of a place, black walls and golden light. A delicious green apple.
“Has life been so horrible at my side, Blackwarden?”
He didn’t answer, and I suspected it was because whatever he’d say would have been unfavorable. True, but definitely not what the queen wanted to hear.
“I’ve tried so hard to tame your arrogant heart. Perhaps this hasn’t been an appropriate punishment?”
Arrogant heart... There was a smirking face, beautiful, with dark eyes and pale skin and black horns. A hand reaching to take mine.
“Why is it you never do as I ask?” she spat.
“I’ve done your bidding for five hundred years, Bevgyah. Perhaps you’ve forgotten.”
Five hundred years? He’d been her prisoner, her consort forfive hundred years? This was how he managed to stay so calm. As horrifying as it was to think, he was used to her torture.
“I forgetnothing.That’s why you’re here!” she said.
“There’s one thing you’ve forgotten, Bevgyah.” His voice held a silky tone; it curled around me and pulled my hand to the doorknob again.
I knew that voice. There were faces. So many faces in golden frames. A man sitting across from me at a table. Two delicate black glass egg cups in front of him.
“You gave me a choice, death or to submit as your consort, but after five hundred years, I can choose differently.”
Bevgyah didn’t move.
The air seemed to freeze in the room. What was he saying?
“You would choose death now? When you’re so close to having your pathetic human lover?”
