When light bathed the side of his face, those nerves settled and her courage rose again.
She spoke before he could.
“Sending your brothers to seal a gate straight after a fight was reckless. Dangerous.”
His features remained flat, unreadable, as he stared at her in silence.
As time trickled past, she struggled to keep her nerves at bay, to keep her chin tipped up and confidence shining through. He wasn’t the first one to attempt to impose some sort of command over her by looking at her in such a way, and he probably wouldn’t be the last.
It didn’t bother her. She wouldn’t be cowed by him. She wasn’t afraid of him.
She really wasn’t.
She was about to demand that he say something when he finally spoke.
“I have seen you with Daimon and I witnessed the effect you are having on him on the battlefield tonight.” His voice turned colder, chilling her as she subtly curled her fingers into fists at her sides, steeling herself. Keras took a step towards her, and she barely resisted the urge to back off one. Darkness rolled off him in menacing waves, blackening his eyes, and the power he always emitted rose, wrapped like shadows around her that felt as if they were choking her. His eyes narrowed slightly, a cruel twist to his lips as he leaned towards her and whispered, “If you hurt my brother, I will see to it that not only you but your entire coven suffer for it.”
Her spine stiffened.
“How dare you threaten my family.” She slapped him hard, her hand flying before she could consider the consequences, her heart jacking up into her throat as her blood thundered and adrenaline surged.
He didn’t even flinch.
Cass struck him again, the sound of her palm connecting hard with his cheek ringing in the still night air.
His pupils widened for a heartbeat before they shrank back to normal.
She hit him a third time, catching his mouth more than his cheek.
He exhaled hard, the sound breathy as his pupils dilated and contracted again, but she felt no anger in him, no sense that he would retaliate.
There was only the strange feeling that he wanted more.
She stared at him, scratched out the thought she’d had about him when he had moved like a shadow along the walkway.
This side of him unnerved her the most.
Something was seriously wrong with this god.
He lifted his right hand and brushed the pad of his thumb across his lower lip, catching the blood there. He sucked it from his thumb and stared at her, silent and still, an air of expectation surrounding him.
Because he wanted her to strike him again.
She stood her ground despite her nerves, despite the fact half of her wanted to leave and the rest wanted to slap him again.
“I would never hurt Daimon so there’s no need to threaten my family,” she bit out, emphasising each word as she stared into his green eyes.
She wasn’t sure how long she stood there in the garden, her flesh chilling as the night dragged on, locked in a silent battle with Keras.
But it was growing light and she was cold to the bone when the scent of snow and spice hit her.
Warmed her.
Daimon.
Keras must have sensed his return too, because he blinked and when he opened his eyes again, it was as if nothing had happened. His perfect features lost all the darkness they had held and his eyes lost the twisted hungers that had filled them.
He turned away from her and strode towards the house, and when he reached it and stepped up onto the walkway, he said, “I will tend to him.”
He took Marek from Valen and carried him towards his room, turning his profile to Cass.
She stared at him, studying his features and the feelings she could sense in him, and frowned. He was the calm and collected god she had always witnessed, not even a lingering trace remaining of the person who had been standing here with her, craving violence from her.
Taking pleasure from it.
Did his brothers know about that side of him, the one who had looked ready to provoke her just so she would strike him again?
She edged her eyes towards the main room of the house.
Cursed in Russian when she saw the state of Daimon.
Her heart lurched into her throat as he hobbled onto the walkway, his right arm banded around his stomach and blood covering the left side of his face.
The urge to strike Keras blasted through her, coupled with a desperate need to go to Daimon, and a foolish hope he would accept her help.
Because she needed to take care of him.
She sent a prayer to the gods that for once, Daimon wouldn’t fight her.
Even when the darkness that shone in his eyes as they met hers said that he would.
Said more than that to her.
It whispered a terrible truth.
Keras wasn’t the only one who courted pain.
Daimon had let the daemons hurt him.
Chapter 19
Darkness was a living, writhing thing inside him. It whispered, coaxed and seduced, and Daimon did his best not to listen to it, not to be swayed by its black magic.
To ignore the craving for violence that blazed inside him.
But it was strong.
Far stronger than he was in his current state, his mind fragmented, torn in two directions.
Images stuttered across the darkest corners of that mind, taunting him with flashes of Cass with another man, a faceless and nameless one who was her destiny.
Who she was apparently resolved to go to even though he had seen the doubts in her eyes.
Daimon stared at the daemons surrounding him, singling out all the males, his mind labelling them as Cass’s intended. He cut through them, a whirlwind of ice and steel, taking some down with spears and
