“It is no matter.” Apex shrugged my thanks off like it didn’t mean anything to him. So much for apologies. “You are right to be quick and ready to attack those who threaten you. In the future, it could mean the difference between life and death. But you do not need to fear me, Atlanta. I am not here to threaten you in the least. I am only here to attempt to take you away from this place, safe and sound.”
“Okay…” I mulled that tidbit of information over carefully. There were a million questions bouncing around in my head, but one was so much bigger than all the others: “Why?”
“Maybe I have pity for you.”
“Well, don’t.” I turned my chin up at him. “I’m not pitiful. I don’t need your pity.”
“Perhaps pity is not the right word. Empathy, I think, would be a better one. Taken from your home, captured, manipulated, caged…” Apex shrugged slightly. “I know what that feels like.”
“You do?” I raised an eyebrow at that. Apex looked like he could easily rip anyone in two if they so much as tried to control him. It was hard to imagine that someone like him could have been put through anything at all comparable to what had happened to me.
“I do. My mother, moons save her spirit, died giving birth to me. Whatever male of my species had forced himself on her apparently did not want to take responsibility for me after.” The coldness in Apex’s eyes seemed more profound than ever as he spoke. No light danced in his dark irises now. “I was given to House Brixta, who control the intelligence forces on Lunaria. Lady Idria, of whom you spoke so candidly of during Lieja’s feast, trained me with the other orphans from the time we could walk.”
“Trained you…for what?”
“To become a specter—an agent capable of operating in the shadows. To listen. To learn. To glean intelligence from even the most resistant parties. And, if necessary, to kill.”
“But if you were only a child…” I shook my head. “That’s terrible. It’s so…unfair.”
“That is life, Atlanta.” Apex tucked his hands behind his back and began walking a slow, measured circle around me. “There is no fair.”
“Okay.” Well, that was grim, then. “But if you really do intend to help me…you’d be putting your neck out for me, right? You already had to, in order to get me out of the dungeons—and again, to get me out of that cage. You don’t just do that for someone you feel empathy or sympathy or pity, or whatever for.”
“Why not?” Apex scoffed. “In the end, the why of it does not truly matter, does it? I am offering to take you away from Nightmoor. To reunite you with your sister and help you build a life for yourself that does not involve cages and chains. It would be a way out for you—and it is not exactly as though you have any other alliances being offered to you. Left to Lieja’s whims, even if you could behave yourself, you must have realized that those who serve her are as dispensable as the bones of the meat she picks clean at every feast she throws. You would last for a time, but you would not last for long.”
“And you’re saying I’d fare better with you? I don’t even know you, Apex—and you don’t know me, either.”
“Don’t I?” Apex paused before me as he completed his circle.
“No,” I said firmly. “You don’t.”
“I would not be so sure of that if I were you.” Apex let out a sharp breath of air through his nose, like I’d just amused him somehow, then resumed with his circling. “It is true, if you choose to trust me, you will still need to obey me. I do not wish to make you a slave, but I will not have you compromising us both with insubordination and ridiculous antics. You must follow my commands—even when they do not suit you. If you are unable to do that, you will not make it off Nightmoor alive, Atlanta. Of that much, I can guarantee.”
“That sounds like a threat,” I pointed out.
“It does. But it is not one. Merely a hard truth.”
“If I do agree to…obey you, or whatever, though…” All this talk of following orders was beginning to turn my stomach. “I’d just be trading one master for another.”
“Perhaps. But given the choice between a comfortable life under the temporary rule of another, or an uncomfortable life in chains, I would certainly choose the former.”
“I…” I sighed. I didn’t like it, but he wasn’t exactly wrong. “Okay. My obedience in exchange for you getting me the heck out of here. But this time, no more cages.”
“No more cages,” Apex agreed.
I still felt like I was getting the short end of the stick here, but all things considered…it could be worse. That was a bad situation, but I’d seen firsthand how cruel and unhinged Lieja could be. She beat her servants. She even treated her lovers like scum. Without Apex’s help, things could easily get a lot worse for me.
As long as I could trust him. Which was a gamble right now—a big one—but one that I’d have to take.
“So…what do you want me to do, then? Where do we start?”
“Undress, then get into bed.” Apex said it like it was something so simple.
Immediately, I was beginning to regret even entertaining the idea of trust.
“What? You genuinely think I’m going to sleep with you! After everything we just discussed…” A kiss on the hand was one thing. Calling him sir and following his orders would be difficult, but I could manage. This, though…
It could be fun, my inner
