The castle loomed overhead, its stone walls devoured by ivy creeping toward the roof’s many peaks, chimneys, and towers. From my view, there was a myriad of windows—most more than large enough for me to fit through—but I saw no other doors besides the main entrance. I would need to establish an escape route before I got in too deep tonight. The interior was alight with countless candles and chandeliers of iron, and the floors were filled with demonic reapers. They danced in the ballroom, surveyed from the overlooking balconies and staircases, and dined from tables filled with delicacies of expensive fruit and meats. Luxurious tapestries depicting scenes from hunts and from mythology draped over the walls, and spread across the stone floors were ornate eastern rugs.
I had attended balls and masquerades before, so I was no stranger to the festivities. I recalled a harlequin in Paris who was an angelic reaper famous among humans for his fire-breathing and disappearing acts. Some reapers had natural abilities that astounded even their own kind. This harlequin would make fire dance in his palms and spread over his entire body until he was drowning in flames, and then he would vanish into the Grim as if he had burned up. Moments later, just as the crowd began to panic, he would reappear in a flash of fire, perfectly unharmed and seemingly resurrected. However, Evantia’s masquerade had no fire breathers, no humans, and the only masked reapers prowling the halls were demonic.
I set about my plan to determine an exit. I made note of how to return to the front doors, but that would be my last resort. Making a quick escape through the middle of the ball would be conspicuous and potentially disastrous. Glancing over my shoulder to ensure I wasn’t being followed, I caught sight of a familiar face. Her white skin seemed to glow around her black gown, and her pointed face—still somehow lovely even with all those angles—was framed by endless red tresses. At last, Evantia in the flesh.
Luckily she hadn’t noticed my pausing and staring for several moments. I gathered my senses and spun, heading for a dark hallway leading away from the main floor. A hand clasped mine and pulled me against the body of a tall man whose face was hidden behind a sinister coal-black mask topped with horns, revealing only soft, sensual lips and burning, poison-blue eyes.
“You are very foolish for coming here,” he said, his voice low. “Suicidal, perhaps.”
“Bastian,” I said, taken by a pang of surprise and foreboding in my gut. “How did you know who I was? What if you had grabbed someone else and called them suicidal?”
He smiled, flashing bright white teeth. “I could tell by your lips. And your eyes. I could forget neither, She-wolf.”
“I was just going, so if you’ll pardon me.” I began to pull away, but his grip was unyielding.
“You dressed for a masquerade and came all this way only to turn around and leave?” he asked, skeptical and teasing. “You never did tell me your name.”
I took my hand back. “Why would you want to know my name?”
“You know mine. It’s only fair.”
“I don’t want you to know my name.”
His smile became a quieter, more secret thing. “Then I shall continue to call you She-wolf.”
I narrowed my gaze at him, having had enough of his distraction. He knew I was angelic and I couldn’t imagine him not revealing my secret to the entire castle. I had found myself in a very bad predicament. “I’m leaving now. Good-bye, Bastian.”
His eyes haunted me from behind his wicked mask. Then, to my shock, he lifted my hand to his lips and kissed my knuckles, his breath warm and gentle. “Always a pleasure.”
He vanished from my sight, so fast my eyes couldn’t see him, but I needed to know his position. He was certain to be out there in the crowd somewhere, watching me, perhaps planning to go to his mistress and alert her of my presence. My mind was screaming at me to get out before this got any worse, but he had been right, in a way. I hadn’t come all this way for nothing.
I scoured the maze of castle corridors for an exit, but there were none to be found. There was no doubt Evantia had chosen this place for that reason. She would want to know exactly who entered her domain and from where, and she wanted to make sure they left the same way they came.
The corridor I searched now was dark, the torchlight sparing plenty of patches of shadow for me to lurk in, but when I heard voices coming down the hall, I searched for a place to hide. I tried the doors nearest me, but they were locked. Just as my heart began to pound, I discovered an unlocked door and I pushed it open slowly and quietly before squeezing myself through and closing it behind me without a sound. I found myself in a sprawling bedroom with an enormous, canopied, four-poster bed with silk-draped columns, a wide desk of dark wood piled with books in front of a wall of bookcases, and windows stretched from the floor to the ceiling.
Footsteps sounded just outside the room. On either side of the windows were great, heavy curtains, and I dashed toward them and concealed myself in the folds of fabric and shadows. The bedroom door opened, sliding heavily across the floor, and several figures entered. From my hiding place, I was totally blind and I silently cursed myself. If I had slid underneath the bed, then I could at least count the pairs of feet in the room and see their movements. I prayed my mistake wouldn’t cost me my life.
“Is the dagger here?” asked a harsh female voice.
“No,” replied a male voice. “We don’t have it.”
“Yet,” corrected a second male voice.
The woman clucked her tongue in impatience. “You must find it. I want it soon or I will carve my displeasure into your livers.”
“Evantia,” the second man said in a cool tone. “We will have the dagger when we know where it is. I have a lead on it already. My subordinates are also looking into it.”
His voice was familiar and I had to see who had entered the room with me.
The first man asked callously, “You would trust others with something this vital?”
“I have to question your judgment,” Evantia said.
“Their loyalty is infallible, as is mine,” the second man said.
Evantia huffed. “We shall see.”
I tried to peek between the curtain and the wall to see their faces. I pinned my body against the wall so I wouldn’t have to rustle the curtain aside, but that got me nowhere. I lifted a hand slowly and pinched a fold of the fabric between my fingers and moved it, but the ears of the demonic reapers were too keen.
“What was that?” Evantia barked under her breath.
“I’ll have a look,” the second man offered. “I’m certain it’s nothing. A mouse.”
Fear coiled in my throat like a serpent as footsteps neared me. I held a hand out, prepared to call a sword. That voice belonged to someone I knew, I was certain of it. But no. It couldn’t be—
Bastian yanked the curtain aside and his eyes captured mine. His mask was gone, revealing the beauty of his face in full. He stared at me and I stared back. I didn’t breathe, didn’t speak, didn’t attack, and it took a long moment for me to realize he wasn’t doing any of those things either. Then a ripple went through him and any surprise he’d had was replaced with amusement.
“Not a mouse,” Bastian said as a smile grew on his lips. “A wolf. An emerald-eyed wolf.”
“Very entertaining,” Evantia snarled, clearly dismissing his answer. “You’re both entirely useless. Let’s return to the ball, shall we?”
“You go ahead,” Bastian said, his gaze unwavering from mine. “I think I’ve had enough of the party.”
“Suit yourself,” she replied. “Geir, come with me.” A few moments later she and the other demonic reaper were gone, leaving Bastian and me alone.
4
THE WAY BASTIAN SEEMED ON THE VERGE OF laughing rather than strangling me was perhaps more unsettling than if he were actually strangling me. Despite being demonic, he was terribly beautiful. It was almost painful to look at him without admiring him.
“Now that you have me cornered,” I asked, “will you kill me this time?”
“That thought hadn’t even crossed my mind,” he replied.
“You’d better run off after Evantia,” I said. “She’s sure to miss you.”
One of his eyebrows lifted curiously, as if he could possibly be more amused. “I hope you don’t think she and I are involved. I should like to kill her.”
“Oh,” I said. “She seems rather unpleasant.”
“You have no idea.” He seemed to melt then and his gaze roved over my face. “What are you doing back here?”
I tilted my chin high in defiance. “Investigating.”
“Investigating what? The embroidery of the curtains? It is quite nice.”
I narrowed my eyes at him, unable to ignore his sarcasm. “What dagger does Evantia want?”
“What dagger indeed?”
“Don’t play games with me. Is it a relic?”
“Why would I reveal that information to a little angelic sleuth? Do you honestly expect me to?”
I didn’t, but I had to ask anyway. “I’ll find out on my own.”
“I beg you not to,” he said, the humor wiping clean from his tone. “There are many of us and only one of you. I wasn’t joking when I said you were foolish for coming here. You are hunting for death, despite your tenacity, which I do respect.”
His closeness set my skin on fire and it was a struggle for me to take slow, even breaths when all my heart wanted to do was race. “Why didn’t you tell them that I was hiding here?” I asked.
His eyes darted back and forth between mine. He inhaled slowly. “You would not have made it out of this room alive.”
“Why would you care?”
The space behind the curtain was very narrow and though there was a halo of cold air emanating from the window, my body was scorching from anticipation and something else. Bastian’s body brushed mine, and he surprised me when he closed the distance between us even more as he settled a hand on my waist. His eyes, bright in the darkness, followed the path of his other hand across my bare collarbone. I couldn’t breathe and I couldn’t—would not—stop him. My lips parted and my chest pushed against his hand as I drew a deep, trembling breath for air. With that hand he traced a trail up my throat and along the edge of my jaw. The backs of his fingers brushed my cheek.
His demonic power lit tiny sparks of fire on my skin and made me shiver as if I were cold. I’d felt the touch of the demonic during fights, but one had never … caressed me before. His touch made me restless, made me want to jump out of my skin. He felt the way a bath did when the water was just a little too hot, hot enough to sting and turn your skin pink, but for some reason the burn felt wonderful. That’s what it felt like when Bastian touched me.
“Tell me your name, She-wolf. I beg you.”
His sultry tone was making my head spin. “Well, it’s not ‘She-wolf,’ so stop calling me that.”
“I’d like to call you by what everyone else calls you.” His lips pressed to my cheek and a hot, falling sensation seared through my belly. “Or perhaps I’ll name you myself, and your name could be our secret. I would very much like to share a secret with you.”
“You lied to your friends,” I reminded him. “You could have alerted them to my presence and they’d have killed me.”
He kissed my throat and brushed his lips against my skin as he spoke. “They most certainly would have.”
“You saved my life. Isn’t that our secret?”
One side of his mouth pulled into a tempting smile. “That is our first secret.”
I almost laughed, but I knew we had to be quiet. “You want more secrets with me?”
“I want a thousand.” He lifted a hand, slipped my mask over my head, and paused to look at me before tossing the mask behind him. His fingers toyed with the thread woven through my dark hair, untied knots, and removed ribbons until my hair fell around my shoulders and was free. He dropped my hood and net to the ground. My entire body trembled and I was undone.
“Madeleine,” I whispered. “My name is Madeleine.”
His eyes were blue fire, like twin stars burning into mine. He was beautiful in the moonlight. “Madeleine.” My name slowly rolled off his tongue just before his lips met mine. His kiss was hard and scorching, overflowing with a predatory hunger that made my lips at his mercy. He was all over me like a wildfire, his hands cupping my face, fingers threading through my unbound hair, closing around the silk of my dress and tugging at it—tugging me closer to him. He could not be satisfied by kisses and neither could I. He broke from my lips and I felt his teeth graze my jaw before he buried his face in my hair and breathed deep. I turned my face to his, questing for his lips again, and he greeted me voraciously as his hands tightened on my body.
I bit my lip and whirled out from behind the curtain, tearing myself away from him. He followed me and thrashed the curtain out of his path. I stopped in the middle of the room, begging myself to run for the door, but my feet had rooted to the ground. My mind was screaming at me, but I couldn’t go. I didn’t want to. I needed to know him, to understand him. I needed to be with him. But this was Bastian—Bastian, for God’s sake—a demonic reaper with one hell of a reputation for mayhem. He would kill me as quickly as he would kiss me.
He took my wrist, his thumb brushing across the tender skin over my pulse, and he kissed me there. “Please don’t run away, Madeleine.”
I grabbed his shirt collar with my free hand and pulled him down to me. I kissed him fiercely, reluctant to let him go again as my heart and head waged their war. I turned and pushed him, guiding him toward the giant canopied bed. He sat down on the mattress, his orphic cerulean eyes glued to mine, and I climbed over his lap, my dress like a violet waterfall over the edge of the bed, and I pressed my hand into his chest until his back sank into the blankets. I leaned over him and kissed him slowly and luxuriously, the pleasure of it reminding me of what it was like to smooth my hand over fine silk. When I pulled away, I lifted a hand to call my sword and the silver blade emerged out of nothingness. I could kill him. I could plunge my sword into his heart faster than he could roll out of its path. He was at my mercy now.
He watched the sword in my hand, knowing what I was about to do, but my hesitation and the heat of my gaze gave away my true desire. I could feel the burn and pressure behind my eyes as their green fire blazed with my raging emotions. Bastian raised his own hands and began to loosen the laces closing the front of my dress, unwinding the spiral knotting with precision—where I always fumbled over my laces, he had finesse. My heart raced faster and desire disoriented me, but I didn’t stop him, not even when he tugged my dress down to my hips. With a growl of frustration, I brought the sword down and stabbed it through the bed, clear of his skin. Then he pulled me down to him and flipped my body beneath his.
“You should stay the night,” he whispered against my lips as he caught his breath. “Until dawn, at least.” He pushed up the folds of my dress and wrapped a hand around my thigh, tugging me closer to him. He kissed me again. “You’ll be safe to flee then. The others won’t be able to follow you into the sunlight.”
“Neither will you,” I said between kisses, holding his face in my hands. “I could flee from you too.”
He pulled away and his eyes searched mine. “Do you want to?”
I couldn’t say it aloud—couldn’t force the words out of me—so I replied by kissing him more. I fitted my bare skin against his body and drank him in.
“Is this even your room?” I asked him some time later as I swirled my fingertip over his chest. My blood was still singing all the way to my toes and the light-headedness had still not yet gone.
His eyes did not open as he huffed, and a catlike grin spread across his lips. I had to force myself not to kiss those lips again. Mine were so swollen still that they ached. “I don’t know whose room this is,” he replied, “but we put it to excellent use.”
“I hope the rightful occupant doesn’t return anytime soon.”
“Don’t worry,” he said dismissively, opening his eyes to gaze
at me. “This is a guest room. Evantia wouldn’t have had us meet someplace we would be interrupted or overheard—yet, that’s precisely what happened, unbeknownst to her. Will I see you again?”
I grinned. “Haven’t you seen enough of me?”
His own smile grew dark and sly. “What if there’s a spot I missed?”
I laughed, realizing it was the first time I’d allowed myself to laugh at one of his jokes, and my laughter seemed to make him brighten. It felt good to let down my guard and be with him. I was a soldier, and we did not have the opportunity to let down our guards. With Bastian, I felt as though I’d never need to put it back up. “In all seriousness—”
“I’m entirely serious.”
“We seem to keep running into each other,” I said, ignoring him. “I’m sure it will happen again.”
He gave me a sober look. “I meant it when I said you should stay here tonight. It won’t be safe until dawn. And I want you to stay. There’s no need to rush off.”
I sat forward, covering myself with the blanket, and I stared at him in disbelief. A smile toyed in one corner of my mouth. “Do you like me?”
“I do like you,” he said. “I like looking at you. I like the soft manner in which you speak. I like your accent and I like your boldness. I like the way you feel when I kiss you and touch you.” He smiled at the same moment I felt heat in my cheeks. “Do you like me?”
I considered that question and then considered my response. “I certainly should not.”
“That wasn’t a no. Are you too proud to say yes? I’m not.”
I swallowed and forced myself to be fully honest with him. “I’m not too proud to admit anything, but I’m afraid of what it would mean if I did like you.”
“Because of what we are,” he said, at last serious. “And how we are different.”
“Yes,” I replied. “This is very, very much against any and all rules of conduct and engagement in battle.”
“No, I don’t suppose it’s considered prudent to make love to your enemies.”