He was listening.
Always.
I held my breath and started again because I had nothing better to do than torment men.
Time folded in on itself.
I blinked, and everyone was putting their trays away. The twins took my uneaten meal, and I looked up to find Jinx focused on me.
Black sunglasses blocked her eyes, but I still winced.
She sat with her shoulders back, ramrod straight, and there was something startlingly different about her, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. Was she getting taller?
“We need to talk,” Jinx said coldly.
I looked down at the tabletop. “Talk.”
“As we’ve discussed, I’m your guardian. I was trying to speak to you during the battle, but our mental connection is—” She paused like she was searching for the right word. “—unreliable.”
Jinx’s voice in my head.
A monster.
The screams of the dying.
I stopped fighting.
An enchanted blade thrust into my stomach.
I shoved my chair back with a loud scrape. “We’ll talk later,” I lied and walked away.
A deserter’s retreat.
Cowardice was my favorite character trait. At least, that was what Mother had said after she’d kidnapped me from the shifter realm.
I shivered harder as John and Luka slung their arms over my shoulders and led me from the cafeteria, out into the chilly air.
Without their support, I never would have made it back to our barracks.
I would have collapsed among the trees and closed my eyes. I would have laid down on the fog-covered ground and let snow gather atop me. I would have— I was startled awake by someone shaking my shoulder.
It took me a second to process my surroundings.
It was nighttime, and the room was quiet as everyone slept. I was lying in my bunk bed, tucked under the covers. Wind howled aggressively outside, and it sounded like the flurries had become a snowstorm.
I had no recollection of falling asleep.
“You should eat this. You didn’t eat earlier,” Malum said gruffly as he handed me a vegetable sandwich he must have stolen from the cafeteria.
I took it from him mutely.
Did he wake up in the middle of the night to feed me? Strange.
I took a small bite because my stomach was hollow, then I devoured it in three bites like I was ravenous. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d eaten.
“Good girl,” Malum whispered as I brushed crumbs off my covers, and I stared at him.
“What did you just say to me?” I asked incredulously.
A blush stained his cheeks like he hadn’t meant to speak.
The cruel devil who had said how much he hated women could not be the same man who was now whispering things about princesses and praising me.
I had to be dreaming.
Snores filled the space as the men slept in the dark bedroom. A faint memory of the twins guiding me into bed played at the back of mind, but it felt like it was someone else’s recollection.
Had I been sleepwalking?
Malum and I were the only ones awake, and he loomed over me like a dark god.
I was delirious.
My comforter was covered in frost, and his fingers danced with flames.
“Were you watching me sleep?” I asked slowly as I tried to figure out what was going on. Why is he feeding me? What’s he trying to gain?
Silence expanded between us, and just when I thought he wasn’t going to answer, he said, “It was my turn to stand watch, and you looked hungry.”
It took a moment for his words to penetrate.
How does one look hungry in their sleep? Red extended across his bronze cheeks like he could read my mind.
I gaped at him. “Um. Thanks? I’m also pretty sure there are enchanted alarms on all the barracks, so you don’t need to stand watch.”
He frowned. “I will do what I must in order to protect my mates.” With crossed arms, he spread his legs wider.
It was pitch black as the storm raged outside the window.
Insanity was saccharin on the tip of my tongue as the leader of the kings cleared his throat roughly.
He leaned down at the waist, so his head was closer to my bunk.
As if in a trance, I reached up for his neck.
“How did you get this?” I whispered as I traced the pads of my fingers against smooth bronze skin and left a trail of blue ice. It instantly melted, and water dripped between us.
There was a sizzle as my fingers burned from contact with his skin.
It stung, but I didn’t pull away.
He moved closer and overwhelmed my space.
Tobacco and whiskey filled my lungs, and the hairs on the back of my neck stood up as goose bumps exploded across my arms.