He lounges in the shadows…

He lounges in the shadows that embrace him, his long legs clad in leather and stretched out across the rock floor. Crossed at the ankles, his boots flicker faintly from moonlight leaking in and reflecting off the crystals in the cavern walls.

“Are you sure you want to do this, my tormented queen?”

His question vibrates through the air like the lax purr of a predator. It makes the space around me shiver as his timbre slinks near, alongside the scents of leather and damp stone and my own sweat.

I hunker inward, hugging my knees in a moonbeam slanting through a thin rift in the rock ceiling. My breath emerges visibly, like a rising wraith in the glacial darkness. I school my features into nothingness—no reaction to him at all—because self-lies provide the only defense.

He shifts position, the motion indulgently relaxed. “You sure you want to relive when you were young and hopeful?”

“You were young and hopeful, too.”

“At the beginning of a story, everyone is young and hopeful.” A sneer twists his shadowed lips. “Bloated with heroic sentiments.”

I force my fingers to remain slack. “And at the end, there’s only survival.”

His low but edged chuckle rumbles with heat through my flesh. “Is that what you call what you did with me? Surviving?”

“What else?”

His smile spreads palpably in the dark, because I know the answer. He doesn’t even have to speak it.

For shame, Alynah, he mocks directly in my head.

My mind was always his to enter, ever since he stole the part of my soul that gave him the key to get inside me forever.

I lift my chin, defiant, and stab back. Should I be ashamed?

His grin splits his face like malice. My poison queen.

Not yours.

Are you poison for anyone else?

---

As you can tell from above, I redid the beginning of The Splintered Princess, which is FREE on all retailers along with over 200 other speculative romance books (some only free today, October 18th) –>

I never wanted to make a book free so chalk this up to insanity 😛

Hoomans, cat Zulejka here to briefly but importantly display the final moments before the demise of the string that sent me to the vet emergency room:

I am all things sweet and cuddly, but I will devour all things deserving of it…

There’s my super-cat again, who has now defected to a high spot of the flat. This will be a short post because my super-cat is demanding I cook her chicken.

(Hooman has neglected me long enough. Pity me, hoomans. Gift me your most piteous languishment.)

Alrighty–

Thrice the shadow. [Nope, I still do not know what that means!]

Anyway, all the love to you all 🙂 Be kind this week. Here is the link to the free books again if you have the feels for romance 😉

Aaaaand if you want to give me some love (or feed me 😀 since I’m always low on food [feeeed meeeeee]), you can ‘buy me a coffee’, that is, send $1 (or more) via buy me a coffee, or to support me regularly, you can join the patreon I’ve been seriously neglecting (but want to resume), or get daily snippets I have been failing to share on Facebook, check out my books I don’t want anyone to buy, or join the newsletter I haven’t been writing (but intend to). THANK YOU for any and all love!