Kill.That cannot be the blood-and-armored man’s real name.
Sparks sear the darkness. In short order, the one called Kill has lit a candle. He continues prying them out of a chandelier that’s fallen to the floor, lighting them, melting the bases, and sticking them to surfaces until the alcove glows with flickering light.
I heave a sigh of relief. My ribs ache with the movement.
I hate the dark. Monsters thrive in darkness. When I was a child, I would lay frozen in terror of invisible creatures beneath my bed. I never completely outgrew my fear.
“We stay here until morning.” His rough, low voice scrapes pleasantly along my neck. “Sleep in shifts. It’s our best chance of escaping alive.”
“Escape? From what?”
“From monsters like that one.” He points. A squeak of alarm rushes past my lips as I follow the trail of blood up the stairway and spy the unmoving basilisk.
“Dead?” The word comes out in a choked whisper.
“We dispatched it. Don’t fret,” says the prince in the blue jacket who won’t stop touching me.
A quiet scoff reaches the edge of my hearing. I have the distinct sense that the man smeared with blood is the hero who slayed the monster. Not the overly handsome one in the bright blue jacket. I may have been raised a sheltered farmer’s daughter, but I’m not stupid.
I fix the handsy one with a glare.
“Who are you?”
At least give me your name before you start trying to sneak a feel of my breast.
I keep moving away or brushing his hands off, but he’s an octopus. I’ve seen that concupiscent expression on other men’s faces.
Not on the one called Kill’s arresting face, though. He looks at me like he wants to feed me to the next monster that comes along.
“I am Alistair, the crown prince of Belterre and heir to the royal throne.”
Out of habit, I bob a curtsey. The last thing I remember is drinking too much wine at a ball to celebrate my unwanted betrothal to a different prince, and then collapsing on the ballroom floor. Very embarrassing, though it was one way out of the situation I’d found myself in.
The last prince was relentless and handsy, too. I dreaded my wedding.
Everyone assured me that once I was married, he would leave me alone to pursue mistresses.
Ironic, that the best way to get rid of a man was to wed him.
But I didn’t want a royal life. I missed the farm and the eternal rhythm of the seasons. Sunlight on my face and sinking my toes into the earth.
I knew the chalice was poisoned.
I drank from it anyway.
“What happened to my fiancé?”
“He is...” This new prince—if he is telling the truth about his status—captures my hands again. “I am rarely at a loss for words, Rose. It’s complicated. There is no need for concern, however, for I shall marry you as soon as we get you down this wretched mountain.”
Why can’t he give me a straight answer?
“Mountain?” I echo. “Marry?” I can’t marry this man. I’m already betrothed, not that I wanted to be. I’m not marrying a complete stranger, even if he is almost as pretty as I am. “My sincere apologies that you went to all the trouble you and your companion have apparently gone to, but I’ll be fine once I’m reunited with my prince.”
My prince.A lie, but one that will buy me time to figure out what is going on.
“Uh, about that…”
“Your beloved is long dead, Princess,” the surly one growls without so much as glancing at me. “You’ve been asleep for more than a century. This one—” he stabs a finger in the direction of Prince Alistair “—is his great-grandson.”
