Page 116 of Slaying the Shifter Prince
Pressure built behind my eyes.
Because even worse, Eric had continued just like before. Performing, laughing with his friends, fucking me. Enjoying life.
While I had nothing to show for my adult years, just this moment. This night. This knife in my hand.
And once I cut his throat, I’d have nothing.
The pressure grew unbearable, threatening to spill over. I shook my head. “I can’t just give up. I still haven’t given her justice.”
“What he did to your sister was awful and it never should’ve happened. But it did. You can’t change it. You can’t bring her back. But you can stop yourself from being lost to it forever. You’ve given ten years to revenge. Your sister’s shade will be happy with that. But ten years is enough.”
Was it, though? Was anything enough? My throat closed around my harsh breaths.
Sepher nodded gently, his fingers flexing in the air before me. “Enough. You’ve given enough. Now give the rest of your life to living… with me.”
The rest of my life? I frowned at the blade, checked it was still at Eric’s throat, then up at Sepher.
His eyebrows rose and one canine flashed in a crooked grin. “You dangling above a stage with your dagger at someone’s throat—not how I’d planned to do it, but considering how we met, it makes sense.” He drew a deep breath, the stripes at his sides shifting and stretching. “Selfishly, I don’t want you to die, Zita, because I want to keep you around… not as my pet, but as my wife.”
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The world went still. Eric might’ve said something, but I couldn’t hear him over my pulse and Sepher’s words, which were just as vital.
He wanted…?
“You are sharp and sour. Focused and as stubborn as an aurochs. I don’t think I could budge you unless you wanted to be budged. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.” His long, curved fangs gleamed as he smiled. “Because I love all this about you. I love the way you cut me. I love how you challenge me. I love the bite of your razor-edged tongue, the viciousness of your wit. Believe me, it kills me to ask you to let him go for now, because I am hungry to see your righteous rage in all its bloodthirsty glory.”
That pressure was back in my eyes, but for an entirely different reason.
He saw me.
Sun and fucking Stars, he saw me.
And he loved me for it all.
He didn’t try to blunt my sharpness or soften my edges. He wanted those edges, held them close so he could feel their cut, licked them like beloved razor blades.
“I may be a prince, but you are my queen. And I will kneel before you a hundred times if it gets you agree to live and let me be your husband.”
No wonder he’d flinched when I’d said he was like Eric: he wasn’t like him. Not at all. Because he saw me, all of me, and he wanted that. He wanted to save that person so he could spend his life with her—with me. With who I really was, not my stage persona or a version of me he’d conjured in his mind, not with my sister’s ghost.
Withme.
There was only one answer I could give.
The knife clattered to the stage below, ringing in the silent theatre.
But I wasn’t done. Not yet.
Hand now free, I embraced the sizzling power in my veins, called to it, beckoned like I was seducing it.
I smiled at Eric, and I pointed.
“May you get the justice you deserve.”
My gift buzzed in the air like a swarm of angry bees. Every hair on Eric’s head stood on end. Goosebumps pricked his forearm as his grip on my wrist faltered.
A curse wasn’t death, but it would have to do.
