The blood in my veins runs cold as he points to a spot a yard away behind a thick trunk. He would have had a perfect view of my intimate act with Dain. I bite my lip. “I’m sorry,” I whisper.
“You’re sorry?” He hisses. “You are supposed to be my wife within the month. Yet you betrayed me.”
“It’s not as if either of us is in love with the other,” I say, desperately searching for an excuse. “Our relationship is a facade.”
“Our relationship,” he repeats, trailing off. I can see the muscle in his jaw twitching as he grinds his teeth. “You aren’t who I thought you were.”
I feel a flash of anger at his words. “You never knew me at all.” I narrow my eyes.
“I thought I did,” he says, his voice losing its furious edge. He sighs. “I thought you were kind, funny, and beautiful. But all I see is a twisted, unhappy, lost girl.”
Twisted? Lost? I bristle, straightening my shoulders. “You have no idea what it’s like,” I hiss. “No idea how it feels to suddenly discover you aren’t who you thought you were – that you have an evil inside of you. I just want to know who I am.”
Altair looks at me sadly. “I could have told you who you were a week ago.”
His words send a lance of pain through my heart. “Altair,” I whisper.
“I care about you, Verity,” he says, closing the distance between us. I try to pull away, but he snatches my wrist. “I want you to be happy. I want us to be happy. Stop keeping such secrets from me.”
My lips part in surprise at his confession. And then his mouth is on mine, kissing me desperately. I yelp in surprise, but the sound is muffled. I’m stiff in his arms as he holds me close to his chest. But I don’t pull away. He’s soft and gentle with me, the opposite of Dain’s embrace. Slowly, I ease into him, relaxing. His tongue eases my lips further apart and our tongues tangle together. I feel a surge of passion as he deepens the kiss, nipping softly at my bottom lip.
Heat swarms through me like a fire blazing through a dry meadow. My nails dig into his back, pushing our bodies closer together. My head grows clear as we kiss and something in my chest clenches tightly. This is how I used to feel around Altair all the time. Our kisses, the few we had, were headier than this – more passionate and freer. He’s careful with me now, as if I’m a fragile doll. His hands rove down my back to cup my ass, squeezing tightly. I gasp, arching into him.
Both hands. The book.
I wrench away from him, eyes wild. I stare at his empty hands as he looks at me with confusion. The book is gone. “The book,” I pant, searching. “What did you do with the book?”
Altair is silent as I drop to my hands and knees and peer under the bench. I see it then, tucked half way beneath the root of a tree behind the bench. I drop to my stomach and grunt, straining for it. When I feel the warm leather binding in my hands again, I sigh. The tight sensation in my gut eases as the book is safe in my hands.
I look up and see Altair studying me pityingly. Shame washes through me as he turns on his heel and disappears into the foliage. Sometimes, we don’t need words to hurt someone. I kneel on the wet moss, book in my lap, staring at the place he disappeared into. There’s no chance at healing the chasm between us. Altair will have given up on me now. This is likely the last betrayal he will tolerate.
I feel something in my chest coil tightly, painfully. I shove the sensation aside and hold the book to my breast. All I want are answers. I want to know my history; why I have the Bloodbane oath running through my veins, waiting for Sadal to awaken it. Altair doesn’t want me to find those answers. He wants me to be content as the mortal, Verity. But I have too many questions for that. And although I don’t want to betray him, it seems more and more that I’m coming to cross-roads.
Altair, or myself?
I bite my lip, fighting the tears welling in my eyes. I used to think marrying Henry would be hard. Now I know that I’m beginning to learn the meaning of the word. My fingers tighten around the book until my knuckles are white.
Chapter 15
Cleo
I pace at the top of the keep, the howls of the demonic army echoing through the mountains. I hiss in response, trying to drown out the noise. For days now, the creatures from the ether have hunted in our mountains, waiting for the order to march on Alnembra. The few animals that roamed the mountains have scattered or been eaten. I’ve warned the covens to stay out of reach of the vile creatures. After what happened to our youngest coven, I can’t allow anymore of my sisters to fall prey to the demons, or to Sadal’s sick machinations.
The creatures’ roars grow louder as they chase one of their weaker members. I stare down at them, frozen in place. Black blood arcs through the air as the limbs are torn from the smaller demon. They fall upon the corpse, yellow teeth digging into its flesh. I watch, fascinated and disgusted at the same time as the corpse is devoured in seconds. The creatures disperse once the meat is gone. Soon, the howling resumes. I shudder back to my senses and feel a curl of anger as they sniff hungrily at the base of the keep.
Maaz has practically abandoned the Bloodbane to attend to Sadal. She spends much of her time with him or admiring the army he gave her. She has abandoned her duties to
