Page 24 of Wings of Lies (Daughter of the Seven Circles #1)

“Who in their right mind would come to a world they know nothing about?” he seethed, the muscle in the back of his jaw throbbing .

“Why does what I do or don’t know even matter to you?” I spat back, feeling itchy.

He stepped forward, knees hitting the bed’s wooden frame, towering over me. My back straightened in response, trying to look strong and not wounded and slumped against the pillows. But I could only do so much as my stitches pulled with my movements.

“What the hell were you thinking? Why didn’t you stay on Earth? Elora is dangerous! It isn’t a place for a senseless, wimpy female.” There was so much angry disbelief in his tone that I bristled.

Stretching further against my stitches, wishing I could stand, I attempted to look intimidating. “I am not senseless or wimpy!”

“Your actions speak otherwise.” He glared.

My anger simmered. I lifted my chin, forcing us nose-to-nose. “If you bring me to your wretched queen, I will gladly burn her face off.”

Blue flame flashed in his irises, and the light under his chin flickered. A half-smirk pulled at my lips, happy to have hit a nerve.

“Listen to you,” he whispered with a deadly tone.

“Spewing this arrogance around creatures you know nothing about. You don’t even have the skills necessary to save yourself, which you proved by barely surviving a Hellhound attack.

You’d be dead if it weren’t for me and my queen.

You know nothing of this world. You know nothing of your powers.

You are an ignorant, untrained, senseless, helpless female.

” The force of his heartless words hit my face.

They were brutal, needling at my insecurities.

I pulled my legs off the bed, making myself sit up and forcing him back a step. Water pooled in the corner of my eyes from the pain, but I wasn’t about to let him get away with what he said. It hit too deep, and the itch wouldn’t let me.

“At least I’m not a bitch’s bitch. ”

Blue and red light erupted, and metal ripped free. A flaming sword came toward my neck, but before it reached me, stabbing pain erupted through my body, and the sword clattered to the ground. He came at me.

“What are you?—”

He tackled and swaddled me in his heavy cloak. Unlike my disintegrated clothes, the cloak withstood the white and purple flames on my skin.

“Get off of me!” I yanked the cloak off my flameless face.

“Hana did a lot for you. The least you could do is not burn down her house,” he yelled back. This considerate act wasn’t for me but for Hana. And based on the indignation that replaced the flames in his eyes, he hated that he had to help me.

No longer wanting to meet his gaze, I glared at the hands that touched me.

Too bad I couldn’t burn things with my eyes.

Maybe then he’d let me go. Not that the leather on his arms needed any more holes or tears.

The Hellhounds had scored gouges into his uniform, and when I tilted my head just right, light gleamed on blood beneath the shredded folds.

The wounds were shiny slivers, almost healed.

He acted and fought against the Hellhounds, and I just hid like an untrained, senseless, helpless female.

The words were like a poison, repeating an endless cycle in my mind. Only the more I heard it, the less it sounded like the mocking tone of my princely jailor. There was someone else who used to call me a helpless little wimp, but I couldn’t remember who.

Shame and anger colored my face, fueling my flame.

The cloak had a threshold of how much power it could withstand as a shimmer of dark violet leaked through the seams. The white slowly dimmed along with my fear.

But calming the rage wasn’t working with Aspen’s swaddling.

It practically proved his point. His seething gaze only made it worse.

“Leave,” I said, trying to pull away, but he wouldn’t let go.

“Are you sure?” he asked, sounding almost concerned. He had to be mocking me.

“I said leave !” I screamed, purple flame spiking through the material.

Holding in a gasp of pain, I rolled onto my side, forcing his hands off me.

The bed moved under his weight, and his sword scraped against the floor and slid back into its sheath.

Once he shut the door, I let out the strangled gasp.

The physical pain was just as bad as the emotional pain.

Tears fell without the audience, rolling down the side of my cheek and over my nose, soothing the haunting melody and itch.

My purple flames dimmed beneath the cloak, sinking back to where they came.

I shifted, thinking it’d help the painful heartbeat in my sides. With my clothing burned to nothing, the sticky honey slid against the heavy fabric of the prince’s cloak. The throbbing worsened.

My fingers lifted the fabric, and I winced. It was stuck, possibly to the honey. Taking a deep breath, cringing, I jerked it off like a band-aid.

Blood seeped down my ribs and around my back.

The fabric had slowed the bleeding, but now my open wounds were exposed. My stomach turned.

“Shit,” I said. Not only were my cuts freely bleeding down my side, but I had to find help, and I was naked.

I searched the room for something to wrap around my wounds, finding no extra supplies.

What kind of healer didn’t have extra supplies?

Muffling my cry, I swung my legs off the bed.

My hands pressed into my sides, trying to stop the bleeding.

It barely helped, but it was better than nothing.

My legs, though—there was nothing I could do for them.

They throbbed with the same fiery pain my sides did and bled.

Working up the courage, I stood. The floor swirled before I gained my bearings and shuffled toward the door. Trickles of blood slid down the backs of my thighs. With slick fingers, it took two tries before the knob turned, and he was already there.

“Aspen?” I whispered, voice hitching. A sudden chill overwhelmed my body, and my knees buckled.

Without a word, he had me in his arms. My sides burned as he jostled me. I hadn’t expected him to pick me up but was grateful even if it was agonizing, and the room swirled.

“Hana!” he called, laying me in bed.

“Why didn’t you say something immediately?” he demanded, touching the opening of the cloak.

“I didn’t know.” I rested my head back against the soft pillow, my mind loopy.

What was he doing?

“Hey!” My vision blinked out, then back in, and my cloak opened. I was bare in front of him. “Stop!” Anxiety seized me as I felt pressure. I slapped his hands and whatever he was doing to me.

“Lucille, you’re bleeding out. I’m trying to help. Please.” The glacial hard tone he usually used melted into something soft and resigned.

He knew my name. How? And why was he looking at me like that?

Two beautiful mountain lakes glistened at me with concern—not hate, not the arrogant sneer or cold mask he wore, but genuine concern, like he had a heart .

I was hallucinating.

Stunned and dizzy, wanting Aspen to stop vanishing behind a black cloud, I stopped slapping him.

At one moment of clarity, I wondered if he sneaked a peek at my pebbled breasts.

“You’re hurting my sides,” I said weakly. “And my legs hurt, Aspen. They hurt so much,” I cried. Why did I keep saying his name? “I hate his name.”

“Whose name?”

“Your name. It’s nice. But you’re an ass. You shouldn’t have your name.”

Did I say that out loud?

“Hana!” Aspen’s voice had to have carried through the whole house. The sword at his hip flashed along with his distorted eyes.

Down the hall, footsteps pattered. A lady barged into the room, frantic, holding a black bag. “What? I was stitching another patient. What’s wrong?”

My muddled brain decided to hallucinate green skin onto the lady and shrink her down to the size of a dwarf. Odd.

Aspen stood as she entered. “She’s bleeding out. Help her.” Long gone was the male with melted seas of worry, replaced by the authority of a commanding prince. The arrogant asshole was back. I snorted to myself.

“How? She was finally stable!” Hana exclaimed, astonished, ignoring his tone. She lifted something from my sides, gazing at my open wounds. Quickly, she set down her black bag and grabbed supplies. “This is going to hurt. Deep breaths, okay?” Tender ruby eyes nodded down to my torso.

“Okay. ”

“And I need you to drink this. It’s a coagulant serum. It will counteract the rest of the Hellhound’s saliva.” She held a vial to my lips, and I let her tip the bitter liquid into my mouth.

“How did this happen? And why didn’t you get me the moment she woke up? Did you want her to bleed to death after nearly biting my head off to save her?” Hana did not sound happy—more like downright pissed off.

I giggled. Aspen was getting scolded.

My thoughts turned disjointed as everything blurred together. I squeezed my eyes shut, relieved by the lack of weirdness. Their words became softer.

“I don’t know. We were talking. I got distracted.” He paused. “I said some things and her powers did the rest.”

He said a lot of things.

“You never thought about the stitches, bandages, or serum.” It wasn’t a question.

“No.”

Was that regret in his tone?

Hana huffed. “Well, hopefully, her accelerated healing can replenish what she’s lost. The serum should help soon, too,” she sighed. “Does she know?”

My sides burned as Hana poured something into each slice along my ribs, then turned me with Aspen’s help to do the same to my thighs.

They moved me back, and I lay limp and barely conscious.

I could feel my body twitch in pain, but my eyes never opened, only aware enough to hear the fading tones of their conversation.

“No,” he said, frustrated. “She knows nothing about Elora either. Why would she come here?” He stomped back and forth. “Why doesn’t she remember? Why didn’t she fucking listen to me? ”

“Did you ever think of asking her?” Hana supplied.

He scoffed, “Why would I do that? Her memories are gone.”

“Maybe to help her?”

There was a long pause before he answered. “Hana, I think you need to stop drinking the earthly wine. It’s obviously messed with your mind.” He sighed, a sound I never heard from him before. “She’s here now. Magda said…”

“She’s a witch who plays with emotions for power. Her words can mean many things.”

“True.”

“Will you tell her? Help her?”

He laughed, a bitter, ruthless sound. “No. The queen will either use her or lose her, like all the others.”

“Always so loyal.”

Aspen gave another bitter laugh. “Either loyalty or death.”

“Or taking my advice from before. Get out. Find a different life. Let her?—”

“Stop! I won’t listen to your pointless advice. It’s too late. I will never betray my queen,” Aspen declared.

“So she’ll be another Nalini?” she whispered.

My ears started to ring with how quiet it became.

“Don’t ever speak her name to me again.” The door opened, then slammed.

“Oh, Aspen, what did she turn you into?” Hana whispered sadly to herself while her soft fingers applied pressure on my wounds. I let myself drift off, wondering about which she Hana was talking about.