Page 7 of Cold Hearted
Think peaceful thoughts. This fae is good-looking and all is well. I mean him no harm.
I opened my eyes, but the cuffs still hadn’t fallen off.
“And what’s your name?” I asked him.
He grinned and again my knees went weak because his smile made him ten times more attractive. He was like a siren,no doubt luring me to my death with that smile. “Commander Zander Warrick.”
I nearly died right there. “C-Commander, as in commander of theentireNorthern Army?”
There was only one commander, right? That meant he was a big deal. Probably only second to Lord Roan himself. What was he doing out here in what was obviously a small fringe village?
He mock bowed. “At your service, little bird.”
Then he walked inside of the tavern and left me stewing in so much violent hatred that the cuffs clamped down harder, and I had to bite my tongue to keep from crying.
What had I gotten myself into?
Chapter 3
He left me stewing outside, vacillating between murderous rage and a fake peaceful, meditative state. I paced the front of the tavern while he drank and played cards inside, the cuffs alternating between biting deeper into me and releasing their grip in relation to my mood toward him.
What insane fae had designed these? They were awful, but also slightly genius and I wanted to bring a pair back to my realm so that we could recreate them. They would come in handy with arrests.
He arrested me!
The anger was back. How dare he arrest me for simply saying I had intel on an assassination toward his lord. Things were so different here. I hated it.
After about an hour had passed, I had resigned myself to being his captor. If this was what it took to get me in front of Lord Roan, then so be it.
When the tavern door finally opened and Zander emerged, he didn’t look at all surprised to see me. He knew I wouldn’t run off. I needed him, and that was what angered me the most.
He took one look at the dried blood on my wrists and shook his head. “Tsk tsk, little bird. You carry too much anger.”
I wanted to blind him with sunlight then, and show him just how angry I could be, but I swallowed it down and held up the loose cuffs. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I wish you no harm and pray that you have many years of health ahead of you,” I said in a syrupy sweet voice, and gave him an overly enthusiastic grin.
The corner of his lips twitched, like he was trying to suppress a smile, but he just inclined his head to the stables. “My horse, Omen, is in there.”
I snorted. Omen. That felt like an appropriate name for the predicament I was in.
“My men are expecting me, and we have several days’ ride to reach them,” Zander went on. “If we ride hard, we can reach Houndstooth Village by nightfall.”
Houndstooth? That sounded lovely. I hadn’t memorized every small village in the Northern Kingdom to know exactly where that was. “Lead the way, good sir.” I kept my voice chipper and walked with my hands bound in front of me. These damn things better fall off soon or I was going to be in real trouble.
The commander retrieved a beautiful black stallion out of the stall and paid an attendant. He then walked the horse over to me and looked me up and down. “Do they teach you to ride horses in the Midlands?”
I seethed and the cuffs tightened slightly. “Not with these on.” I held them up and glared at him. I learned to ride a horse bareback when I was three. How dare he speak to a royal princess like this.
He nodded and then placed one foot in the stirrup, swinging his leg over. He inclined his head for me to get on the horse.
One horse.
Riding behind a man for days on one horse. My mother would drop dead if she were here to see it. But my people were counting on me, so I needed to press on.
I placed my left foot into the stirrup and then fumbled with my interlocked hands, finally glancing up at him. “A little help?”
He reached down, hooked his hand under my armpit, and hauled me up as if I were made of feathers.
Whoa. He was strong.Reallystrong. I swallowed hard as I swung my leg over the stallion and my butt slammed on the horse behind the saddle, my chest pressing against his back.
