Nightbane (Lightlark, #2)(21)

That couldn’t be true.

What was there to like about her? She was weak. Foolish—

She looked away. Suddenly, she was the one who was uncomfortable. Oro didn’t lie, but she couldn’t imagine anyone saying good things about her, when her mind told her the opposite. “I feel better,” she lied. “You can leave for a bit, if you want.”

“Is that so?”

“Better than ever, actually.”

“Right.” He lightly brushed away another strand that had come loose—because he was truly hopeless at tying her hair—and she knew he was also subtly checking her temperature. “Well, Wildling, even if I couldn’t naturally tell that you’re a liar, your skin is so warm, you could pass for Sunling.”

Oro should be with a Sunling. Someone more like him. Someone who wasn’t such a mess. “Do you wish I was?”

“Sunling?”

She nodded, and it didn’t do anything to make her head feel better. Before he could respond, she added, “Do you wish I wasn’t . . . everything I am?”

He was quiet for a moment. Her eyes slowly began to close, suddenly heavy. Fighting against sleep was useless in this state. “No, Isla,” he finally said. “It’s the parts you don’t seem to like about yourself that I love the most.”

Love—

She wanted to accept it, savor it, clutch it, let the word swallow her whole and make her happy. But instead, she drifted off, into the waiting arms of sleep.





BEFORE


She was kicking off her shoes, rubbing her toes. No matter how many times Poppy made her stride in straight lines, or even forced Terra to make her train in the ridiculous heeled shoes, she would never get used to them.

And the dresses.

The ones with all the ties and buttons hell-bent on not letting her breathe. Each stitch and clip of her corset was conspiring together to suffocate her, she was sure of it.

Your face and words will be just as important as your blades and swords during the Centennial, Poppy said.

Isla highly doubted it.

She had all the buttons down the back of her dress undone when she noticed a shadow in the corner of her room. A shadow that flickered.

In a moment, the dagger she kept hidden beneath her vanity was in her fingers, and she whirled around, only to be face-to-face with the shadow now as it rippled then settled.

Grim was standing over her, eyes trained on the dress that hung from her shoulders, not her blade.

“Hello, Hearteater,” he said.

He had found her. She had foolishly hoped it would take him longer to figure out her identity. Or that her stabbing had wounded him enough to buy her a few weeks to figure out a plan. She knew it wouldn’t kill him. She had just wanted to incapacitate him long enough to make her escape.

Now here he was.

Impossibly, in her room, in the Wildling newland. Here to kill her.

Before she could breathe, his hand was wrapped around hers—the one that held the dagger—so painfully that she flinched.

Isla grunted, adrenaline rushing through her, as she tried to wrestle herself away. That only made him angry. He growled and shoved her against the glass wall of her room. It felt nothing like before.

No, this time he twisted her arm painfully, so that her own knife was at her throat.

She writhed beneath him, heart pounding, arm flashing in pain. All he did was frown down at her, eyes fixed in a glare.

“You cursed hearteater”—he spat the word like it disgusted him—“dare to come to my realm, disguised, to assassinate me.” The blade dug against her neck. She had sharpened the tip herself; it was so sharp that it immediately cut into her skin. She smelled her own blood. He was going to kill her, stab her just like she had him.

She wasn’t like him. She didn’t have power that would delay her death. Isla flicked the wrist that he wasn’t holding. The weapon disguised as a bracelet unveiled its spike. She stabbed it through his thigh.

The Nightshade ruler roared, and her dagger dropped to the floor—but before she could take her chance to escape, the blade to her neck was replaced with an invisible grip.

She choked as she floated in the air, clawing at her throat. He stood there, focused, as she was hauled farther up the wall.

Isla gasped for breath, but the grip didn’t loosen. She saw stars. Could barely hear him as he said, “Was this your plan to keep me from the Centennial? To try and break the curses? Did you mean to make a fool of me?” The pressure gripped even tighter, and her vision went white. “Who are you working with?”

Isla tried to speak, but her words sounded like whimpers.

“How did you travel to Nightshade so quickly?”

At that, Isla glared at him, enraged, exasperated. How was she supposed to answer all his questions when he had her throat in an invisible fist?

Like he could read her thoughts, he bared his teeth—

And released her.

Isla fell to the floor in a heap, gasping, her fevered forehead and hands flat against the cold ground. Her unbuttoned dress slipped down her shoulders.

It took what seemed like a lifetime to catch her breath. Once she did, she gripped the dagger from the floor, scuttled to the corner of her room, away from him, that monster, that filth—

He had almost killed her.

Across the room, Grimshaw frowned. Frowned.

It was her turn to bare her teeth at him. She lifted the dagger in his direction, with a shaking arm. “Monster,” she said, her voice just a rasp against the back of her throbbing throat. She spat at him.