Page 19 of Vow of the Undead (The Bloodrune Saga #1)

K ing Drakkar’s thick arm wrapped around my lower back while he held my other hand. My heart flipped as he guided me to my feet. The memory of him lifting me from my knees was an echo of my stopped execution.

Just like the moment he interrupted my execution, what might come next was impossible to predict.

“I plan to marry you,” he said, his voice low but cutting with confidence.

Marry me? How could I become the wife of the king who exiled people like me? My stomach revolted with a pulse of bile pressing up into my throat. I swallowed it and lightly palmed my throat to feel the ripple of my swallow. The action grounded me enough to process his words.

It wasn’t even a question, or the proposal he’d promised, but neither was it a punishment nor servitude. At least not in the way I expected.

He tilted his head, eyes scanning every inch of my face before he held my gaze. “Silver?”

I sucked in a tight breath, but relief didn’t come. If I accepted, I might share in the secrets he held as king. As his wife, how much easier would it be to find the lost history? Or to convince him to free my mother?

“This isn’t what I thought I came here for.” It was all I could think to say.

“Do you deny the heat between us?”

Heat? That was just the burn of hate.

I said nothing.

If I bound myself to him, this would be my sacrifice. This would help me pass Freya’s trial. Who better to see the king at his most vulnerable than his wife? Despite all this logic, I couldn’t bring myself to accept. Which was another one of my selfish choices.

Now the tingle of nerves fluttered in my chest. They buzzed in my fingertips and I slipped my hand deeper into his steady hold.

A slight smirk curved at the edge of his lips.

How could he want me after I’d killed his courtiers? Standing before him, we were surrounded by people who must have been friends with the man and woman I stuck like suckling pigs and left in the forest to rot in blood-stained snow. They were dead by the very hand the king now held in his.

“Say you’re mine,” he said as he dropped to one knee before me.

It wasn’t a question. He didn’t ask me to marry him as was tradition for most couples in Vylheim.

He spoke it into existence as if I didn’t have a choice.

And, of course, I didn’t, though something about the way he waited for me to respond told me he wanted me to at least give me the illusion of choice.

He gripped my hand, staring up at me like I was fowl waiting to be shot out of the sky with an arrow and then devoured alongside a plate of potatoes. “With me, you’ll want for nothing. But I need you to say it. Say you’re mine, Silver. Or shall I call you my wife?”

“But I’m not your wife.” The words slipped out before I could swallow them, my natural inclination for the independence that Freya spoke of in her sagas.

King Drakkar stood, still gripping my hands as he stepped toward me and lightly tugged me into him.

His voice dropped to a volume only I could hear.

“Perhaps you shouldn’t announce that in front of inquiring ears.

Your father informs me you need safety, as you have…

” he paused to lift the back of his finger to the scar Sten had left across my cheek, tracing it with the slightest touch as he seemed to search for the right word.

“Persistent admirers. When I say you’ll want for nothing as my wife, I mean there is no admirer who’ll be allowed within reach of you ever again. No human, or monster.”

My heart thudded in my throat. Did he know I still spoke of the old tales, spreading the sagas of monsters and Gods?

When had my father told him this? I’d suffered nightmares my entire life, but I never breathed a word of it, nor of the gods I still prayed to and the monsters my mother taught me to fear.

My gaze slid to my father only a few steps away. He beamed, seemingly proud that they’d finally, truly made a deep connection with the wealthiest ruler in Vylheim. I flinched at the sight of his smile, so unnatural on my father’s cruel face.

Turning my attention to King Drakkar, I conjured my voice. “What do you know of monsters?”

He grinned. “Everything.”

Did the records show glimpses of giants and the undead? “There’s rumors about lost history here?—”

“Yes, but you’re not part of Mara’s Keep, Silver.

Not until we’re married.” King Drakkar dipped his mouth to my ear, blocking everyone’s sight of his face with me.

His voice was nothing more than a whisper, a breath on my neck.

“Many have come here excited for my betrothal. Let’s not keep them waiting.

Kiss me to show them who you belong to.”

Heavy silence coated the room. Some three hundred pairs of eyes watched, breathing scantily while the people listened for my response. A shiver trickled down my spine, but I lifted my chin and met his gaze as soon as he pulled back from my ear and faced me.

He didn’t move. He didn’t even blink for an unnatural amount of time.

The crushing weight of his hold made me want to rip my hand away, but he’d promised me the one thing I needed.

The only thing I wanted—save for a way to go back in time and change what I’d done—was access to the records.

And protection too? It was all I could want, especially after a lifetime of being followed by glowing red eyes.

I hated my shadows for frightening me, my captors for pushing me to the edge, but I hated myself the most. I’d let the idea to destroy Astrid and Sten overcome me and it had made me the very thing that haunted my nightmares, a monster.

I shoved the thought away before it spread like poison in my veins. Before the incessant and nervous dwelling left me questioning my own identity.

He waited patiently as I processed this.

Then, I tipped my head back, my chin lifted, my lips meeting his as I rolled to the balls of my feet.

To my surprise, he melted into me, soft at first, then firm and hungry for far too long in front of so many people. He cupped my jaw with one hand and pressed his other palm against my spine, pressing me flush against him.

My cheeks flamed, and when he pulled back and our lips parted, I missed the bite of the sharp, spicy wine on his lips, the firmness with which he held me—a promise that he’d keep me so close nobody would sink their fingernails into me or threaten to taste my blood again.

King Drakkar turned to his people with a savage smile cutting his face. He’d gotten exactly what he wanted. Now he’d announce our betrothal. Could this have been what the hooded figure was warning me against? Or had he just wanted to devour me like the other red-eyed creatures I saw in the shadows?

I followed the king’s line of sight as he gazed over the people of Mara’s Keep.

Everyone waited for the announcement, the official statement that’d claim me as King Drakkar’s future wife, but all he said was, “let’s feast.”

That was it, let’s feast.

I nearly snapped my neck as I raked my gaze over him. He forced his fingers into my clenched hand, spreading my fingers so he could slip his in between. When he lifted my hand as if to kiss my knuckles, he drew me into him with a quiet strength that held me in place.

Without turning his head or affording me the mere regard of looking at me, he spoke. “You’re wondering why I didn’t announce a marriage?” I huffed my agreement. “Because you never said yes.”

“You never asked.”

It still didn’t make sense why he cared about my answer when I didn’t have a choice. He said nothing else as he turned his attention to his people.

The crowd broke apart, spreading like stray dogs in Skaldir, searching for food and attention as they chose to dance or fill their plates with lamb and crusts of bread to coat with soft cheese or dip in buttered juices dripping from the steaming meat.

Those who served in King Drakkar’s castle moved with frantic ease, scurrying through the mix of guests and the hundred or so people who took residence with the king, advisors, friends, perhaps relatives.

While other servants carried plates and trays, distributing them to the people with practice, the woman who approached us held only a single bronze goblet.

Her straight black bangs hung like a curtain above her eyebrows.

The dangling earrings she wore set her apart from the other servants.

Glittering jewels swung lower than the hair she kept cropped at her chin .

Presenting the goblet to King Drakkar, she met his gaze.

They stared at one another for a long, tense moment, until she looked away.

With her head angled to the side and her milky skin nearly translucent, I couldn’t help but notice that her throat throbbed with an erratic pulse.

Absent-mindedly, my fingers found their way to my throat where my own heart beat off rhythm.

What caused her spastic pulse? Sweat lined the curls of hair sticking to her forehead, and her jaw twitched with the subtle grinding of teeth. Was it fear, or the strain of work?

When my gaze slid back to King Drakkar, my breath snagged. He had yet to break his attention from her, as if this servant had enchanted him with the kind of magic my mother claimed she could once cast.

King Drakkar lifted the goblet from her pale fingers, and as he brought it to his lips, he stared at her, sipping without so much as a blink.

Envy boiled in the pit of my belly, not for his attention, but for this strange power she wielded.

What entranced him to her? Could such influence guide him?

He was the head of this kingdom, but I could become the neck, the muscle that’d point his face to Skaldir and the other villages in need.

When King Drakkar broke his gaze, time seemed to speed up. The servant woman spun around and disappeared into the crowd. Bodies closed in around her, swallowing any trace of her, and the king downed the rest of his wine in a single gulp.

“What was that?” I asked as he turned, and pulled me with him.