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He was dressed in black, with gold accenting the clasps of his surcoat and securing his cloak, which draped over his right arm in a pool of deep red. There was always a sharpness to his features, but this morning they seemed far more menacing.

“Am I a monster?” I asked.

He chuckled, amused by my question, but his response only made me angry. “It would seem so,” he said.

“So you failed,” I said. It wasn’t a fair thing to say, but I felt like fighting because he had laughed and I…I was afraid.

Adrian narrowed his eyes and tilted his head to the side. It was as if I had slapped him. “If I had failed, you would not be here now in human skin.”

I cringed at his words.

“Iamhuman.”

His smile twisted my stomach.

“Not anymore.”

“What is this pride you have?” I demanded. “I am amonster.”

“So am I,” he said. “Does it make you sick to be like me?”

“But I am not like you!” I snarled. “I am a creature, ananimal! I do not even know who I will be when I shift. What if I murder innocent people? What if I am murdered byyourpeople?”

It was a fair question. I would look just like every other black hound in a pack.

Adrian’s mouth tightened. “You will not be killed,” he said.

“And you can control that?”

“I will,” he said.

We glared at each other for a moment. I was the first to turn away, closing the shutters. I crossed to the bed where Adrian’s robe lay folded on a chair, pulling it on.

“You are failing to see the potential in this power,” Adrian said.

“It is hard to do so when I do not know what this means for me,” I said. I had already expressed my fears. Did I need to repeat myself?

“What happened last night?” I asked. “After I turned.”

“You came out of the water and collapsed and turned back into…you,” he said. “I brought you inside, and you were still feverish, so I opened the window while you slept.”

I did not know what to say, so I remained silent, attempting to process everything that had occurred.

“Do you think I will leave you to figure this out on your own?”

The angry part of me did not want to figure this out because I did not want tobethis.

“And how will we do that?” I asked.

“You are not the only shifter in this kingdom, Isolde,” Adrian said. “There are others like you.”

“Sorin is a falcon, not a—”

“Monster?” Adrian cut me off. “But he is a monster. We all are, and we all have sides of us we must learn to control. You are no different. You never have been.”

I clenched my jaw hard. Right now, I did not feel like controlling myself. I wanted to tear him to shreds. I wanted to eviscerate him with my words. I wanted to lash him with my tongue.

And he must have been listening to my thoughts because he laughed. “I would take the tongue-lashing,” he said, “if it meant I could fuck you on your stomach.”