He was mildly surprised that she knew about that, but then he should have known that his brother wouldn’t keep his mouth shut. “Jericho told you.”
“Someone had to, don’t you think? It certainly wasn’t going to be you.”
“When?”
“When what?”
“When did he tell you?”
“What difference does that make?” she snapped for the first time looking slightly disconcerted.
He took a step toward her, but she didn’t move away, didn’t even flinch. He’d had enough of her defiance, enough of her hostility. She should be fearful; she should be telling him everything that he wanted to know. She should be begging for her life like she had begged for Max’s, but she wasn’t, and she wasn’t going to. “Do you have no common sense whatsoever?” he inquired, his voice a low growl as he watched her. “No survival instinct?”
“I live in hell every day,” she grated through clenched teeth. “A hell that you monster’s created for us. The only sense I have is for survival, but since you’ve pretty much admitted that you’re here to kill me I see no sense in worrying about anything else right now, do you?”
He took another step toward her. “I’ll shoot this, I swear I will,” she hissed.
He quirked an eyebrow, amused by her idle threat. She would shoot it, but it would do her little good. “Will you now?”
Her eyes narrowed, her hand clenched tighter around the bow. “Your lackey bastards were near here the other day. They raided one of our encampments. I’m sure you already know that though because I’m assuming one of them spotted me somehow. That’s how you knew where to start looking for me.” She continued to glare at him as she broke off, waiting for him to say something. When he didn’t, she continued on. “There were children in those caves!” she snarled. “Children!”
“There are laws, and you and your people are breaking them.”
Her eyes fairly sparked with rage, he could sense her rapidly unraveling control. He had always enjoyed baiting her, watching her response, but this was different, this was not the girl that had stayed in his apartment at the palace. No, this girl was stronger, harder; colder. This girl fairly vibrated with anger and hostility. She looked like a warrior, she was a warrior, he realized. She had always been a fighter, but now she was so much more than that.
She was not the girl that had offered him her vein. She was the woman that was going to fire that arrow at any moment.
“Laws,” she snarled. “Laws! You’re a worse bastard than those monsters that came here to hunt us, and kill us. You sit there in your golden palace and you use us as your food, and your slaves, and you keep us starving and on the run. And you judge me you hypocritical son of a bitch!”
He knew she was going to let the arrow fly seconds before she did. He had pushed her to a breaking point, pushed her control to the edge. The string of the bow twanged as the arrow sliced through the air. He moved swiftly, darting out of the way of the lethal projectile moments before it slammed into the tree behind him. It would have been a fatal shot if he had still been standing there, that fact was not lost on him. She had shown no mercy, and neither would he.
He lunged at her. He had expected her to run, to try and flee on foot. It would have been pointless, but it was human instinct after all. What he hadn’t expected was for her to take to the trees like a monkey. Heaving the bow over her shoulder, she seized hold of a branch over her head, and heaved herself easily into it. She shimmied swiftly up the large tree, moving rapidly through the branches. Braith lunged for her, nearly catching hold of her pant leg. Her eyes were wide when she glanced back down at him, but it did not slow her down as she scurried up the tree.
She leapt onto another limb; she sat upon it for a moment before rising gracefully to her feet. Holding onto the trunk, and the branch above her head, she steadied herself. She stared down at him with narrowed eyes, her breath coming rapidly, and yet she still showed no fear. He had no intention of going up there after her, and she couldn’t stay up there all day, but it was only a matter of time before someone came looking for her, or came to the river. He had to get her out of the damn tree. And once he did, he was going to throttle her.
She stared down at him for a long moment, and then she turned and ran. His mouth dropped, he watched in wonder as she sprinted easily across the thick limb. She didn’t hesitate, didn’t pause as she dove off the limb, flying out across open ground before she caught hold of a branch from the tree next to it. He was too stunned to move for a moment, he could only watch as she swung herself easily onto the branch, hopped to her feet and sped across the newest limb. He recalled Jericho’s words that no one knew the forest like she did, but it appeared that not only did she know the forest she seemed to have mastered it. He was still gaping after her when she leapt easily into another tree, vanishing from sight.
It was her disappearance that drove him into action; he rushed through the woods, following her as she leapt and dove and ran through the trees with the agility of a squirrel. He had never seen anyone move like she did, so effortlessly and easily. She was heading deeper into the forest, drawing him farther away from the area she had been walking toward when he found her. She was trying to lead him away from her family, and friends.
She raced down another limb, he watched in horror and amazement as she leapt fearlessly out of the tree. Except there wasn’t another tree to catch hold of this time. She folded in on herself, curling her arms around her legs as she spun through the air. He had no idea what she intended until she hit the ground. She landed easily, bouncing swiftly up. She darted through the woods in a zigzagging pattern, easily avoiding any obstacle in her way. It was amazing to watch her, amazing to see her sleek agility, and her profound knowledge of the world around her.
Though he was fascinated by it, and felt that there were still many things she could do, many secrets and abilities that she had hidden, he was tired of being avoided. She was heading toward another large tree, if she got into it they would continue to play this game of cat and mouse even longer. He poured on the speed, rushing after her. She had just thrown her arms around the tree branch when he caught hold of her. She did not cry out, did not scream as she planted her legs against the tree trunk and shoved off it with all of her might.
He stumbled slightly backward as she lurched sharply against him with the full force of her small weight. He kept hold of the collar of her shirt though, clinging to her as she tried to dart forward, tried to pull free of his hold. She was far more stubborn, wild, and determined to escape than he had thought she would be. He knew she was a spitfire, but she was a lot more volatile than he recalled her being. She flung herself forward; the thin material of her clothing tore within his tight hold.
She staggered, seemingly just as surprised as him to be momentarily free of his grasp. He dove at her, wrapping his arms around her waist as he caught hold of her. She cried out softly in surprise as they tumbled to the ground. Though he didn’t care about her, he shifted his weight away from her, trying not to crush her beneath him as they rolled over the ground. She was frantic now, squirming against him, her terror evident as she tried to escape his ironclad grasp.
He was surprised by the brief moment of guilt that tugged at him. He wanted her to pay for her perfidy, but he had not meant to terrify her to this extreme. She tried to stagger to her feet, but he kept hold of her waist, pulling her back underneath him as he flipped her over. Her eyes were wide, her hair a straggling mess around her flushed face. She was panting beneath him, her fear palpable as she continued to try and squirm out of his hold.
He seized hold of her hair, his hand wrapping into the thick, wet mess. She pushed at his chest, shoving against him as a soft whimper escaped her. He didn’t know what he was thinking, what he was doing, but instead of burying his teeth in her neck and draining her dry as he had imagined doing for the past couple of months, his lips descended upon her mouth, seizing hold of it. Her hands flattened against his chest as she went still as stone beneath him. He pressed tighter against her, wanting some sort of response, needing something from her, anything.
Needing to break her in some small way, just as she had broken him.
Then, her hands curled into his shirt, her fingers dug against his skin. A small gasp escaped her as her soft lips parted beneath his. She clung to him, her body melting against his. He invaded her, savoring in the taste and feel of her as he pulled her tighter. He forgot everything, all of her treachery, all of the anger and hurt as he held her. It was hard to remember anything when she was so right, and good in his arms. He had never felt anything as wonderful as she was, and as long as he held her, he didn’t care what happened around them.
It wasn’t until he tasted the saltiness of her tears upon his lips that he realized she was crying. It wasn’t until he pulled away to wipe her tears from her silken cheeks that he realized he cared for her far more than he had been willing to admit to himself. It wasn’t until she rested her forehead against his chest and began to sob heavily that he realized they were both doomed.
***
Aria watched silently as the prince threw another log on the fire. She folded her hands before her, clasping them tightly between her legs. Her eyes felt heavy, sore from crying. Her chest still hurt from the force of the sobs that had wracked her. Despite the heat, she was cold, freezing really. Numb with the shock, and horror, still clinging to her. He turned away from her, the muscles in his hard back flexing as he grabbed another log and tossed it onto the fire.
Aria glanced around the small house he had brought her to. She didn’t know why she was here, how he had known about it, but it was a quaint little cottage. He turned back to her, studying her for a long moment before he made his way slowly back to her. “You need to dry off, you’re shivering.” She didn’t tell him that she wasn’t shivering because she was still wet and chilled from the river. They both knew that it wasn’t the reason. “Arianna?”
She managed a small nod before rising to her feet and moving toward the crackling fire. She settled before it, holding out her numbed hands to the flames. He settled onto the arm of the sofa behind her, drawing his long legs up onto the cushions as he watched her. She pulled her hair before her, trying to dry it out and untangle it as she worked slowly through the thick, wet mess.
She didn’t know what to say to him, what to do. She didn’t know what he wanted from her. She started to shake again; she was trying not to start crying once more as she recalled the fierce, wonderful intensity of his kiss. For one brief moment she had felt whole, and alive, again. For one wonderful moment all of the pain of the past months had vanished beneath his touch. All of her hurt and the anger had melted beneath the wonder of his mouth against hers. She had tried to forget how amazing he could make her feel, she had remembered in an instant. And she was fairly certain that she would never be able to forget again.
“When did Jericho tell you about Gwendolyn?”
Her fingers froze in her hair; she turned slowly toward him, admiring the play of light over his hard features. “Gwendolyn?” she asked quietly, baffled by his question, and the name.
“The woman I am supposed to marry.”
“Oh.” Her eyes widened, her fingers slipped from her hair as the numbness returned in full force. She had forgotten about that little detail, that huge, awful betrayal. For a moment she couldn’t breathe through the pain and anger that constricted her chest, through the knife that stabbed deep into her heart, destroying it. Her fingers clenched tightly in her lap, her nails dug into her palms. If she thought she had any chance of succeeding she might just punch him, but she had already managed to hit him once, in the palace, she didn’t think she would get the chance again. “I didn’t know that was her name.”
His head tilted slightly to the side, he had slipped the dark glasses off, revealing the full beauty of his steel gray eyes, and the bright blue band that encircled his irises. It was so rare when they weren’t in place, so rare when he relaxed his guard enough to take them off. She could see the faint hint of the scars that marred his striking eyes. Scars that served as a reminder that no matter how stunning his eyes were, they were flawed, and unseeing around everyone but her. “When Arianna?”
She turned sharply away from him, unable to look at him any longer. It hurt too much. “The morning he came to get me.”
“Why did he tell you?”
She spun angrily back on him, her eyes narrowing fiercely as she fought the urge to punch him. “What difference does that make?” she spat.
He stared silently back at her. “I want to know, that’s the difference.”
“And I want peace, but we don’t always get what we want.”
