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“That sounds like a problem for you, because I will not have you, beast.”

He flinches as if struck.

My chin rises. “And if you are to sacrifice your evate, then should she not be allowed to do the same? No matter which way this goes, whether I live or die, Daxeel, understand this.” I take a step closer. “You will be alone. You will be without me. And that loneliness is what you deserve,” I spit the words at his feet, then reel back.

A single tear clings to his long, thick lashes. It wavers, dancing on the precipice, not quite ready to fall yet.

I spare him a lingering, hateful look full of the bitterness within our bond, this trap that binds us unwillingly. And now, aren’t we both unwilling?

I turn my back on him.

But before I can storm out of his bedchamber, and leave him to his own depravity, a thud comes from beyond the door.

I freeze.

Muscles bolt to bones. I flinch as if struck.

That horrible thud is closely followed by a shout, a female’s scream, and the wretched, thumping sound of a body crashing down to the stairs.

Someone has fallen.

Behind me, Daxeel is as still as I am, as though the winter chills of high mountains invade the room and frost over us.

Then we hear it.

The strangled cry that penetrates the door, that screeches through the walls of Hemlock House.

“Aleana!”

24

the night I broke Daxeel

††† TEN YEARS EARLIER †††

The death in my stare lacks ferocity. It is a mere reflection of my slumped insides, my rotting heart, the deterioration of my soul.

I watch Eamon stride down the edge of the dance podium. His brisk pace is wrought with tension. Hands balled at his sides, a severe set to his tight face.

The violence of his flat mouth looks as though it’s been painted on, a cutting strike of a paintbrush over his deep-toned skin.

He doesn’t turn it on me.

He doesn’t even look over his shoulder at me before he strides out of the High Court.

Somehow that stabs a little harder, cuts a bit deeper than if he did throw his disappointment at me. Now, it’s as though he just doesn’t have the heart to look at me, like he can’t bring himself to do it.

Eamon leaves.

He chases after his cousin.

And I am left alone in my pain.

I force back a thick swallow, the tears I fight, before I glance up at father on the dais.

The weathered lines of his face tighten. Proud, he lifts his angular chin and looks down his nose at me.

Slowly, he nods a single, slight gesture.