Page 19 of House of Gilded Nightmares

“Oy, there! You’re a pretty one.” He weaves as he leans, closing the scant distance between our tables. “Is that your husband?”

I hesitate only the barest of moments before nodding. Zyren’s expression has gone from light to the blackest storm in the matter of an instant.

“Too bad, that.” The drunk man reaches out and tugs a strand of pale hair that’s escaped the hood of my cloak. “I was about to show you a proper roll in the hay. The kind where you can’t walk straight for a week.”

My mouth falls open in shock at his brazen comment, but before I can draw another breath, Zyren’s hand darts out, quick as a snake. He snatches the man by the collar of his shirt and yanks him out of his chair. Then Zyren is towering over me, the drunken man dangling from his iron grip and gasping as the toes of his boots kick back and forth an inch above the ground.

Zyren’s voice is more terrifying than all the nightmares howling together in the night. “If you speak to her again, if you so much as look in her direction, I will cut out both your tongue and your eyes and string you up from the top of this building for the crows and vultures to feed upon. Am I understood?”

He doesn’t wait for a reply. He hauls the man to the door as if he weighs nothing and hurls him out into the street. Then he strides back to the table. When he reaches it, he looks down at the companion of the drunken man. Just that one look, and the other man tips over his chair in his haste to leave and scrambles for the door. The bar falls utterly silent as everyone stares in our direction.

“Let’s adjourn to our room,” Zyren says, casting a glare across the crowd in a clear warning to anyone else foolish enough to approach us.

I get up from the table and follow Zyren into the adjacent inn, the blood rushing in my temples and my heart pounding so loudly it hurts. We don’t speak as Zyren pays for a room, takes a key from the innkeeper, and leads the way up a set of wooden stairs to the second floor. It’s not until we enter the room and he closes the door behind us that my thoughts begin to slow down enough to think clearly.

“So much for not drawing attention,” I say, shaking my head.

“I didn’t have much of a choice, did I?” He scowls at me. “Tomorrow, we will break our fast here. It’s far too busy in that tavern.”

I cross the room and look out the window. It’s not a big room. The idea of spending it holed up here with this man makes me want to throw something.

“Where are you going to sleep?” I ask, looking over my shoulder at him. I point to the small single bed up against the far wall.

“I don’t need to sleep.”

“Of course not,” I scoff, rolling my eyes.

“You’re angry that I defended you down in the tavern.” It’s a statement more than a question. Zyren’s eyes burn into mine.

“I’m not angry about that. I’m angry you abducted me and are now forcing me to marry your king.” I stare at him incredulously. “How else am I supposed to feel?”

He doesn’t respond for a moment. “I am your guardian. It is my duty to protect you, and I will do whatever I must to ensure you are safe. It does not matter whether you like it or not.”

“You’ve made that very clear,” I growl. “Now, if you don’t mind leaving me in peace for a few minutes, I’m going to wash up.”

I walk to the corner of the room where a large clawfoot tub sits behind a silk screen, a screen that barely hides the tub from view. Behind it are two large wooden buckets filled with clean water, which only fill the tub about a third of the way, but it’s better than nothing. I strip off my new clothing, setting it carefully on a side table, and then I step into the tub. The water is, of course, cold, so I can’t help but shiver a bit.

I’m overly conscious of the fact that Zyren is standing just a few feet on the other side of the screen, which isn’t exactly solid. Other than the High Priest, who I interacted with very little before two nights ago, and the guards at the Amethyst Palace, I really haven’t been around many men in my life. Which is why what happened down in the tavern had been so shocking, as was Zyren’s reaction. Now I’m completely bare, in a room with someone who is mostly a stranger and definitely not a friend.

I wash with the soap next to the tub, luxuriating in removing all the mud I’d gathered over the many miles we’d traveled today. Zyren is so silent on the other side of the screen that I wonder if somehow he’s vanished. But when I finish up and step around the screen again with a towel wrapped firmly around me, he’s still there, standing by the door as if expecting someone to come bursting in at any moment.

Now that I am clean and have a full stomach, exhaustion swoops in on me. I don’t say anything to Zyren as I pull back the sheets and blanket covering the bed and climb beneath them. I turn my back to him, and within moments, sleep takes me.

In the dream, I am standing beside a huge black lake. A forest of golden trees frames the far side, just a glimmer of brightness in the distance. The shoreline is gray sand that sparkles faintly in the sun.

I am not supposed to be here. The realization brings a flicker of unease felt deep in my gut.

There is a boy next to me, around twelve years of age. He has light brown skin and black hair and silver eyes. He looks like…

The dream shifts, as they do, and suddenly the boy is not next to me but out in a small boat on the lake. I watch him from a distance. He has a fishing pole and a line in the water. I have one, too, in my own boat a ways away.

When the water begins to ripple, the boy is excited. He’s caught something. He calls over to me, face alight.

That’s when the surface of the lake erupts, and a creature of nightmares bursts from the water.

It happens with astonishing quickness, and it also stretches out for an eternity. A gaping maw. The flash of sword-like teeth. Huge black wings, and fins, and coils. A beast of darkest horror.

Then there is nothing on the surface of the lake except for one splintered piece of wood from the boat. One piece of wood and an expanding circle of ripples…

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