Page 49 (1/2)

I’d never had friends before, either

We sat in silence for some time Verusha finally broke the dark pall of the roo, "This This is e don’t allow Pinkies to think for themselves Poor little fool!" She hurried out the door as if anxious to be away fro, "There are beds made upstairs, the open doors My darleenk, it is not silk and gold, but it is better than a valise Sleep well Toin"

"What does that mean?" Casper’s hand left ard but handsome, the lines of his face sharper than they had been, as if an artist had gone over a sketch with a firar Snow Ball is to, we’ll prepare and dress We’ll board the carriage at dusk and ride through the forest to the Ice Palace We’ll dance to bring down the snow, and then I’ll kill Ravenna"

"And after that?"

I chuckled, sinister and sweet "After that, I s, darling So s"

I breathed in deeply, dreas I would clean up Ravenna’s mess I would send so with the heads of his aifts inside I would send dangerouson Ruby Lane and fetch my sister’s remains home I would even put Keen’s picture in the papers and see if we could find her with a reward large enough that she would come claim it herself

"I’ about me, Ahna What will you do about me?’

"You’ll be the court composer for all of Muscovy I keep my promises"

"That’s not what I mean"

The turn of his head, the way his throat ht have been able to wiggle out of his clutches before, but I could already feel the sharpened force of him Before, I could have run Now he could catch er, and it didn’t matter that I was royal, a princess I couldn’t escape the reality of his physical presence, and especially not its pull on me Especially not when he demanded it

He waited, quiet but alert, as the eer, and the beast in me wanted to submit, to roll belly up and lick his throat as wolves did in the wild I liked him I cared about hiht and, if we did, if he would survive a single day in the Snow Court He wasn’t the only one ould wish to stand by h the others would do it for political power Was it kinder to tell hiether during n ith me as the stoic, married royal and him as the court composer armed my bed in secret?

"Ahna Ahnastasia"

He tried to touch my face, but I pulled back with a hiss and a blush He s back with his arm across the sofa behindscared before, darlin’"

He could sense it, the bastard! I had been so eager to turn hiotten the powers of an alpha-male Blud downmore useful to do I couldn’t sit on the sofa beside his I couldn’t find the words for how I felt, and the longer and closer I lingered, the faster he would decide for himself What I wanted to say to him would be my choice, and I wouldn’t let his blud take that away froht We need sleep To Sleep well"

I didn’t look back as I slipped into the hall and scurried up the stairs The first open rooundy, but the second rooold, as if Verusha had kept it waiting for me all these years Once inside behind the locked door, I undressed quickly to slip into a bed fir over the ground