Page 108 of Thief of Souls
I can’t help thinking of the way he kissed me that long-ago summer.
Every day I’d promised to kill him, and every day he’d simply laughed and said, “No, you won’t.”
And I hadn’t. I hadn’t beenableto.
It’s the one time my knife has hesitated, the one time I’ve failed. It cost me more than he will ever know.
It cost me my heart.
My cruel, treacherous heart.
“Curse you,” I whisper as I run my tongue over my teeth, searching for the capped one. I break the tiny glass vial embedded there, and as the antidote floods my mouth, I lean down and kiss him.
Shoving my tongue into his mouth, I force the antidote within him. Tiny shards of glass cut my lips until I can taste my own blood. Taste his mouth. Taste him.
One single stolen kiss.
It reminds me of so many others. It reminds me of everything I forced myself to forget.
A hand suddenly sinks into my hair, and then I gasp as Mistmark wakes beneath me, sucking in a huge breath.
I jerk back, patting his cheek. He’s alive. I wasn’t too late.
But as his lashes flutter against his cheeks, I know I have to get out of here. He cannot discover I was here.
I barely escaped him last time.
A hand catches at mine as I turn to flee. “Sora?” His glazed eyes search for me.
He shouldn’t be able to sense me.
Once again, that fucking inexplicable bond between us has bound me in place.
“I thought… you tried… to kill me…?” His vision finally seems to focus upon my face.
My heart skips another beat as a thousand emotions wage war within me. “I did,” I whisper, and then, unable to help myself, I lower my face to his, stealing another kiss from his cold mouth.
One last desperate taste of him before I vanish.
He’s fading as I come up for air, his eyes rolling back in his head. The antidote will take several minutes to work its magic, and he’ll be weakened for weeks. It was the best I could come up with when Zemira first worked over this plan with me.
This poison is an inevitable death once ingested.
But the recovery is swift, and the consequences few.
As much as I want to kill him, I don’t actually want to hurt him.
He’s got you twisted in so many knots, you don’t even know yourself.
Cupping my palm over his eyes, I slowly close them. Maybe he’ll remember me. Maybe he won’t. But I can’t just leave without saying goodbye. “Sleep well, my lord.”
And then I steel myself and push to my feet, turning toward the doors.
Except I’m no longer alone.
“I wondered what you would do,” Falion says, leaning against them and watching me from beneath his silvery lashes.
Mistmark’s assassin.
