Page 36 of The Beast King's Bride

“You’re like a prickly cat,” I inform him. “We had a few around the kitchens. Always hissing and biting.”

“I don’t hiss,” he says with great dignity and I glance up at his face, surprised to find a teasing gleam there. “And I bite only on occasion.”

“That appears to be the only difference,” I mutter and I’m disconcerted to find a smile on my lips. “Let’s see. I have to take your belt off.”

He says nothing, which I take as agreement. I step closer to him, reach for the silver square buckle, and am aware of his body like never before, his height, the way his shirt stretches over his impressive physique, that wild scent curling around me like a vine.

I know I spent some time on the horse with him pressed to my back and how intimate that had felt, but this is different, probably because I’m facing him, and he’s looking down at me, eyes seeming to track my every movement, limpid in the dancing flames like dark crystals.

“You have a warrior’s hands,” he says as I finally unbuckle the belt and grab the hem of his shirt, untucking it from inside his trousers, the silky material catching on my rough fingertips and palms.

“A servant’s hands,” I say. “From peeling carrots and turnips. Haven’t you ever noticed your servants’ hands?”

“Looks like another kind of battle.”

I don’t know what to say to that. All my life I struggled with myself, longed to return into the good graces of the human royal court. A reflection perhaps of people’s behaviors around me. They made it clear that only a noble had respect and any prospects for a happy life.

And his words make me think… they make me think I was wrong to assume that. It’s bewildering.

“All these books in here,” I say. “They can’t be all reports. You like reading.”

He frowns. “Once upon a time, I did.”

I’m about to ask what happened but I already know. The Decay. The curse. But then my thoughts become sidetracked as I lift his shirt to bare the wound. His muscled stomach is a work of art, grooves and planes clearly defined, skin smooth like polished marble. I find myself wanting to touch it, splay my hands over it, trace its lines up, unlace his shirt and take it off him—

“When did the curse fall on your lands?” I grip the hem tightly, needing to focus on something else before I do something foolish.

“Long ago,” he says.

“Always so forthcoming with information.” I swallow a sigh of frustration.

“Do you read?” he asks, not mentioning the fact that I’m still gripping his shirt, not doing anything. Maybe he thinks it’s some weird, incomprehensible human ritual.

“I started learning, long ago. That was before the royals decided that I wasn’t one of them and sent me to live in the kitchens with the servants.” I shrug, dismissing the old pain, and lift his shirt a little more, finally baring the makeshift bandage wrapped around his ribs. “Long story short, no, I can’t read.”

“The kitchens. But I met you at the ball, dressed in a gown—”

“I stole it. Well, borrowed it.” The bandage is thick, yet soaked in blood. I tug it down and barely manage to suppress a flinch. “Gods, this looks bad.”

He says nothing as I stare at the deep gash in his side that’s seeping blood, the edges an angry red.

“It looks infected. There’s poison in your blood.”

“The iron,” he says.

“Right. How do you heal from iron wounds? Don’t you just… magic them away or something?”

His stony gaze weighs on me. His lips press into a tight line.

“No replies, huh? I suppose you would have healed yourself if you could. Funny, I always thought that the Fae kings had great power. That’s what they say.”

“You humans also think that leaving us bowls of cream will buy our favor, as if we’re cats.”

“Didn’t we just establish that you are, indeed, like a prickly cat?”

He growls softly at that, and boy, do I like the sound. What’s wrong with me?

“So what you’re saying is that humans are stupid,” I mutter.

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