Total pages in book: 222
Estimated words: 213974 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1070(@200wpm)___ 856(@250wpm)___ 713(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 213974 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1070(@200wpm)___ 856(@250wpm)___ 713(@300wpm)
“And if I am?” I challenged. “Then what do you imagine?”
“You already know what I imagine.”
I did. “Eventually, Kolis will grow tired of me. Whether it takes weeks, months, or years.”
He nodded. “You’re only an inconvenience.”
“I’d rather be that than an ass-kisser.”
“Charming,” he murmured.
“Thank you.” I smiled at him in the way I did that used to irritate my mother, wide and brightly. Based on his stiffness, I knew it had the same impact on him. Hiding a grin, I leaned back in my chair, deciding I was in the mood to be annoying. “So, what’s up with the masks?”
“What about them?”
“Why is it always painted on your face and the other Revenants, those not as special as you?” Ash had told me the wings were silver when his father was the Primal of Life, but I hadn’t gotten the impression that everyone ran around with the masks painted on their faces when he ruled. “And on the guards.”
He stretched an arm over the back of the settee. “They are symbolic.”
“No shit,” I muttered, quickly swallowing. The tender beef tasted…different. I couldn’t put my finger on why, but yuck. I washed the lingering taste away with a gulp of water.
“It symbolizes that we serve the true King of Gods and are created in his image.” His fingers tapped.
“And who would that be?”
He chuckled. “Cute.”
I ignored that. “I’m guessing the golden wings are supposed to mimic Kolis when he is in his true form?”
Callum nodded.
“But I’ve seen him in his true form,” I said. “He’s nothing but bones.”
The Revenant’s fingers stilled.
“I’m also guessing that’s due to what remains of the last true embers of death in him,” I surmised.
“You’ve seen him like that?” Callum asked.
I nodded.
A slow smile spread across his lips, one that caused my skin to prickle with wariness. “Then you’ve seen death,” he said. “True death. No one sees that and lives very long afterward.”
My stomach twisted as our stares locked. “You don’t scare me.”
Callum laughed. “But he does.”
When Callum returned on what I could only assume was the following day, a bath had been prepared. Which was routine, but after I bathed, a Chosen entered the cage with a swath of sheer material that shimmered like liquid gold in the chandelier’s light.
The quiet Chosen had dressed me, then brushed my hair until it gleamed, sweeping it up with delicate pearl pins like my mother often wore in hers. Rouge was then applied to my cheeks and lips.
Then, she left.
And Kolis arrived.
While he was dressed as usual, a crown I hadn’t seen on him when Ash and I came to Dalos now sat upon his head. It was so golden and bright I couldn’t make out much detail at first, but the longer I stared, the more I saw.
The crown of gold was fashioned into a row of nine swords, each tip bearing a glittering diamond. The center spike was a sun made of more diamonds.
The Primal of Life’s crown was the opposite of the Primal of Death’s, yet they were identical. Day and night. Life and Death.
It was hard not to stare at it and think how it should rest on Ash’s head. Yet seeing him in such, even in my imagination, didn’t feel right.
Kolis’s crown wasn’t the only thing on display.
So was I.
There’d been no more talk of discovering my secrets as he’d warned. He hadn’t mentioned Ash, and there hadn’t been time for me to even ask.
All he’d said to me was, “Do not engage with those who enter the chamber,” which was a clear warning. After that, between conducting the businesses of the King of Gods from where he sat upon his throne while staring at me—at certain parts of me—he was occupied.
Which was why I was dressed as I was, my hair styled in a way that provided an unobstructed view of everything the gown revealed.
The same brown-haired guard I’d seen during my escape attempt escorted the gods into the chamber. I’d discovered his name was Elias. I remembered it because he was the only one whose gaze never strayed in my direction.
The gods who were brought in often looked, no matter their gender, as they informed Kolis of the requests being made at the Sun Temples. Many of their stares were full of curiosity. Some carried the glint of want I was beginning to recognize in Kolis’s eyes.
It was nothing like what I saw in Ash’s gaze. His had been full of want and need, but there had also been tenderness, yearning, and much respect, reverence, and passion. A fondness and devotion that could’ve grown into love if he had his kardia.
The gods’ stares reminded me of my stepbrother’s—full of the desire to consume. To dominate without deference. To have for the sake of having because I’d been prepared to be pleasing to the eye and displayed in a gilded cage.