Page 36 of Promise of Darkness
“What do you think you’re doing?” he demands.
I lead the white mare out of her stall and tie her up. “I’m coming with you. You’re the one who insisted that if I wanted to ride, then it had to be with you.”
“You’re the one who refused,” he comments coolly, his eyelids half-shuttered as he takes me in. “You’re up to something.”
“What could I possibly stand to gain?” I roll my eyes as I swiftly saddle the mare. “I’m bored. Your company is better than none. And I want to feel the bitter wind on my face and see something other than the inside of this cursed palace.”
He crosses his arms over his chest. “I would rather you didn’t.”
“I would rather I did.”
“And if I refuse?”
I pause. “Why would you refuse? I thought you wanted me to come with you.” I pretend to notice his sword. “You’reup to something.”
He stares at me for such a long time, I swear he’s going to deny me. “Fetch a cloak, a bow, and some warmer clothes. I’ll make a bedroll for you.”
“A bedroll?”
“Unless you want to share mine?”
When the Horned One walks the mortal realm again….
“I thought so,” he replies smoothly, as if my expression isn’t a complete insult right now. “I’d hurry. You have twenty minutes before I leave without you. And pack for a couple of days.”
Freedom.
I don’t waste any time.
Sprinting back to my rooms, I swiftly lace myself into warmer clothes, and then pause with my velvet-lined cloak in my hands. I don’t have anything warmer. I was expecting to be locked away in a palace when I packed, not invited to ride into the snowy wilderness.
And I was so furious at my mother that I hadn’t thought ahead.
By the time I return to the stables, I’m dressed, but not as I’d like to be.
The prince tosses a bedroll toward me, then arches a brow at my cloak. “You’ll freeze.”
“Some of us weren’t prepared for sub-arctic temperatures.”
“Then use your magic to ward yourself,” he says, leading his enormous stallion out of the stables.
My cheeks heat as I hurry after him. “I’ll be fine. Where are we going?”
“Beyond the range of Valerian’s warding spells,” he points out. “You may be warm now, Princess, but you won’t be warm where we’re going.”
Plenty of opportunity for him to suggest I curl up nice and close. I thought he’d like that. “Asturians have fire in their blood. We run hotter than most fae.”
“I know.”
It’s such a suggestive comment, I can’t help but arch my brows at him.
“Ward yourself,” he says, “or you’re not coming.”
The mare tugs at her reins as I stare at him.
Magic and I have never been close allies. I spent years trying to master the basics, only to have it slip through my fingers at the most inopportune times. It’s there, within me. I know, because I can feel it. But accessing it is like trying to capture pure moonlight in my hands. The only thing I have any success with is creating fire.
Sometimes.
