Page 22 of My Dark Horse Prince

I can’t bring myself to look at the naked man, who must be part icicle by now. At least it stopped raining. “And?”

“He and his two best friends fell victim to some part of the magic that made them the way they were by refusing to help some other friends of theirs.”

Aleksandr coughs.

“Okay, more like, acquaintances of theirs. It triggered some kind of curse.”

“A curse?”

“We’re looking into it,” she says. “But until today, we haven’t had any luck at locating his friends or figuring out the details of the curse.”

“Grigoriy?” I ask. “That’s one of his friends?”

She nods. “The good news is, this is Grigoriy’s house.” Kris points. “So the fact that he popped up here, close by, is really good.”

His house. The enormous mansion is. . .the naked man’s house? “Wait. He owns that?” I can’t help turning around to look—and seeing a very naked, still quite hot, and also covered-in-goosebumps man behind me. “Someone get that guy a shirt and some pants.” I shake my head.

Aleksandr springs into action, shedding his coat. “You’re never cold, so I didn’t think about it as an urgency.”

“My powers aren’t working for some reason,” Grigoriy says softly, clearly shivering. “Wha-wha-what’s going on?”

“You’re lucky I was here,” Aleks says. “No one else was awake when I woke up, stuck in my equine form. I was taken by some horrible men, sedated heavily over and over, broken to be ridden, and made to race with men on my back.”

Like a ton of bricks being dropped on my head, it all starts to make sense. “Wait.” I turn back to face Kristiana. “Obsidian Devil?”

She nods.

“He’s—Aleksandr is Obsidian Devil? They’re the same—er—not person, but they’re the same. . .entity?”

“The very same,” Kris says.

Of course. “That’s why I never saw him with the horse he was supposed to be training.”

Kris shrugs.

“You have no idea how many jokes the grooms made about him. They all thought you were sleeping together, but no one could figure out why you kept him around just for that.” I should not have said that, judging by the look on her face. I throw my hands up. “I defended you.”

“How classy of them.” Kris looks irritated as she turns to face Aleks. “Now that she knows, maybe we. . .” She tosses her head up the hill, toward the mansion this man apparently owns.

“Yes, that’s a good plan. I could use a very stiff drink.” Grigoriy sounds far too calm for someone who was recently bucking and rearing back as a horse and who was apparently stuck sleeping for a long time under some curse. “I assume Heinrich stuck around, even if many of the staff left. He’ll have kept the best vodka safe.”

“Is there any good vodka?” My joke falls a little flat with this crowd.

Even Kris, who should have laughed, looks preoccupied. “About the staff.”

“Clearly, given the state of my home, not many of my people stuck around once I disappeared.”

Aleks cringes. “Yeah, so.”

“So, what?” Grigoriy glances from Aleks to me and back again, as if I might know what’s making his friend nervous.

“Don’t look at me. I haven’t met anyone. I have no idea who Heinrich is.”

“It’s been a hundred years and change since we were cursed,” Aleks says. “All your staff, whether they stuck around or not, are now dead.”

This time, Grigoriy’s the one sputtering. “What?”

“It took me the better part of a month to get this pile of rubble looking as good as it looks right now. It’s a work in progress, but it’s much better than it was.”

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