He’s the king everyone fears. The ruler who delivers rotted corpses like they’re bouquets of daisies. He’s arguably the most powerful monarch that Orea has ever seen, because he’s fae, and he’s been hiding in plain sight.
I’ve been sleeping in his damn tent, just feet away from him every night, without knowing who he really is.
I’m unable to sift through all of the layers that this truth brings. I’m not sure I’m in a state of mind to properly pick it all apart and digest it, and I don’t even know if I want to.
No, right now, I’m too pissed.
I glare at him. “You...you fucking liar.” I can hear the scorching vehemence burning my words as surely as I can feel their flames light up my eyes. It consumes me in a second.
Rip—Ravinger, whoever he Divine-damned is—rears his head back, like my anger is a shock to him. His body tenses, the malevolent spikes of his arms reflecting off the dim light of the room. A room that feels entirely too small all of a sudden. “Excuse me?”
I stand in the doorway, and my fingers bunch into fists at my sides, as if I can take the reins of my anger and steer it galloping forward. I take a step into the cage room toward him, my exhausted ribbons trailing after me like sickly worms writhing on the floor.
“You’re the king,” I say, shaking my head like I can erase this fact. I knew his aura was strange. I knew I could feel an underlying power there, but I never would’ve guessed the depth of his trickery. “You tricked me.”
Rip levels me with a glare. The black coal of his eyes looks like it wants to catch the flame of mine. He looks like he’s ready to burn in my anger.
Let him.
“I could say the same,” he retorts.
I bristle. “Don’t you dare try to turn this around on me. You lied—”
“So did you.” Ire bleeds through his expression, making the gray scales along his cheeks glint in the dark, the sharp face of a predator bearing down on me.
“I concealed my power. There’s a difference.”
He scoffs. “You hid your power, your ribbons, your heritage.”
“Being fae has nothing to do with it,” I snarl.
He eats up the remaining space between us in three long strides. “It has everything to do with it!” Rip seethes, looking like he wants to reach out and shake me.
I lift my chin, refusing to cower, imagining my ribbons rising to punch him in the gut. If only they weren’t so limp and exhausted. “You’re right,” I reply with forced calmness. “I’ve had to hide in a world that wasn’t my own for twenty years without seeing a single fae, until I met you.”
Some of the hardness leaves his face for a split-second, but I’m not done. Not nearly.
“You pushed me relentlessly to admit what I was.”
Irritation flashes through his features, lightning to strike the hollow ground. “Yes, to help you—”
My eyes narrow. “You forced truths out of me while concealing yourself. You don’t think that’s hypocritical?”
Rip’s teeth grind together so hard I wonder if he’ll break a tooth. I hope he does, the lying bastard.
“I couldn’t trust you,” he replies coolly.
A whip of a scoff comes out of my mouth, the sound of it punishing and unkind. “You self-centered ass. You stand there and talk about how you couldn’t trust me?”
“Careful,” he says, baring his teeth in a wicked smile. “There’s a saying about rocks and glass houses.”
“I don
’t live in glass, I live in gold. So I can throw whatever damn rocks I want,” I snap.
“Right. I should probably expect nothing less from you.”
My back goes rigid. “What’s that supposed to mean?”