Page 31 of Reigning
Those are the repeated words I continue to tell myself for hours into the evening.
The door at the top of the stairs spills white light across the dark dungeon floor and the little bit of hope that I was clinging to leaps to life inside me. Silence builds into something unmanageable in my mind, and it kills me that I don’t hear the heavy footsteps of his boots during that time.
Until he comes into the light in front of our cell.
“Are you okay?” I shove open the unlocked door the moment he’s close.
Every inch of him is naked and damp. His big hands shake, but his jaw is strung tight with strength and pride. When I slip my fingers through his, his skin is freezing to the touch. I pull him closer to find every part of him is unnaturally cold. A violent tremor trembles through his frame; it’s enough to bring him to his knees and take me right along with him.
That fire of heat I keep inside myself to keep out the chill of the dungeon sears through my skin until I’m sweating, but I give all that unbearable heat to Kain as I hold him. He shakes his head, his damp hair skimming along my neck.
“She took me to Minden herself.” His voice is a growl that hums through the room. “I thought she’d torch the kingdom just like she wanted, but we landed in the center of the village. She strode off of me and into the crowd like an idol ready to be idolized. The town’s people knew who she was immediately. She wanted to be worshipped, and they did just that. She promised them she’d be back to take care of them as she did in the old days. She said she’d return to them no matter the cost.”
“Why the fuck are you like this then? What happened?” Rime lowers himself down on his hunches, pulling off his shirt and draping it across Kain’s shoulders. Rime’s cold eyes eat up every weakness in his friend right now.
There’s a murderous glint in Rime’s gaze that’s fixated on the very next thing Kain says.
“When we flew over the gate of Attika, just past the border, she leapt off of me. In mid-flight, she just jumped off.” Kain’s jaw clenches at the same time his fists do. “Her voice was like an echo through the wind. She said I could walk back. That she knew I loved my mate and that I’d return to her at all costs. And to ensure that what happened yesterday never happens again, she was going to take away my biggest strength.”
I notice then that the halo around his head is just a dark line of steel. The warm burning color like Rime, Chaos’, and Sin’s is no longer in Kain’s device.
It’s the smallest detail, and it’s all I can think about for several seconds.
“What?” Chaos’ voice is so loud I flinch.
“That fucking cunt.” Rime’s growl immediately intensifies the frigid air wafting through the room.
“What…what did she take, Kain?” My tone is barely a whisper while the aggression of the other two shifters seems to press in on the quietness.
I feel like I’m the last to understand. Even Sinister looks like he might be sick at any moment, avoiding my questioning glance and keeping a distance from the four of us.
It kills me the longer the silence spans.
“What did she do?” This time, my scream scratches through the brick room, carrying so far that the people farther down shift anxiously.
Kain trembles once more, his muscles tensing in my arms before he peers up at me with a deadness in his deep-green eyes. “She took my ability to shift.”
The beating of my heart stops, restarting, catching, and stumbling to find its pattern again.
She took his fucking dragon?
My fingers shake when I casually run them over Kain’s thigh. Dark jeans form around his nakedness. He doesn’t even glance down. He keeps his eyes focused on me while I work and try to process what he just said to me. I run my index finger down the etching line of his abs, and a thick, long-sleeved shirt follows in its path. I drum vacantly along his arm as I think and, without really thinking, I add black shining boots to his feet, bringing the long laces up, crossing them in the air and tying them neatly without lifting my hand from his body. I busy myself with the mundane task of making him look completely presentable. Not a crimson hair is out of place on his head.
There’s an eerie calm inside me. The thoughts fly through my mind, though, one after the other, even as I skim my hand slowly up his shoulder, along his jaw, and through his wet hair. I press my lips to his in a single, chaste kiss. His brow lowers in confusion at my odd behavior, but he kisses me back.
“I’m going to murder her for hurting you,” I whisper against his mouth.
His head hits the floor hard when I stand abruptly. I manage to make it a single step before all four men catch my wrists at once.
“That’s…a little hasty, love.” Sinister searches my gaze, looking for some form of rational thought.
And finding none.
I take a small breath. Try to see it from his point of view. Tilt my head slightly to see if I can almost, sort of see logic from his angle.
Nope. I’m going to kill that bitch.
Four strong hands slip away from me when they seem to think I’ve found my rationality again and I start up the stairs in a flash of angry adrenaline.
