My threatening snarl didn’t intimidate him at all, though. If anything, his jaw set with steely determination, and his eyes filled with rage. Stepping right up to me, he voluntarily fit his neck against the blades. All I’d have to do is snap the knives together and he’d be about a foot shorter.
But he knew I wasn’t going to kill him, and I was forced to edge a step back. Then another. Soon, he’d have me backed against a tree, and I would have no way to escape.
Panic crawled up my throat.
He lurched to a halt. “I would never hurt you,” he swore with so much fervor that I swallowed hard. “You’re my blood, my soul, my destiny. I don’t care if you succumbed to bloodlust this very moment and murdered a dozen people, I couldn’t kill you.”
My heart fluttered against my will.
Just a little.
But I pushed the stupid emotion down and tilted up my chin defiantly. “Just admit it,” I growled. “If that mark wasn’t on your face, telling you who I was supposed to be to you, you’d have killed me a dozen times by now, wouldn’t you have?”
“I don’t know,” he said softly. “Maybe.”
I jolted in surprise, not expecting him to so openly admit it. His shoulders slumped. “But it is on my face, so I’m not going to.”
From between clenched teeth, I snapped, “Just go ahead and try. What’re you waiting for?”
Shaking his head, he repeated, “I’m not going to kill you.”
I snorted. “And you’re still convinced we’re going to have some perfect relationship?”
He laughed softly. “No. There’s no such thing as a perfect relationship. The mark never would’ve paired me with anyone if it’d been looking for that. My mother always told me finding my soulmate would just be the beginning. It will still take a whole lifetime of work and effort to make our relationship work. And I suppose we’ll have to work through more than most. But yes, I’m convinced we will. Or that we at least can.”
“Work through more than most?” I sputtered incredulously. “You’re insane. I’m not working through shit with you. I want nothing to do with you. Your people are trying to indiscriminately murder and capture my—”
He kissed me. The asshole actually had the gall to lean in and press his too-soft lips against mine.
I still held the daggers scissored up against his throat. All I had to do was snap, and it’d be bye-bye, true love.
But my heart gave another stupid shudder. A piercing ache followed, and a part of me I couldn’t seem to control wanted someone to put in the effort. It wanted someone to love me and say words like Indigo had just said. Didn’t matter if he was totally the wrong man for the job, and he was only saying it because his mark was basically forcing him to, his devoted words were nice. So I couldn’t even say he startled me motionless when he sprang the kiss on me. I was still fully capable of cutting him or even just pushing him away. Yet I didn’t.
Because I didn’t want to. His lips contained an addictive pleasure I was incapable of resisting.
He was the idiot who messed it up by separating our mouths and pressing his brow to mine so he could talk some more.
“I’m sorry,” he rasped. “I know my countrymen’s—and my own—philosophy on how to handle the Graykeys is flawed, but you’ve got to admit we can’t just do nothing and let the curse continue. It’d eventually wipe out the entire Outer Realms with the killing sprees and wars it causes. I would’ve thought you’d know more than anyone just how destructive your curse is.”
“Of course I know,” I growled, pressing the hilts of my daggers against his collarbone to shove him away. As soon as he stepped back, I lowered the blades and sheathed them with a huff. “I saw my family tear each other apart. My own mother stabbed my brother to save me, while my father charged her, only for his brother to murder him. I saw my grandfather’s head roll across the floor and my cousins claw out each other’s eyes with their bare hands. I know exactly what the curse does.”
“God.” He winced.
He reached for my arm with his manacled hands, his eyes full of sympathy and hurt. I stepped back, avoiding him.
“But I took steps to make sure I couldn’t add to the damage. I shed my magic, I closed my womb, and you know what? High Cliff warriors still try to track me down to this day. To capture or kill me.”
With a solemn nod, he admitted, “That doesn’t seem fair.”
“No shit,” I muttered. “Because what about Quo and Quart who were killed? Did anyone stop to ask if they were willing to go through the same measures that I did to help stop the spread and avoid execution?”
“I doubt it.”
His honesty kept startling me. I would’ve thought a guy trying to get into a woman’s good graces wouldn’t be so quick to confess something he knew would piss her off. But then, a part of me appreciated his bold, ugly truth. He would never lie to me, would he?
Dammit. That didn’t matter. I pushed my palms against his chest. He backed another step away, letting me have the small distance, but I only used it to get back into his face and be the aggressor.
“So, what?” I charged. “It’s just easier to kill before we could do anything wrong than ask us a simple question first?”
“No,” he murmured and shook his head. “It probably had more to do with the fact that no one else even considered the idea.”
“How in God’s name could you not consider something so logical and right?”
With a shrug, he said, “Ignorance. Fear. Revenge. A lot of High Clifters lost family members because of the aftereffects of a reaping. Hell, I doubt I’d be the sole survivor to House Moast right now if it weren’t for the Graykeys.” His eyes went sad and pained as he searched my face. “It’s hard to look past pain and hurt and anger sometimes and just calm down enough to realize you’re not putting a stop to something with your extreme reaction; you’re only making it worse.”
“Oh, so you’re having a sudden change of heart?” People didn’t change their opinions that easily, and if they did, how could they be considered in any way dependable.
“I don’t know about a complete change of heart,” he told me with a wince. “Something’s still got to be done about the curse, but there could be some better, smarter ways to go about it. I like the idea of trying to compromise and talk it out first.” Then he lifted a finger. “Except when it comes to Qualmer Graykey. I’m sorry if you’re close to him, but if I ever cross paths with him—”
“Then you’ll have to wait in line behind me to kill him,” I said.
Qualmer and I had never gotten on, not even when he wasn’t consumed by bloodlust. He’d been a bully who’d tormented me, killed every pet I ever had, called me awful names, and even tried to molest me once before Melaina had discovered us and saved my virtue.
Across the camp, the High Clifter frowned at me in confusion.
“I also have a score to settle with that specific Graykey,” I reported, lifting my chin a notch higher. “Qualmer killed my mother too.”
Chapter 15