Page 35 of Sunsplitter
This time, Fi did jump.
Behind her, Avroz stood with a soft grin and those skin-peeling eyes.
Holy fuck. He was quiet.
He’d crept up on her, close enough to brush a finger through her hair if he wished. To dig claws into her throat. Fi dared a glance at Antal, farther out in the garden now, his attention drawn down to a fishpond. Too far to hear unless she cried out.Fuck.
She kept her hands calmly folded in her lap. Most of what she knew of Avroz, she’d learned from Antal’s descriptions—proud, confident. Always in control. Never to be taken at face value.
“Good morning.” Fi bowed her head, plastering on a demure mortal grin. “It’s a beautiful garden, but I wouldn’t want to intrude.”
“Ah, you do speak daeyari. I wasn’t sure.”
His clothes were simpler today, a tunic belted at the waist, loose trousers, all fringed in dark velvet and iridescent vesper fabric. His antlers were banded in silver at each point, thinrings, not as eye-catching as the inlaid bands of gold.
A Sunsplitter, Antal had said. A capable fighter, on top of everything else. Avroz tilted his head, that look of a panther studying prey, uncannily like when Antal did it.
“But you must be terribly bored,” he said. “Sitting here all alone. And they’ll be preoccupied for some time, touring all the gardens. Come, why don’t we speak?”
Well no, actually, that sounded like the worst of all possible options. Fi kept her smile bright.
“A kind offer, but I should be on hand, in case…” She looked again to the garden.
Antal was nowhere in sight. Neither was Yme. They must have stepped around a bend in the path, hidden behind lush vegetation.
“… in case Antal needs me.”
Oh. This bastard. This piece of trash daeyari.
Of course Avroz had waited to corner her the moment she and Antal were separated. Fi fought a littleharderto keep her breath steady, to speak past her quickening pulse. This close, the daeyari must be able to sense it.
“How dutiful.” He circled around, tail arcing behind him, until he stood between her and the garden. Between her and any hope of salvation. His grin, like hers, never faltered. “If Antal needs, he can find you easily enough. Come.”
Avroz held out a clawed hand, gesturing to the house.
Fi had dealt with few daeyari beyond Antal. There’d been Verne, with her haughtiness of six centuries, cunning but fatally sure of herself. There’d been Tyvo’s more ice-honed eight centuries, quick to anger, feral as any beast.
Avroz was a more patient creature. One look at him, and she knew he was used to getting everything he wanted. That was an unsettling trait in a human. Terrifying on an immortal.
Fi weighed her options.
She could keep deflecting. He wasn’t going to let her off that easily.
She could shout for help. He’d have claws in her throat before her second breath.
She could reach for her sword. Again, that whole claws-in-the-throat dilemma.
Only one option, then. He knew it. So did she.
“I suppose you’re right.” Fi stood, armed with her complacent grin, contemplating how pleasant it would feel to crack his antlers off his skull.
Avroz waited to let her go first—letherturn her back to him.
Still no sight of Antal. Fi kept her chin up and walked toward the house. Clawed footsteps tapped behind her, an intimidation tactic she knew well.
The sitting room had a door to the kitchen on one side, a second door opposite. Avroz opened it and, once again, gestured Fi to step through first. She, once again, smiled and did as the filthy bastard asked. Like a wolf herding a sheep. She itched to show him her teeth.
The room was a study. A desk sat to one side, dark wood stacked with tidy paperwork, the shelves behind filled with books. The rest of the space was a sitting area, blue and silver cushions arranged into a lounge against the windows. These weren’t open-air, like the others. Tinted glass created a barrier to the outside world.
