“Garin, stop it,” Lilac objected. “That’s cruel, even for you.”
Garin spun on her, his lips curled warningly over his fangs. “You cannot possibly defend him.”
“There’s no way Myrddin could’ve known.”
“He has done enough tonight. Bringing you both here, putting you in danger.” Garin’s chest rose and fell unevenly, his breath shallow. “I ordered him to watch over you, protect you against any harming hand. My own or otherwise.”
“His duty may be to you, but Myrddin’s will is his own. Just because he has not done it your way, doesn’t mean he has disobeyed you. At least he has the freedom to do so.” Garin flinched. “You will never hurt me.”
“You think—” Garin laughed, a ridiculing sound, just as a patch of clouds moved across the moon. This had seemed to strike a deeper chord of fury in him. “You think I am incapable of hurting you?” The clouds had shifted across the moon, casting them into the shadows, but she could feel it—his eyes combing her face. A lover’s caress as he spoke slowly. Intently. “You are mine. You made sure of that. Mine to protect. Mine to covet. Mine to break.”
She swallowed, Garin’s fixed gaze a noose around her neck. He wasshifting, morphing into something and someone else entirely—yet not wholly unfamiliar. The brothel had been but a glimpse of his depraved hunger, hadn’t it?
“I thought you were an open book before. Simple to read, most amusing to digest. Spread too easily upon my fingers. Now that we’re bound, I’ve come to realize my hold on you is directly related to my appetite.”
Lilac didn’t dare budge, despising the way her body was already reacting—the heat creeping up her throat, stinging her cheeks, surging between her thighs.
“Look at you. You register the threat in my words, yet still struggle to hold yourself from me. I can sense it now, just what this does to you.” His head tilted, craning toward her. “I hear your heart thudding away, I can feel your clit jumping at the sound of your name on my tongue. Doesn’t it, Eleanor? Your Majesty. Lilac.” The last word he spoke nearly broke her will. “Princess.”
She was her kingdom’s beloved ermine caught in a snake’s trance, coiled tightly between muscles trained to kill with nowhere to run—not that she even wanted to.
The minute movement of Myrddin caught her eye. Over Garin’s shoulder, the warlock was inching back towards Rupert.
Myrddin put a slow finger to his lips.
“I taste you on the wind,” Garin muttered. “It is gut-wrenching how sinfully I crave you. Your laughter is the sound of cathedral bells—the scent of your hair, the sun warming me through the high windows. Your body, the pulpit. All I want to do is kneel, and repent, and drink of your wine, and sin, andsinagain, until there is little left of the monster I’ve become.”
Lilac dug her nails into her palm so hard, she started to bleed. She raised her chin, simultaneously acknowledging Myrddin’s message. “You miss it, don’t you? You miss your mouth on me, my arousal coating your lips. Your fingers slicked in me.” She cocked her head—a very Garin-like gesture. She hoped he recognized himself in her. “You go without the taste of this pussy for three days, and you’ve already lost your mind? Shame.”
His smile then grew vicious, and she could’ve sworn his eyes glinted in the dark. Garin’s head fell back, mouth opening in a plea of silent laughter as he gripped his chest.
Atthat moment, the clouds parted.
Yanna gasped.
Lilac would’ve run for the trees, then, if not for every bit of instinct telling her being chased—hunted—would certainly have made it worse.
With his face basked in the moonlight, Garin’s features were illuminated.Allof his teeth were fangs, some whose point came at a lethal slant—some, more jagged than others, his canines still especially long in comparison. Sharp nails had sprouted upon his lengthened fingers, his already-huge hands enlarged.
Blinding need boiled her blood, stronger than the fear that chased it painfully through her veins. She imagined tackling him, pushing him back and riding his mouth, her fingers twined through his luscious black hair until he sank his teeth into her.
She wanted to nip at his throat and make him bleed. “Your bark is stronger than your bite.”
“No,” Yanna whimpered frantically, sidling up to her. “Are you fucking crazy?”
“I do miss it.” Garin wiped his chin across his forearm. He wasdrooling, his voice a deep moan that may as well have been two of his thick claws up her skirts. “Oh, gods, I do. More than you’ll ever know.” His eyes darted onto Yanna, who hid behind the curtain of Lilac’s hair. “Though, the taste of your sister was almost—nearly—close enough.”
Lilac’s hungry smile fell.
All the excitement left her body in the whoosh of air expelled from her lungs, her chest caving in until it ached. This time, the pang of raw jealousy at the fresh memory of his fangs in Yanna clanged with something far more primal.
Lilac turned to Yanna through her heated, already blurry vision; her handmaiden’s blonde hair was silver in the moonlight, framing her face. Yanna was too busy glaring daggers at Garin, tears already streaming down her plump cheeks.
“Don’t listen to him,” Lilac said, grasping at her own sanity. “He’s trying to get into your head.”
“Me?” Garin pointed at himself, his claw pricking his chest. “No. No, not in the way I’ve buried myself into yours.”
Lilac slinked her fingers between Yanna’s, just in case she ran to fighthim. Or worse. She thought of her castle—her throne. “My father never told me?—”
