Aleia Mills ’s Reviews > Feathers So Vicious > Status Update

“Oh, but I did,” he rasped, gliding his palm up along my waist, over my chest, only for his finger to swipe along my bottom lip. “When I fed you from my lips, little dove. It is the kiss of the raven, but a kiss nonetheless, reserved for our mate and no one but her. It is why we guard them so.”

“You promised not to be on your best behavior.” “Oh, but I happen to love how it flusters you.” His chuckle came with those fingers that gently combed through my hair before he nuzzled my temple. “And if you run from it this time? Little dove, there will only be one set of arms left to run into. Mine.”

Is this not what you pretended to do?” Malyr asked. “When you ran along the bailey?” “Yes, but—” “Stop pretending, Galantia,” he said. “Do it. Lean slightly forward, press your legs against him, and say, alesh.” “It’s dangerous.” “Mmm, did your mother not tell you?” he whispered with a shove of his nose at my temple. “My little white dove, so is playing with knives.”

The gulf between what I yearned to believe and what I had come to expect from him seemed impossibly vast, and I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was teetering on the edge of a cliff, one misstep away from a fall that would shatter me beyond repair.

“Fated only to end in emotional tragedy.” His fingers stalled in my hair, and I only now noticed the slight tremble they carried. “As it should. As it ought to. Anything other than that, Galantia, would be too great a betrayal to my family, no matter my personal… affliction.” His personal affliction.

“A bracelet. The chain of aerymel, a local artisan crafted for me, but the trinkets I chose and gathered myself.” He lifted the bracelet from my palm, letting wood and bone clank against metal. “Show me your wrist. No, the other one.”

“Yeh ash valtem skalde ya.” Something deep at my core reveled at his word. “What does it mean?” “I will forever treasure you,” he said.

“Do you want to know what is worse than being forced to endure the most depraved acts?” Brisden looked down at where I’d wet myself, grinning. “Liking them.” And I knew then that it wasn’t urine the man forced from me. He cut through my body, past my decaying mind, and straight into my soul. And I felt it crack. Sensed it shatter into a million pieces, filthy and corrupted, never to be whole again.

“It’s silly, I know. But then again, we already established that I’m a foolish girl. Today made that quite clear. It was stupid to expect that Father would bother to get me back. It was even more stupid to hope that you would… somehow protect me.”

Yes, I was worthless. Never wanted, never loved. And how could anybody love something so deranged? So broken? I looked into his pitch-black eyes, my throat strangling tight. “No matter how much you want to hate me, it’ll never measure up to the loathing my father clearly harbors for me. You think you rendered me worthless? Don’t flatter yourself, Malyr. I was born worthless.”

“Maybe you are already a little bit cracked, a little bit broken. Look at me.” His words fractured something inside me, splintering away on my dignity, my sanity, my sense of value as I looked at him. He must have seen the damage somewhere in my eyes, that cracking of my soul, because a guttural groan ripped from the chest that held his black heart.