Page 55 of Hellish Fae
Just like tonight.
“Do you think your brother will look for you here?” Damien asks, glancing up at me.
“He’s too afraid,” Krave tells him. “He’s far too hated here. He and his father would be killed with slow, drawn-out deaths the second they stepped foot in the sand.”
What about me? As his sister, am I considered the same?
There are so many thoughts running wild in my mind, but the most prominent one is how content Catherine feels inside me right now. She’s silent. She’s resting. In peace.
Because she’s home.
We reach the top of a dune. Enormous pale buildings stacked atop each other crawl into the dark skyline. They’re whitewashed and unending. They stretch on like bleeding shadows, and I can no longer see a hint of sand between the structures. Best of all, far off along the horizon, a sparkling sea shines in the moonlight.
Is hell supposed to be this pretty?
Yes,Catherine replies on a painful tone that cuts through my chest at the sound of her remorse.
A smile, a real smile, pulls at Krave’s lips.
I love when he smiles, and that dimple shows in his left cheek. It’s a genuine look of happiness that I rarely see from him anymore.
We walk on.
I wish things were different between Krave and I. He’d be a good mate. A loyal and fierce protector.
If he wasn’t an informant on every little thing I do.
Everything that happens tonight, he’ll be forced to feed right back to my father. The magic that binds them hurts Krave if he keeps secrets from his handler. That’s how Nathiale knew I was in the fae realm. And he’ll know what I’m planning if I say any of it out loud.
I can never trust Krave. I know it, and he knows it.
And that’s a shame, because he was once the only person in all the realms that I did trust.
I was an idiot then.
Krave makes a direct line to a solid white building that’s identical to the hundreds of other white buildings surrounding it.
I have no idea what signals to him that this is the right place.
He knocks.
Only once.
A single hard rap of his knuckles.
I release my hands and slide down from my little perch on Ryke’s back. My feet meet the hot stone, and my heartbeat makes itself known. How is it I don’t trust Krave, but I don’t question him at all either?
How do I know this isn’t a setup my father and brother put in place to ship me off to a new realm altogether?
Whose house is this?
Why does he feel safe here, and why would he bring me here?
The sea stone white door slides open without a sound, and then there is no time for further questions.
A lithe man with an intense red mohawk lining his head meets Krave at eye level. His shining eyes are oddly golden and slightly mesmerizing. They don’t say a word to one another as mohawk guy pulls Krave forward and wraps his arms around him in a tight hug.
“Nix,” Krave says, clapping the stranger on the back with the widest smile on his face.
