Thief of Souls
Bec McMaster
Copyright © 2021 by Bec McMaster
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Cover: Covers By Combs
Editing: Hot Tree Edits and Olivia Ventura
Proofread: Julie K
To obtain permission to excerpt portions of the
text, please contact the author at
www.becmcmaster.com
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Contents
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Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
22. Soraya
23. Zemira
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
27. Keir
28. Zemira
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Afterword
Promise of Darkness
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Also by Bec McMaster
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1
I drown a thousand times.
Every day, for months. Sometimes twice a day. Sometimes three times. In the cold, dark silence of the Abyss it’s difficult to keep track, so it’s only when the winch starts clanking that I get my first warning that we’re going to play this game again.
My stomach tenses, and I jerk out of the half-comatose reverie I’ve been existing in. No. No, not again. Pain screams through my shoulders. I’ve been hanging in these chains for so long that the only time I can feel my arms is when they threaten to dunk me into the pit of water below.
My throat is raw from screaming, and there’s no point.
There’s no one here to hear me anyway.
This is the cost of failure.
As the chains lower me back into the watery pit, I can’t stop myself from shaking. I don’t want to do this. Not again.
But when I returned from the Court of Dreams without the Dragon’s Heart I was sent to steal, my father sentenced me to three months in the Abyss.
Three months hanging in chains over a watery pit, just waiting to drown again.
It won’t kill me.
I might, however, begin to wish I could drown and be done with all of this.
That’s the problem with being a half-breed. The fae are long-lived, and wraiths are difficult to kill. I can heal from almost anything, if given the chance.
It’s both a gift and a curse.
Because the ability to heal from most things means the ability to survive most things.
The first shock of frigid water hits my bare toes.
“Stop!” I grab for something to save me—anything—and then I suck in an enormous breath.
The chains rattle faster as I’m plunged into a watery grave. The cold iron that burns around my wrists shoots straight for the bottom, taking me with it.
No matter how many times this happens, I still fight. Far above me, high in the tower, is a single lantern, and I can see that firefly glow slowly fading as the chains haul me lower.
A bubble escapes me—an unconscious cry of fear—and then several more as panic starts to set in. Kicking hard, I yearn for the surface, but the weight, the wretched weight, is dragging me down, down, forever down—
Pressure crushes my chest.
Please. Please, no. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to fail. I won’t fail you again, Father. I won’t. I promise I won’t—
It’s so hard to keep holding on. My lungs kick like a mule, heaving at my ribs. Nothing. There’s nothing there. Only my ears threatening to pop, and bubbles slipping from my mouth as I try to capture them with my hands and hold such precious oxygen in….
The first mouthful is the worst.
I scream, but there’s no air. Only thick, wet weight that sinks through my lungs and the anchor that hauls me to my doom. Maybe this time will be the last time. Maybe this time my father will keep me down long enough that even my body can’t heal itself.
Darkness roars over me, but it’s not the warm cocoon of nighttime. It’s a greedy fist locking around my throat and choking me.
Please! Please help me!
A little spark of light burns to life in my chest like a hot coal.
Magic. Pure magic.
I reach for that spark with desperate hands.
“Merisel?” whispers a startled voice in my head.
A male voice.
Merisel? That’s not my name.
Why would he call me…?
My eyes blink open in horror, but it’s too late.
Because the spark of magic is consuming me, right at the moment where consciousness meets that dawning darkness.
Heat and flames snap around me, and I’m pulled through time and space until I finally slam into the world again.
I suddenly blink and find myself standing within an enormous bedroom. The first gasp of air sends me to my knees, slapping wet palms on the tiles. I can breathe again. Hot, blistering air that burns my ravaged throat and lungs. Warm. The tiles are warm. I want to kiss the floor and bathe in that heat. Or maybe just collapse. Water pours from my body, my shirt clinging to every inch of me. I can’t move. I want to, but I simply don’t have the strength within me.
This is some sort of gift, but fate never deals me a hand like this. Miracles are for pretty blonde fae princesses who have never known a day of toil in their life, until the moment they’re horribly cursed or prick their finger on an enchanted spinning wheel. There’s always a kiss stamped into their destiny, a twist of fate, hope.
But even though my silvery hair might charitably be called blond in a certain light, and my father technically is a king, I’m not that princess. I’m the villain of the story. I’m the thief, the liar, the girl of storms with her mercenary heart.
I am the Wraith King’s daughter,
