Zodiac Academy Fated Throne - Caroline Peckham Page 0,29

I'd choose to relinquish my hold on the shadows?" I asked him. "For you?"

"Not for me. For you. For your sister. For-"

The ground beneath our feet began to tremble and I knocked his hand off of my cheek, but took a step closer to him as I raised my chin.

"I think you're under the impression that I'm some kind of damsel in distress, Darius Acrux," I said in a low voice as shadows flickered before my eyes and shimmered over my skin. Even the mention of his name sent the memory of agony pulsing through my chest, but I held the shadows closer to fight off the sensation. He didn't step back as I moved right into his personal space, but he swallowed thickly and my gaze tracked the movement of his Adam's apple as it bobbed before I looked up into his dark eyes again. "But I have everything I could ever want and more with my king. I have power and love and freedom. What else could I possibly desire?"

"You don't have love," he growled, his eyes flashing with reptilian slits as the Dragon beneath his skin peered out at me too. "You don't love that monster. You love Darcy. You love..." His brow creased and he shook his head. "I love you. And you promised me forever once. So if I have to-"

"Forever?" I asked, a memory pushing into my mind but fleeing again before I had a chance to look at it.

My heart slammed against my ribs at his words and the memory of my flesh burning and charring while I screamed in agony made bile rise in my throat and a ringing start up in my ears.

I flinched away from him as my king's voice filled my head. Who do you love?

"I love my king," I hissed, stepping back and sneering at the man in front of me as he tried to follow.

The shadows rose up in me to soothe the ache of the lightning that had crippled me time and time again. All of that pain, all of that suffering was his fault. Every time I'd been burned by the power of the storm, ripped apart and set alight in the heart of it had been because of him. My king had healed me of that agony and I wasn't going to let him poison me with his lies. The deeper I fell into the shadows, the less I remembered that pain and the more I craved the dark.

Darius took a step closer to me as the expression fell from my face and I tightened my fist, yanking on the shadows inside him as I invaded them with my own.

"Stay away from me," I warned him as his muscles tensed against the pain I was driving into his flesh.

"What if I won't?" he gritted out.

"You will," I insisted, pushing more shadows into him and making him swear as he fought to stay on his feet through the pain of them.

"I promised you forever too, Roxy," he growled. "And I intend to keep my word."

My gaze skipped between the black rings that surrounded his irises just like mine and I almost drew the shadows back for a moment before a stab of pain resounded in my chest like a bolt of lightning.

With a hiss of anger, I threw the shadows at him hard enough to knock him back against the glass wall of Ignis House then turned and strode away from him without another word.

I constructed an air shield around myself that was utterly impenetrable as I walked up the path, focusing on the feeling of the shadows as they snaked beneath my skin and soothed the aches in my flesh.

They weren't hungry anymore, sated by the pain they'd caused Darius, and yet somehow I still felt unsettled by the interaction.

I reached into my pocket, my fingers curling around the edge of my Atlas as I considered calling my king again, then sighed as I forced myself to release my hold on it. I'd be seeing him tonight. I could last that long without him. But the ache in my body was only going to grow more urgent until then.

I moved inside The Orb and took a seat at a table to the rear of the room with a single chair at it and a fireplace right beside it, wanting to replenish my magic while I focused on my task. There was only one reason for me to be in this place after all and