Page 84 of Blood Oath
Slipping out of Limbo, I smile softly at her. “No need to be wary, love. I would never touch you without permission.”
“You would just violate my dreams without permission.”
“I’d hardly call it that. You were in pain. I needed to stop it.”
She clenches her jaw. “What did you see in my dream?”
That memory clearly distressed her in the extreme. It’s something private, something she wouldn’t want me to know. I didn’t get the complete picture of what was happening, but it doesn’t matter—unlike Crane, I know not everything can be fixed. Invisible scars can’t go away.
I understand that part of her more than she may ever know. I also understand wanting to keep a broken past as a secret.
“I saw nothing,” I murmur. “I just sensed the nightmare and took it away.”
I fully expect her to swear at me or kick me out of the room, so it’s a pleasant surprise when she looks away, dropping the subject to frown at the curtains, which are letting in soft light. Time is warped in dreams, so it’s unsurprising if her sleep felt bizarrely short.
“What time is it?”
“Mid-morning. Worried you’ll miss the wedding?”
She pauses. “My father’s cousin had planned an outdoor wedding. They postponed it due to the weather, so I’m not going after all.”
Either she’s a very smooth liar, or I must thank Frost for buying us even more time with our keeper. “Then shall we lounge in bed for a few more hours?” I try, hopeful that she might be softening towards us after all.
Maven gives me a dry look. “Get out, Crypt. The fae mead left enough of a headache without you exacerbating it.”
Obediently, I move back into Limbo, but this suite is spacious enough that she can’t sense me anymore by the time I reach the front door. I watch, enraptured, as she rolls out of bed and immediately drops into a set of push-ups and other exercises. It’s clearly her wake-up routine, though why she’s pushing herself to do this when she told me herself about her headache, I can’t comprehend.
I turn to drift through the wall and give her space, determined to taste her dreams once again.
But the next time I do, I want them to be sweet dreams. And someday, she’ll be asking me to join her in her dreams every night. Someday, I’ll make her just as obsessed with me as I am with her.
25
MAVEN
After I shower and go downstairs dressed in my typical baggy attire, a gorgeously sleep-rumpled, shirtless Baelfire serves omelets and fruit for breakfast. He makes small talk about his shifter-centric classes at Everbound while I fail to keep my eyes off all his golden muscles. Meanwhile, Silas keeps giving Crypt long glares. I don’t know if he suspects that the Nightmare Prince took a joy ride in my subconscious last night, but he says nothing about it.
Neither do I. I’m still torn. On the one hand, the idea of anyone taking a look inside my head makes me want to tear out of my own skin.
But on the other…he stopped my most painful recurring nightmare before it got to the worst part. I haven’t rested that well in a long time, even if I’ll never admit that to him.
Still. From now on, I’m taking a dreamcatcher with me everywhere I go.
Everett joins us late for breakfast. The storm is no longer raging outside—instead, there’s a crisp layer of glistening snow covering as far as the eye can see outside the ostentatious inn. I appreciate the macabre beauty of a world frozen over.
With no storm, I could leave to carry out the hit.
I just…don’t yet.
They asked for a day, so I’ll stay for a while and slip out later. I’ll still have Lykoudis’s heart to Melchom before midnight.
“So, Crypt says there’s no wedding anymore,” Bael says as he follows my self-tour of the inn. Silas trails behind us, and Crypt is invisible somewhere nearby. Professor Frost is keeping his distance elsewhere. “I gotta admit, I was really looking forward to seeing what you would wear to the shindig, Boo.”
“This,” I lie easily.
He blinks, stopping with me when I pause to examine yet another long hallway. “You were going to sit through a wedding while getting swallowed up by that long-sleeved shirt and pants that completely hide how perfect your ass is?”
“Not all of us can walk around half-naked.” I look pointedly at his bare, muscular torso. The guy really is massive, and I’m starting to suspect he hasn’t bothered putting a shirt on because he wants to test my limits.
