Page 54 of Crown of Storm and Silence
The cottage materializes around me, my magic tearing through protective wards like paper. The poison screams through my system at the exertion, but I ignore it. Nothing matters except the woman before me.
Nesilhan jolts awake in her rocking chair, her eyes wide with alarm as she takes in my presence—all six feet of barely contained violence standing in her moonlit room. The scent of her light magic hits me immediately, pure and clean, making the poison in my blood writhe in response.
"Say it again," I command, my voice deadly soft in the darkness.
She sits up slowly, one hand pressed to her belly in that protective gesture that makes my chest ache despite the fury consuming me. Even pregnant with my child, she instinctively knows I'm dangerous right now. Good. She should be afraid.
"Kaan—"
"Say. It. Again." Each word drops into the silence like stones into still water. The shadows around me pulse with each syllable, reaching toward her with hungry tendrils. "Tell me exactly what you did with that pathetic excuse for a man while I was slowly dying in the shadows."
Her throat works as she swallows hard, and I can see her pulse hammering against the delicate skin of her neck. The primal part of me wants to bite down right there, mark her so thoroughly that no other man would ever dare touch her again.
"I kissed Sinan," she whispers, and the admission hits me like a sledgehammer. "This afternoon. After I spoke with my brother."
The poison surges so violently I taste blood on my tongue. My vision goes dark at the edges, and I have to press my palm against the wall to stay upright. The cottage walls groan under the weight of my shadows as they spread outward, consuming every corner of the small room.
"And I suppose you thought I wouldn't find out?" I ask pleasantly, taking a step closer to her. The shadows around me writhe with hunger, reaching toward her with dark tendrils. My voice might be calm, but my magic tells a different story—violent, possessive, barely leashed. "Or perhaps you simply didn't care?"
She flinches back in the chair, her light magic flickering defensively around her. The golden glow makes my shadows hiss and retreat slightly, but they don't disappear. They circle us like predators, waiting for the moment I lose control completely.
"I thought you were going to kill him," she says quickly, fear and concern warring in her expression.
"I was," I agree with dark satisfaction, moving another step closer until I'm looming over her chair. The poison makes every movement feel as if pieces of glass are grinding in my joints, but I welcome the pain. It feeds my rage, sharpens my focus. "Still might, actually. The night is young, and I do so enjoy creative violence under starlight."
Her breath catches, and I can smell her fear now—sharp and sweet, mixing with the warm scent of her skin. It should repel me. Instead, it makes the darkness in my blood sing with approval.
"Kaan, please?—"
"Why?" The word cracks like a whip, and the windows rattle in their frames. "Why did you kiss him,zevciyem? Whatcould that pathetic little hero possibly offer that your husband cannot?"
She flinches at the endearment spoken with such bitter possession, and I see tears gathering in her golden eyes. Part of me—the part that still remembers how to love her—wants to comfort her. But the poison has its claws in me now, showing me images of her mouth on his, and all I can feel is rage.
"My brother... he told me things. About how I married you to save his life, about the choice you gave me. He said I'd be better off with someone human, someone who doesn't radiate darkness and death."
My shadows pulse with violence, and I have to grip the arm of her chair to keep from reaching for her throat. The wood splinters under my fingers. "And so you decided to test his theory by pressing your mouth to another man's lips?"
"I needed to know," she says desperately, her light magic flaring brighter as my darkness presses closer. The opposing forces make the air between us crackle with tension. "I needed to understand if I could feel something for someone else, someone safer?—"
"Did you?" The question emerges rougher than intended, carrying all the desperate vulnerability I'm trying to hide. The poison whispers that I already know the answer, that she's lost to me forever, but I need to hear it from her lips. "Did you feel something for him?"
She meets my eyes directly, and the honesty there nearly destroys me. "No. Nothing. It was... pleasant, but empty. Like kissing a stranger."
Relief crashes through me with enough force to shatter stone, though I refuse to let it show on my face. The poison recedes slightly, appeased by her admission. She felt nothing. The kiss that's been driving me to distraction, that made meconsider creative dismemberment as a viable life choice, meant absolutely nothing to her.
But the rage is still there, simmering under my skin. Because even if she felt nothing, she still allowed another man to touch what belongs to me. And that cannot go unpunished.
"Close your eyes," I command softly, my voice gentling despite the chaos still raging in my chest.
"What?"
"Close your eyes,hatun. Go back to sleep. We're not finished with this conversation."
She stares at me for a long moment, uncertainty flickering across her features. Before she can protest, I move closer and press my fingertips to her forehead. Shadow magic flows through the touch—not harmful, but compelling, wrapping around her consciousness like silk. Her eyes flutter closed almost instantly as the spell takes hold, drawing her into the deep sleep I need to bridge our minds.
"Sleep,sevgilim," I whisper as her breathing evens out into the rhythm of enchanted slumber. "Dream of me."
And I follow her back into dreams with very specific intentions about how this night will end.
