Page 89 of The Crimson Throne
In its place comes unease.
Everything here feels like those items I used to collect for Cecil. Red Cap weapons, I know now; but they wereenticinglike this is,enticing when they had no business being such, because they were so deadly. And all with that soft scratch at the back of my mind, the wrongness of it.
So is everything here deadly too?
My awareness flares up, eyes narrowing in alertness, sweeping over the items around us, the people with renewed intensity. But Alyth pushes on, familiarity in her gait; she knows this place. She must know of its threats, then.
We reach a wide-open area, a market square. The road has turned to cobblestones, and the expanse is cleared for twisting, twirling couples all throwing themselves into a dance.
Music plays from—somewhere.
Everywhere.
It’s all over suddenly, a tune that resonates in the tips of my fingers and the edges of my teeth, where they clamp tight, trying to stave off more of that weirdness, and in a flash, panic floods my limbs, has my eyes flying wide.
Is the music magic? I’m used to items, things I know not to touch—but how do you avoidsound?
Alyth stops when I do, looking back at me with confusion.
I see the music hit her. See the chords and rises reach her mind, the way her pupils dilate.
And all my panic finds a target.
I drop my grip on her and thrust my hands over her ears, blocking the music from her in a flurry of instinct. But I have nothing to protect my own ears, and I can feel the melody creeping into my head, sliding up over my mind and…and…infecting me is all I can think. It’s in me, this heavy beat, drums and flutes, maybe—I can’t place them. Just when I think I recognize an instrument, it changes, keeps me playing guessinggames in a chase like the wisp through the bog.
“Alyth,” I gasp, clamping my hands tight to her head, hoping I can at least protect her. Let her be all right.
All the panic, the oddities, the off-balance wrongness—it grabs me by the throat, and I choke as my vision prickles.
Don’t black out. Don’t—
She touches my wrists. “Samson, it’s all right. The music won’t hurt us.”
Her words take a beat to process.
“It won’t?” I clarify.
She gently lowers my hands from the sides of her head and nods toward the square. “Look.”
There’s a couple not far, tangled up in each other, mouths locked and hands roaming, both looking mostly human save for pointed ears and the shared purple glow pulsating off their skin. One of them, a woman in an opulent gown made of sunflowers, lifts the smaller woman so her legs knot around the lifter’s hips. Their kiss intensifies and sends a sharp bolt of jealousy arching through me.
I could lift Alyth like that. I could hold her against me.
The thought charges into my head, dragging with it an army of wants: I want to sweep Alyth into a dance. I want to hold her close like we were in Mary’s palace, only I need her closer. I need her forming to my body the way these fae dancers are molding to each other, letting the beat move them in a sinuous sway.
Ineed heragainst me, a need so potent that it terrifies me, and she must see the worry in my eyes.
Her gaze sparkles. “The music just lowers your inhibitions.”
“That’s—” I swallow. “That’s it? It isn’t dangerous? It won’t hurt you?”
She smiles again. “You aren’t worried about it hurting you?”
I blink. And it must be the music. Must be why my tongue loosens and I say, “No. Not at all. You’re all that matters.”
Her smile dims but doesn’t vanish. She studies me and I let her, all open.
After a long beat, the music building in me, building and building until I might burst, she whispers, “It’s safe.”
