Page 52 of Cursed Shadows 2

With that, I stuff a chunk of chocolate into my mouth.

For a long moment, he watches me.

The moment snaps as he leans back with a grunt. He picks up his fork—and takes another piece of the black pudding. Just one piece, so I know he only does it to soothe me.

And just like that, our quarrel is over.

The moment we’re back in the shade of the thick branches above, concealed by the benches and trees around us in thepark, Daxeel tears the sweater from his body.

Really, he snatches the zipped front and just tugs hard enough that it somehow shreds off his leathers. The material falls to the path like confetti. And he steps on it, entirely uncaring of how easily he spoils this land.

“You litter,” I say it with a sniff.

His gaze cuts to me. “There is litter all over this park.”

He isn’t entirely wrong. ‘All over’ is something of an exaggeration, but there’s enough to prickle me and curl a silent snarl at my lips.

Crumpled up bags made from material I don’t know; an old worn-out boot down at the edge of an abandoned pond; there is even a metal basket on wheels that is toppled overinthe pond; and along the edges of the path, smoked parchments left to rot on the grass.

My gaze swings to the nearest mess can. A red shimmer catches my attention, a shiny piece of litter.

My pace quickens.

Daxeel keeps a leisurely stride at my side.

I feel the burn of his gaze searing into me as I bend to snatch up the red object, but I’m only focused on this—the bauble.

Turning it over in my hands, I eye it closely. Cracked surface, a tender ball of sorts, with the words ‘Merry Christmas’ etched onto it in silver glitter.

I have the urge to steal it away, take it home with me and hide it in my room. But it’s cracked, smeared in dirt, and so the temptation is mild enough that I might be able to fight it.

Daxeel’s soft breath suddenly brushes through my hair. “So very litalf of you.” He dips his head to ghost a kiss along my temple. “Blinded by the lure of false treasures.”

I stiffen.

That mocking kiss brushes along to the shell of my ear. “Will you throw yourself at my boots if I dangle something shiny in front of you?”

A scowl twists my face.

The urge to keep the bauble flames up inside of me. My fingers tense around it, but I draw on scraps of control, thoselittle disappointments about its cracked façade and the dirt caked into it.

I loosen my grip. The bauble falls to the grass. It’s so light it doesn’t make a thump as it lands, yet Ifeelit thump, like a heartbeat in my chest, and I steel myself against the instinct to keep the bauble for myself.

If there were no imperfections on it, I wouldn’t have been able to drop it. Then I might have died from the shame of Daxeel seeing me like that.

I throw him a withering look before I start back on the path.

A small smirk plays on his lips as he keeps pace beside me all the way to the bridge. He says nothing as I climb through first.

The circled warp of the tree trunk expands for us, opening like a doorway, and it’s too easy to fall back through to the light realm. So easy in fact that I wonder how more humans don’t end up on the other side, like they used to.

I wonder if it’s their new toys that keep them from falling through our bridges, that it’s the fones and the kars that distract them so well that they don’t so much as notice the shadowy bridges in their trees and streams and mushroom circles.

If any human were to land here, where I do in the willow field, I wonder how long they would survive before one of us snatched them up for the Eternal Dance or even to be servants in a house. Would they even make it that far? The trees here might kill them if they hit the wrong branch. They are sensitive like that.

Daxeel walks me through the field to my home. We’re only halfway through the field when he says, “Despite your human blood, you can live without their world. Could you live withoutthis?”

I study his profile for a moment.

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