Page 155 of A Kingdom of Wild and Power
Her brow furrowed. The words unsettled her.
‘What do you mean?’
His eyes darkened with something perilously close to fear.
‘You are my one and only,’ he said. ‘I have done everything for you, Melinoe.’
A chill crept beneath her skin.
‘What did you do?’
She saw it then. The ache in his stare, the dread of truthunravelling between them. The fear of losing her once more.
Instead of answering, he brushed a kiss to the tip of her nose and stepped back, as though distance might protect them both.
‘Come back,’ he said quietly.
Mal frowned. ‘Why wouldn’t I?’
Thanatos did not answer. Instead, he reached for her once more.
For a fleeting heartbeat, Mal thought he meant to kiss her again and, to her own surprise, she wanted him to. She wanted the world to fall silent once more, to drown in that impossible warmth and forget the abyss yawning at her back. But his hand struck her chest.
A sudden, brutal shove.
The ground vanished beneath her feet.
Mal gasped as she toppled backwards into the chasm, her dark hair whipping around her face, her fingers clawing at nothing. Her eyes locked onto his as she fell.
Thanatos stood at the edge of Tartarus, motionless, watching her fall. And for the first time since she had known him, fear fractured his composure. Real, unguarded fear.
Not fear that Hell would imprison her.
Not fear that Persephone would defeat her.
But fear that she would choose not to return because of the truths learnt below. That she would find something in those depths that would make her stay.
The abyss swallowed her.
Heat rose to meet her, thick and suffocating. The darkness shifted into red-gold flame as she fell deeper, the roar of Hell rising like a welcome.
Mal did not scream.
She did not flail.
She straightened her body mid-fall, eyes hardening, resolvesettling over her like armour.
She fell into the flames, ready for whateverawaited her.
Oh, the desert folk love to gamble. Just as much as they like to drink. And to witness their strange creatures fight.
Tabitha Wysteria
Dawn ought to have felt uneasy riding the dragon with Kai seated behind her. After the conversation they had shared—the rawness of it, the things left hanging in the air between them—she should have sought another mount. And yet, when she approached him and he extended his hand, something inside her quietened.
The instant her fingers slipped into his, the world seemed to steady, as though a piece long out of place had finally clicked back where it belonged.
The journey north had been gruelling. Sandstorms rose without warning, walls of gold and fury that forced King Siroc and his serpents to retreat time and again. Alina had cursed nearly the entire way, her temper fraying thinner with every delay. Kai, of course, had teased her mercilessly, which only sharpened her irritation further. Dawn had half expected Alina to shove him from the dragon mid-flight.
