Page 55 of The Mating Fire
Her breath hitched as her gaze roved over the creature, the long hair spilling down the back… the pointed ears like that of a goat, the horns protruding from the top of his skull were curved as a goat’s horns.
Fascinated, she crept closer. Suddenly the creature stood and snarled.
He stood nearly seven feet tall, with cloven hooves for feet, and his face was that of a fierce beast. Horns twisting from the front of his head were long, pointed. Demon horns. Yet this was no demon. No ordinary demon.
He looked like the stuff of nightmares, tales parents whispered to their children to coax them into behaving at Christmastime.
“Krampus?” she whispered.
The legendary German monster who tormented bad children at Christmas night while Saint Nick handed out gifts to good little boys and girls surely could not be standing before her.
The monster that had terrified her as a young girl.
The creature snarled again. “It is I, Harper Ashley. Jared Griffin. Now you know my secret.”
His long tongue flicked outward, the pointed goatee covering Jared’s once well-defined jawline. His eyes were dark as pitch, Jared’s eyes, but rimmed in red. His nose was long and sharp and as he opened his mouth, she saw two sharp fangs.
Harper stepped backward.
He advanced toward her. A leather loincloth covered his groin area. But for that large square of cloth, he wore nothing else but the fur on his body.
“Say it, Harper. Tell me what I am. Tell me how terrified you are of the grotesque beast.”
Curiosity killed not the cat, but the stupid girl dumb enough to open the door and see what he hid. Harper began to shake. She didn’t dare say anything, only stared at him as he kept creeping toward her.
Krampus, the monster who would devour her.
The nightmare was real.
“Say something,” he roared.
“Jared.” Her voice came out as a whisper. Maybe if he didn’t hear her, if she was silent and a good girl, he wouldn’t hurt her.Wouldn’t come lurching at her in the darkness, laughing at her screams as she tried to run from him…
“I am hideous. Do not lie to me. I know what I am.”
Whimpering, she kept backing away, toward the door, the exit offering safety, away from this horrible secret he held, the nightmare beast who haunted her dreams.
Harper backed up until her body hit the thick oak door.
She’d have to turn around to open it, slip away. Show him her back. Oh, but everyone knew the moment you turned your back on a monster, that was when he got you, slashing at you with those claws as you went down, pleading for mercy…
Fumbling for the door latch, she tried to be quiet, oh so quiet, her breath coming out in little whistling gasps.
“Now you know.” He smiled, a grotesque display of sharp teeth. “This is what I am, Harper Ashley. A beast, cursed to remain like this every night from midnight to sunset.”
“Please,” she whispered, her throat clogged. “I’m sorry I spied on you. Please don’t hurt me.”
Stupid pleas. They never left you alone. Hadn’t Jared himself warned her the demons were out to get her? Beasts like this had no gentleness, no compassion, no goodness in them. Not a droplet of love.
Only a vicious hunger to suck away all her magick and leave her drained as an Egyptian mummy.
And here in this castle, where he’d brought her, perhaps as his own private meal in the dark of night, she would meet her end.
He stopped in his tracks. Clawed hands hanging at his furred sides, his dark gaze… something in his eyes caught her attention.
Not triumph nor rage, no not even hint of bloodthirsty need to slash, tear and maim.
Something else. Jared’s eyes in Krampus’ face.
