Page 28 of Antiletum (The Nocturne #1)
Val clocks the motion, going unnaturally still. With a shuddering breath, he meets my wide, horrified gaze. “I can’t stand to see you hurt any more.”
Offering me sound advice to keep learning about his wrongs safely. How courteous.
“I thought you went to see Parliament.” Another step back.
He follows, shoulders shifting ominously to push himself off the table. “I did.”
“How are you back so quickly?”
“I have my ways. ”
I laugh. Unhinged and hysterical. “How long were you watching me?”
I back away from him a little more.
“Since you tossed the antiletum in your mouth.” Val’s words are gravelly and strained, his jaw incredibly tense.
Still retreating, I knock into a table, something crashing to the floor.
“Might as well get this all over with now,” he says softly, “so we may move on and have no regressions later.” Val takes a tentative step closer to me, trying not to spook me further.
“My intention was never to hurt you, Delaney. Only to have you. To keep you safe .” Those odd, black eyes bore into me with reverence.
With the same light of adoration Valledyn offered me at our wedding, and it all makes sense.
A brief glimmer of my first visit to The Citadel flashes through me. The curious face of a man, explaining that his father—Llewellyn ven’Sol—was late because his other son took ill on the journey. Said brother being Val.
The way Val’s older brother Heath studied me curiously, offering me a secretive smile before being ushered through The Citadel to meet my punishment, to my parents who would decide to tuck me and my willfulness away for good.
“What was your father’s gift?” I whisper. Then, even quieter, “Your brothers?”
But I think a part of me already knows the answer. Most don’t openly share their gifts. As a general rule, that information is only passed within tight circles.
Val inhales deep, understanding fully the connections I’m making. He doesn’t try to deny. “My father and Heath were both trackers, Delaney.”
A strangled cry lurches up my throat. The ache in my chest is too harrowing.
Blackened with grief and fear and too much treachery.
“ You knew. You knew what I was—before our wedding.” More wetness spurts from my eyes.
“Your brother saw me, scented my necromancy, when I was fifteen. You were after me all along.”
My husband doesn’t falter. Doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t even blink.
“Yes.”
A single, damning word. He’s unapologetic. The same as he was when he murdered Rainah. The same as he was after our wedding, holding me tight, kissing me desperately, telling me that I was safe and accepted and loved in his arms.
All for what I could do for him.
My flight or fight response is coming alive. Dread fuels my heartbeat, collecting my energy as my horrified stare pins on the man that I’m bound to for life and beyond, our souls intertwined. No escape.
Fear thickens further, a cloud of it plumes around me, pulse roaring in my ears.
Val’s eyes shift. The pure slick of his pupils eating up all that glorious, faceted black. “Don’t,” he practically growls, fighting something within himself and head doing a slow tilt to the side. “Don’t run.”
His suggestion has the opposite effect. I turn, and dash towards the door as fast as I can.
I haven’t made it far when an angry snarl calls at my back. Breaths saw through my lungs. Loud beats pulse in my head and it takes only a second for me to realize that the pounding isn’t only my blood raging against my eardrums, but my husband’s thunderous steps following behind me.
Pace kicked up, I storm the short set of stairs, pass by the breakfast nook—running and running and running for the—
Something slams into my back. I yelp as thick arms wrap around my waist before I can hit the floor, holding me hard against a hot, tight, dangerous body. Feet tangle in my skirts, kicking out at nothing while Val lifts me in the air.
I tear at his arms, ripping his skin with my nails, the scent of his blood wafting around my face absolutely haze inducing.
It’s too much.
My scream of rage morphs into more of a wail, tears flooding down my face. I can’t breathe, hyperventilation taking me over.
Val’s grip relaxes slightly, only enough to no longer crush my ribs and his hold to turn from something predatory to tender.
“I’ve got you,” he says. Laughably unthreatening. Soothing.
I’m bending over, my body aching for the floor. To curl into myself and try to hold what’s left together. If there is anything to salvage at all.
It would be easier to simply no longer exist.
“I’ve got you.” Val’s front curls against my back as I lean forward to pour out my anguish, never letting me crash, holding me together while I completely fall apart.
“Shh,” he shushes through my hair over and over. Saying things I can’t comprehend. Can’t rationalize in comparison to who I now know he is. His soothing words never stop. Coming on steadily with his mouth against my ear, my hair, my cheek.
It’s endlessly fucked, how comforting it is, and speaks volumes to just how broken I am. How my body melts into his, responds to his gentle urgings. How good he smells with his breath so close to my nose, its heat caressing my skin, and I think I could maybe stay here forever.
Val’s lips press against my face, tasting my tears and huffing his air across me, trying to ground me so I may be able to breathe again, despite him being the one to have stolen all my air.