TWENTY-FOUR
Pity me?” Sian had once been one of the most perfect male specimens in all the worlds!
Desired. Pursued. Coveted.
His ego took yet another blow. He felt it all the more because she was right. He was lonely. But he hadn’t been before her return—because he’d drifted through his life like a sleepwalker.
Now she was awakening things in him best left dead.
That stubborn pride of his made him lie: “I’m hardly lonely. My concubines cater to my every filthy desire.”
“Then you can take them from the cupboard.”
“You will dine with me each eve.”
“I’d rather eat dirt.”
“That can be arranged,” he grated. “Again, this isn’t an invitation. You’ve received a command from your king.”
She bit out: “Not—my—king.”
He inhaled for calm, reminding himself of the illusion he’d seen in the fire.
In hell, mystics read flames. Sian’s own mother had been a pyromancer.
He didn’t know if the castle had spoken, declaring Calliope its mistress, or if Sian’s subconscious had supplied the vision, but either way, he knew better than to ignore it.
Tomorrow night at dinner, he would harness his temper. He would treat her as if she were made of glass.
He gazed down at his long, sharp claws. In those first days, he’d been crazed with the fragile fey. How many times had he hurt her?
There had to be a way to retract his claws fully. He’d been in this form for so short a time, he still didn’t understand all the facets of his evolving—devolving—body.
He pictured his claws retracting even more—and they did! He was about to call her attention to it, but she appeared to be reaching her limit with him.
“Now that you’ve put away your doll, you can leave.”
He exhaled. Even if he’d treated her like his queen, Calliope could never accept a life in hell. Much less his monstrous appearance. She would attempt to escape him again and again, for the rest of her life.
The odds of her return had been hundreds of billions to one. Right now the odds of any kind of understanding between them seemed far less likely.
Even if he could discover a way around all their obstacles, she would never forgive his upcoming invasion of her home. Still he said, “Calliope, I don’t want to fight with you anymore.”
“No, I’m well aware of what you’d rather be doing with me.” Hands balled into fists, she snapped, “You’ve imprisoned, starved, and abused me. As you told me less than an hour ago, you’re the Møriør who poses the greatest threat to me. Why in the gods’ names would I ever kiss you?” She was shaking even more.
Any female who’d trembled near him in the past had quivered from desire—all females save the one linked to him by fate. She’d hated and feared him since she was young.
Picturing Calliope as a little girl afraid of monsters, he scrubbed his palm over his face. His repulsive face.
Wait . . . His brows drew together as he recalled her words: Why in the gods’ names would I ever kiss you?
Among all the reasons for not kissing him . . .
She’d never mentioned his appearance. Could they get past it? As he gazed down at her, he felt as if some constriction around his throat was loosening.
She turned from him, all but dismissing him, then headed to her new room.
Biting back commands, insults, questions, he traced away. In his quarters, he stared at the hand mirror lying on his bed as an opium addict would a pipe.
Was the mirror a new lifeline? With a curse, he surrendered to his compulsive need to watch her. She paced at the end of the bed.
He winced at the lewd writing surrounding her. She was an innocent, yet he’d put the female in a former sex den, his idea of a joke.
She glared at her ring, then made her way to the balcony railing. She stretched her right hand past it. When she tried to do the same with her left hand, the ring wouldn’t pass the invisible barrier.
She muttered, “Sneaky fucking Abyssian.” Her eyes shimmered as her tricky mind plotted retaliation. He welcomed it, enjoyed the games they played.
As long as she couldn’t escape.
In the past, Sian had felt as if he’d stared at that miserly hourglass, willing a single grain of sand to drop. The hours he’d just spent with her had sped by faster than any before them. His loneliness ebbed whenever he was simply near her. Even when they fought.
I want her.
He wasn’t ready to release his lifeline and let himself free-fall—how could he ever bring himself to trust her?—but he knew beyond a doubt that he couldn’t live without her passion.
He would possess her for his own; he could try.
Just as Goürlav had done, Sian would bravely enter the godsdamned ring.
He would investigate possibilities, pouring his energy into a potential future with his mate—which meant he needed to clean up his life so he could focus on her.
Right now he had twelve too many concubines and a debt to the Sorceri hanging over his head. Picturing the ordeal to come, he ripped off his shirt, then stretched out on his bed.
Damn. This is going to hurt.