Page 62

Thorne

“ H ere, try this,” Galen said, handing me a skewer. “Best fish I’ve ever had, and that’s saying something.”

I took a bite of meat hanging off the edge. He was right—the skin was the perfect crispiness, seasoned with rosemary and a hint of spice. It fell apart in my mouth as I chewed and groaned my approval.

It had been a long time since I’d been to the island.

My father used to bring Mother and me when I was a teenager, which was when I met Daelan and Hector.

They were several years older than me, but they were still willing to give a scrawny, annoying adolescent the time of day.

I was instantly awestruck. They were everything I wanted to be—confident, untroubled, likeable without even trying.

An air of lax importance that made others respect them and want to be their friend at the same time.

Their father was the Regent Lord of the Island Territory back then, so they would often visit the North Territory when meeting with King Orion.

The two of them, Galen, and I became instant friends.

It was always like this when we saw each other again. Laid-back, indulgent, burdenless. Laughing and drinking around a fire like nothing had changed.

But this time, something was different. This time, all four of us bore titles and positions of power we hadn’t before. And this time, we had secrets we couldn’t share.

Too much was on the line, and there were too few people I trusted after multiple assassination attempts and all the other strange incidents.

I thought Galen knew the urgency of the situation.

I thought he understood how careful he needed to be to get through the rest of this tour, considering not twenty-four hours ago, he was seizing on the floor with poison coursing through his veins. But tonight…

“I’ll take another, beautiful,” he slurred to the woman passing by on his right. She and a couple other islanders had been bringing him drinks all evening. I’d lost count of how many he’d downed.

Perhaps things hadn’t changed as much as I thought.

“Galen, you might want to slow down,” I muttered.

“Why? We’re on island time now,” he said. “If someone’s gonna try to poison me again, at least it’ll taste good.” He threw an arm out wide to grab his fresh drink. His sleeves had ridden up his forearm a couple inches, exposing bronze skin that had me instantly flinching away.

“Because you get careless when you’re drunk,” I hissed, pointing to his skin.

He rolled his eyes. “I’m not drunk.”

“Trust me, friend. You’re drunk,” Daelan said as he swung his arm over Galen’s shoulders. I tensed, then relaxed a fraction when the high collar Galen always wore held true, blocking Daelan’s skin from touching his. During Galen’s drunken stupors, I had to constantly be on alert.

A glorified babysitter. Except the baby was a grown king who could kill someone with a single touch.

“Shouldn’t your fiancée be with you tonight?” Daelan hinted suggestively, nudging Galen’s shoulder.

On instinct, my gaze found Clarissa. She was sitting at a nearby fire with a man who looked familiar, but I couldn’t place why I knew him. Clarissa, however, seemed to be well acquainted with him .

Something hot and acidic boiled in my chest. It didn’t matter how casual or friendly it was—every time the man’s hand grazed hers, every time I heard her laugh fill the air, my fingers squeezed tighter around the edge of the log beneath me.

The thought of others being able to touch her the way I did…

She may be engaged to my best friend, but Fates, she felt like mine .

And I couldn’t stand the sight of her with someone else.

A piece of the log splintered under my grip, breaking my glare.

I looked down to see blood welling on the pad of my thumb and hastily pressed it to my lips to stem the flow, careful not to wake sleeping Marigold.

She and Mia had both passed out sitting between my legs.

Her head rested against the inside of my knee, while the little pup was curled in a ball in her lap.

Mia had only been with us for a week, but she’d already grown enough for her paws to hang over the edge of Marigold’s legs.

Galen sighed dramatically, drawing my attention back to him and the brothers. “Don’t save us a private suite just yet, if you know what I mean. Especially after today.”

“What happened today?” Hector asked.

Shrugging, Galen leaned back on the log, precariously close to tipping right off. “She wasn’t exactly receptive to my advances.”

My stomach sank to my feet, that same searing heat snaking its way across my chest as Daelan chuckled and said, “Well, Fates, if the King had no luck, nobody will.”

“What did you do?” I asked Galen, my voice shaking with an attempt to rein in my rage.

“Kissed her.”

“You what ?” I growled. “And she—she didn’t—” I glanced over at her again, needing proof that she wasn’t a rotted corpse.

That his curse truly didn’t affect her. I’d wondered last night when Rose touched his skin.

It shouldn’t come as a surprise that he’d wasted no time testing that theory on his future wife.

“She’s fine, Thorne. Obviously.” For a split second, the alcohol-induced haze disappeared from his eyes, and his brow furrowed as he looked at me.

Something like suspicion shone from the hazel depths.

It was gone just as swiftly, his eyelids drooping and a grin slipping easily onto his lips.

“I s’pose we have different ideas of what this marriage will look like.

It’s a shame. Would love to see what I’m working with. ”

Anger tore through me as Daelan and Hector both smirked. Was this what I used to sound like? What I used to be like? Viewing women as nothing more than objects at my disposal, expecting them to cater to my every whim?

“You’re disgusting,” I muttered, shoving my long hair out of my face. “She’s doing this to save you, you know. Show her some respect.”

Daelan and Hector exchanged confused glances, and Galen narrowed his eyes. I was dangerously close to the subject of the curse, something nobody outside of those closest to him knew of, but I didn’t care.

The image of him running his fingers along her skin the way I had slammed into me. Of him pushing her against a wall, sliding his lips over hers as she tried to get away.

My jaw was clenched so tightly, I thought my teeth would crack.

“I need to get Marigold to bed,” I spat out, avoiding their eyes as I scooped my daughter in my arms before they could respond.

The movement made Mia jump off and shake her body.

Her leash dragged on the ground when she followed me, running in wide circles around my legs.

“I’m sorry, Thorne,” a breathless voice said from the side. “I didn’t mean to leave her with you for so long.”

Clarissa drew nearer and knelt at my feet to grab the pup, then paused to look up at me. Her cheeks were pink from sitting near the fire, and her windswept blonde hair pillowed on the shoulders of her black cloak.

My heart stuttered.

My black cloak. The one I’d given her on the way back from the Aurelia Cliffs.

“Are you heading to the huts?” she asked as she stood.

I merely nodded, not trusting my own tongue. Burning rage and jealousy paired with the sight of her on her knees with my cloak wrapped around her neck ignited some territorial instinct that I needed to get rid of.

“I’ll walk with you,” she offered. “I’m getting tired, anyway.”

“Was the company not riveting enough?” I blurted, jerking my chin toward the man she’d been with all evening. He was watching us and had the nerve to wink at me when my stare met his.

She glanced back at him and rolled her eyes. “That’s just Nox. He’s a friend from home. My ambassador for Mysthelm, actually, although he didn’t get the chance to do much before he was called back to his province.”

Nox. Nox Duma . The Shifter. It all came back to me—he’d been sent to establish communication with Galen’s council after their former emperor died eight and a half months ago. We’d met with him a couple of times, but in the wake of King Orion’s death and Galen’s new curse, I barely remembered him.

“What’s he doing here?” I asked, the iciness melting from my voice as we walked. Marigold settled against my chest, puffing warm breaths of air in her sleep.

“Apparently, he’s the ‘group of Shifters’ Rose and Leo heard Scarven was sending here. Only, it’s just him, and he’s definitely not here to kill me.” She shrugged. “We were wrong. They aren’t the ones after Galen and me.”

I made a disgruntled noise in the back of my throat. “So we’re back to no leads.”

“My money is still on the regents. After everything Rhys Penworth said, I wouldn’t be surprised if he was working with others to make them look like accidents. And Dion Silenus wasn’t exactly my biggest fan in the beginning.” She eyed me. “You seem close to the Zelorias. How well do you know them?”

“I highly doubt they’re hiding poisonous snakes in your bedsheets, Empress,” I said with a chuckle.

“Well, thank you for giving me that new fear.”

“They’re good people. We were much closer when we were young.

Their family would come up to the North Territory all the time to meet with King Orion.

Daelan was actually the one who taught me how to flirt with women,” I said, laughing as memories came back to me.

“The second they could sneak Galen and me into the taverns, we were there every night. His favorite line when meeting a beautiful woman was always, ‘I was enjoying my drink, but then I saw you. Now I think I need something stronger.’”

Clarissa snickered. “Did that actually work on anyone?”

“It did for him. But when I tried it once, she swung her satchel at me and said, ‘Here, is this strong enough?’”

She burst into laughter. I had to control my shaking shoulders so as not to wake Marigold.

“Alright, fine. If you say I have nothing to worry about with the Zelorias, I believe you,” she said as our laughter subsided.

“The good thing is, it sounds like your shot with women improved over the years. Galen mentioned you being rather ‘wild’ once upon a time.” She quirked a mischievous eyebrow at me.

“I suppose I was. But thankfully, I figured out who I wanted to be.” We reached the door of my hut and turned to face each other.

“And who is that?”

I looked down at Marigold. “A father. A romantic, ” I said teasingly, then my eyes met Clarissa’s and my voice softened. “A better man.”

Sounds of the island filtered in around us—the chirping insects, the wind through trees, the distant laughter and crackling of fire. Her stare lingered on me before flitting to Marigold.

“I should let you get her to bed,” she whispered.

Those dark eyes traveled back up to mine, and that same territorial instinct from earlier pounded like a drum in my chest. I bit down on my tongue before I said something that would only be a mistake, but every muscle in my body yearned to reach for her.

She swallowed, the edges of her lips falling slightly as she tapped on the doorframe with her knuckles and turned on her heel.

Fates help me .

“Do you want to come in?” I asked .

She froze and slowly faced me again. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”

I shook my head. “No.”

My eyes caught on her mouth as her teeth pulled at her bottom lip, indecision warring across her features. I held my breath and willed my pulse to slow. Blood rushed through my ears like a tidal wave when she took a hesitant step forward.

And another.

And another.

And then she opened the door and walked into the house.