Page 100 of Settle Down, Princess

Where the hell had that prim little reply come from? The man stood before me, not the beast, but Creed had still not returned to the same person I met back in the stews at the docks. There was a sureness to his step as he came closer, a deadly intent in his eyes. He snorted in response, smiling slightly, which would’ve been reassuring if I hadn’t seen the flash of his fangs.

“Jess, then.”

He might not be a beast, but he was as naked as the day he was born. The dappled light that filtered past the trees seemed to caress every inch of his still much larger, masculine body. My eyes moved down of their own accord, taking in the scratches and beads of blood, cataloguing the wounds he had taken to get him here, but that wasn’t all. They slid further down, then widened, right before I jerked them away from the evidence of how Creed responded to me. He noted that with a widening smile, but it didn’t last long.

“I never would’ve allowed them to take you to the capital.” A dreadful earnestness in his eyes loosened something in my chest. “The king was never going to lay a single fucking finger on you. I’d break that, his fucking neck, this whole fucking country if that’s what it took to keep you safe.”

“Do you know how much I needed to hear someone say that?” My lips twisted into the semblance of a smile, but I felt no joy in it. “When my father delivered the news, when my mother told me what she intended…” I shook my head sharply, as if that would dislodge his words. “I would have given anything for someone to step forward and tell me exactly that with all of that confidence.”

My feet couldn’t stop moving, taking me in a circle around the clearing we now stood in, his doing the same. It was as if we were performing a dance, but it wasn’t a pleasant one. Each step brought the pain surging up.

“I needed a champion so very badly.”

“And I am that, Jess.” He cut across the circle, ready to rush by my side, but my jerk backwards stopped him. “I will always look after you.”

“But you didn’t.” I stopped then because there was no outpacing this. “You didn’t, Creed. You didn’t reassure a frightened girl. You didn’t tell her what she so desperately needed to hear.”

“If I told you anything, the commander would have gotten wind of it, and…”

“And what, Creed?” I asked, peering into his eyes as his head dropped down. “And what? What stopped you from telling me it would all be fine.” I tossed my head, forcing my eyes away to look at the forest around me. “One word from you would’ve changed… everything. I wouldn’t have considered running off into the forest.”

“You were going to run away?”

When my gaze locked with his, the sensation was almost painful.

“I wouldn’t have put my trust in men I had no business talking to.” He winced then, walking backwards as I approached this time. “I wouldn’t have been knocked unconscious. I wouldn’t have been trussed up like a roast pig, ready to be carved.”

“I know, Jess.” His voice broke then, and it felt like my heart did as well, but I couldn’t take on his burdens. I just couldn’t. “I know it’s my fault. If I’d said—”

“Why me and not the others?” My mind closed around this point like a steel trap. “Why bring me here and not all the other princesses? If the packlands are a safe haven for all women, why not them?”

“We didn’t know what he’d do the first time,” he said, his voice becoming hoarse with each word. “And the second… We thought she was from a country big enough, powerful enough the king wouldn’t dare harm her. The third took matters into her own hands and tried to kill him. She was executed as a result.” I flinched at that, my hand going to my throat. “The next had her head cut from her body for not being a virgin, and the fifth… We realised then what this was.”

His eyes met mine, and I noted that all the yellow had faded from them, leaving a very human hazel. Sad eyes they were, tortured ones.

“The king wanted Arik to die when he sent him to the army. When training failed to end him, the prince was put with the most unruly, least-disciplined cadets, thinking we’d kill each other outright or through our own stupidity.” He shook his head sharply. “But we made a name for ourselves, surviving one suicide mission, then another. The very thing designed to rid the king of his nuisance half-brother made Arik’s position stronger. The court knows he’s the only true born son of the king, and the whole of Khean knows the Bastard Prince. The king tried to kill his brother, and instead, he turned him into a hero.”

“A hero that stood by as women died.” I felt like I spoke for each one of them right now. “A hero that refused to step up and protect the weak from the brutal.”

“That’s how it works.” Creed stared into my eyes. “Nothing King Magnus threw at Arik made a lick of difference, until this. The first time a princess died, that bastard declared a challenge. Either keep ferrying high-born girls to the palace only to watch each one be broken like a spoiled child might dolls, or…”

He sucked in a breath, right as a breeze rippled through the forest.

“Or Arik had to stop him. Kill his brother, take the throne, become the next king of Khean. It’s why I couldn’t say anything to you, even though every fibre of my being needed to, because I knew I couldn’t rely on the commander to back my play. He will do anything to avoid sitting on the Emerald Throne, including seeing a bunch of women die.”

I blinked, my cheeks flushing bright red, as if I’d just been slapped. In some ways, I had been, by a truth I didn’t want to hear. The world belonged to men. I knew that before I left the palace that was my home, but now… The only way I’d ever be safe was to remove one man from the throne and place another upon it. My eyes met Creed’s then as they began to narrow.

“You want me to feel safe? You’ll do anything to make me feel protected? Then tell me how to do that, Master Creed. Tell me how to make Arik king.”

Chapter 58

Arik

Fuck.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

That was apparently the sum total of my thoughts the entire time I spent with the bloody crown princess of Stormare, and that didn’t improve now. The three of us were tired, bloodied, and bruised, but rather than sit at a table and drink down a big tankard of beer, we were all running towards the forest.

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