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Brekt expected a lie—I could tell by the set of his jaw.

He was giving me the look the Keepers had, like Rebeka always had.

Even Nuo had called me a liar. But I never earned the mistrust people placed on me.

And this time— for the first time —Brekt was asking for the truth when no other had before him.

I shoved his hand away, grabbing his face instead, and his dark eyes went wide.

“I didn’t know. And that’s the truth. Nothing between us was a lie.”

“Is that so?” He turned his head into my palm and kissed it. “So we are enemies by fate, not by choice.”

I held my breath, wanting to feel more of those lips, wishing in some twisted way that he was still holding me hostage. “So, what does that make you feel now?”

Brekt went eerily still, turning his gaze back to me. The rattling in his chest returned, filling the dark. “I want to kill you as much as I want to fuck you.”

My mouth hung open.

Brekt gave a quick shake of his head, and the curling horns appeared and disappeared. “I am no longer just a man. I no longer have a single urge.”

“Then you can leave me be.”

I stepped back, and he vanished, all but those glowing slitted eyes.

The beast was back. His chest rattled, echoing in the silence that followed my request. “Leave? Where is the simpering girl I found in the cave? You want to command me now, Ikhor? No longer feel the pull, love? You’ve moved on to your pretty replacement? ”

Did he mean Ollo?

I sucked in a breath and clamped my muscles tight, holding my fists at my side, resisting the urge to slap him across his stupid face.

“Never start a fight you can’t finish,” he’d once warned me. I wasn’t sure I could use my magic to protect myself from the beast—not in this place.

“So you believe it’s me all of a sudden?

” My anger flared. We were and had always been hot and cold.

One second yearning, the next ready to spit fire.

“You die on me, then come back to be a real pain in the ass. More so than before.” I shook my head.

Unbelievable. “I didn’t move on. I mourned your death.

I flooded the lands, missing you. But this before me?

This was not what I wanted to come back.

If you’re not the same man I cared for, then I don’t know you anymore. ”

He prowled again, and this time, I didn’t spin with him. He was at my back when he replied. “I am, and I am not.”

That was my biggest fear after seeing him alive on the deck, that it wasn’t the same man I had once known. “Then leave. And return when you are.”

Brekt placed a hand on my hip, sliding it over my waist, stopping when he held my stomach. He pulled me back, so I was flush to his chest, and pressed into me, lips brushing my ear. My body melted against him as a fire raged through me that had nothing to do with magic.

“And what of my desires? Should I not demand the woman I knew? You are not the same woman from my dreams. Do I tell you to leave and return when you are what I want?”

It was hard to ignore the inferno raging through my body. I never needed so badly as I did around this man, but this wasn’t how I wanted him.

We had fought before. He’d always pushed me and welcomed it when I pushed back.

I raised my chin, not backing down. “I accepted you as you were before the Aspis rose. You were a cranky bastard who barely ever spoke his true feelings. You shielded yourself away from people. But you were thoughtful, teasing in surprising moments. You were not an easy man to lo?—”

I shook my head, dislodging those words from my tongue, “I wanted you then. If you aren’t that man, then I don’t know you anymore.”

The chest against my back vibrated—the Aspis was angry. Or was it Brekt?

“I am not that man anymore.”

“Then I don’t know where that leaves us.”

“Enemies, it sounds like.” His mouth pressed against my neck, and I knew only that spot where his kiss marked me.

I hid my hurt, not letting my breathing hitch or the tears run. This was a battle between two legends, only it wasn’t violent—it was a test of wills.

Brekt’s fingers dug into my stomach, and his face buried into my neck. “Turn. It. Off.” His voice was guttural like he was talking around those fangs.

I shoved my emotions down and calmed my mind.

His jaw travelled the length of my neck. “You go with the Aethar now.”

I leaned into him, feeling the hard length of him against my lower back, suppressing a moan. “Two of them. Not the Aethar you know. These people are different.”

Brekt seemed to consider my words, adding a second hand to his embrace. His arm encircled me, holding both of mine pinned down, his hand squeezing below the scar on my shoulder. “You are not from my world. You wouldn’t understand what Aethar I know. What they have done to my people.”

“Well, you’re a new man now,” I said, using a tone I picked up from Maev. “Get a new perspective.”

Brekt smiled against my neck. “Vicious as always. Your words sting like the point of a knife. Does your pretty boy get this kind of treatment? Does he get off on your anger like I do?”

He rubbed himself against me, and this time, I couldn’t hold my whimper in. My head fell to the side, allowing him to bury his face farther, and his lips brushed my collarbone.

“He doesn’t force it from me,” I said.

He let go of my arm, grabbing my chin and moving my face so our mouths were a whisper apart.

“Oh love, I have never forced you.” He let go of me, and a chill rushed to every spot he had been touching.

He was out of sight when I spun around, but his voice drifted to me.

“Even as a beast, I don’t force. Your anger is beautiful.

Likely, the pretty boy doesn’t know it was always a part of you.

Your fire has always been your own making. ”

I squeezed my fists tight. “I haven’t decided to forgive you for wasting the time we had before. And I don’t know if I’ll forgive you for coming back to me like this. If you’re leaving now, you will come back.”

Darkness pressed in, and a deep voice echoed from far away, “That’s a promise.”

He didn’t push. He didn’t beg. He was right that he forced nothing from me.

Dear god. It really was him.

Eyes flashed in the shadows. It was terrifying, and yet … I couldn’t help the burning desire to rush to him. I liked the attention, even if it felt like it wasn’t him—liked that I was his prey.

I hated pushing him away, and a moment later, my heart broke when I sensed the room was empty. I hadn’t even asked what would happen next. I reached out in the dark, regretting letting my anger speak for me. “Please come back.”

I waited.

But there was no response.