Total pages in book: 200
Estimated words: 189930 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 950(@200wpm)___ 760(@250wpm)___ 633(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 189930 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 950(@200wpm)___ 760(@250wpm)___ 633(@300wpm)
Hawke grinned up at me, the dimple in his right cheek appearing. “I’m liking where this is headed.”
I punched him in the face, right in the godsdamn dimple. Pain lanced across my knuckles, but I drew my arm back.
Hawke caught my wrist and yanked me down until my body was almost flush with his. “You hit like you’re angry with me.”
I shifted, jamming my knee down between his legs and aiming for a very sensitive area. He anticipated the move, and my knee hit him in the thigh.
“That would’ve done some damage,” he told me.
“Good,” I growled.
“Now, now. You’d be disappointed later if I couldn’t use it.”
For a moment, I couldn’t believe he’d actually said that, but he had. He totally had. “I would rather cut it from your body.”
“Liar,” he whispered.
The sound that came from inside me would’ve scared me if it had come from anyone else. I jumped up, breaking his hold. I went to bring my foot down on his throat, but Hawke caught it and pulled. I went down, landing on my side. Pain flared, but I ignored it as I slammed my fist into his side.
“Damn,” Kieran drew the word out.
“Should we intervene?” Delano asked, sounding concerned.
“No,” Elijah answered with a chuckle. “This is the best thing I’ve seen in a while. Who would’ve thought the Maiden could throw down?”
“This is why you don’t mix business with pleasure,” Kieran commented.
“Is that the case?” Elijah whistled. “My money is on her then.”
“Traitors,” gasped Hawke, rolling me until he was on top. I went for his face, but he caught my wrists. “Stop it.”
I tried to lift my hips, and when that didn’t work, I pushed my upper body up. It took everything in me, and he simply pinned my wrists to the straw.
“Get off me!”
“Stop it,” he repeated. “Poppy. Stop—”
“I hate you!” I screamed at the sound of my name, ripping one hand free in my rage. I slammed my fist into his face. “I hate you!”
Hawke caught my hand, jerking it back to the ground as his bloodied lips peeled back. “Stop it!”
I stopped.
I went completely still as I stared up at him, the shock robbing me of my ability to speak for several moments. I saw him—saw him for what he really was.
He wasn’t just any Descenter following the Dark One.
“That’s why you never really smiled,” I whispered.
Because, how could he?
He had to hide the sharp, sharp teeth.
Two of them.
Fangs.
I remembered the feel of them against my lips, my neck—recalling how oddly sharp they’d felt.
Gods.
Now I understood how he could move so fast, why he seemed to have better hearing and eyesight than anyone I’d ever met, and why he sometimes sounded as if he’d lived decades longer than I had. It was why he was quick to break a kiss whenever I came close to feeling his canines.
I’d been so blind.
He wasn’t mortal.
He wasn’t a wolven.
Hawke was an Atlantian.
I shuddered as something deep inside me withered. “You’re a monster.”
Hawke’s eyes flared an intense gold, and they weren’t normal. They’d never been natural. “You finally see me for what I am.”
I did.
He was a thing of nightmares hidden in the guise of a dream, and I had fallen for it. I fell so hard.
The fight went out of me.
Him being a Descenter was bad enough, but an Atlantian? His people created the creatures who’d taken my mother and father from me, who’d almost killed me.
Hawke seemed to sense it because he moved swiftly, hauling me to my feet. “Delano,” he called. “Take her.”
I was handed over like a bag of potatoes, and Delano kept my arms clamped to my sides.
“Where should I put her?” Delano asked.
Hawke’s chest rose sharply. “Somewhere where she can’t escape and can’t hurt herself.” He paused. “Or hurt anyone else, which is more likely than the former.”
“Are we holding her prisoner?” someone demanded. “We’re keeping her alive? Will we feed and shelter that.”
That.
As if I were the monster, the one who supported the Dark One and could create Craven. These people were beyond help.
“She’s the Maiden,” another yelled. “She needs to die!”
A round of agreement sounded, and someone else said, “Send her back to their counterfeit Queen and King. Just her head so they know what is coming for them.”
“From blood and ash!” shouted a young boy as he pushed to the front of the group. It was the kid from the day before, the one who had run from house to house.
My legs weakened.
Several voices answered, “We will rise!”
“No one touches her.” Hawke scanned the group in the yard, silencing them. “No one,” he repeated as he turned back. “No one but me.”
The moment I saw the dank and gloomy cells under the keep, and the twisted, white mass of bones that covered the entire length of the ceiling, the fight in me came back. There was no way I would just allow myself to be placed somewhere it appeared people never left. Not even when they died.