The Twelve Kingdoms: The Mark of the Tala Read Online Free Page A

began to fit together again.
    “Finished?” the man pressing me to the ground asked. He sounded grimly amused. Probably feeling triumphant. I could use that.
    I opened the eyes I’d held squinched shut since my fall. His face loomed a hand’s width over mine, the knife cut I’d given him welling blood that smeared down his face and neck, contrasting with those fierce midnight-blue eyes. His black hair had come loose from its tie during the struggle, and now it rained down around us.
    “Let me go,” I whimpered, wriggling against him in what I hoped was an enticing way. It worked in that I managed to reposition a knee to the inside of his thigh. I’d likely get only one chance at that, but even a glancing blow might distract him long enough for me to plant the dagger in one of those blazing blue eyes.
    Like you should have done in the first place.
    His dark lips twisted in that half smile. “Nice. But you don’t play the damsel in distress all that well. And if you go for my balls, I’ll break your wrist.”
    “If you plan to rape me, you’ll have to get them out at some point—I’m sure I can find a way to injure the precious things,” I snapped back.
    He blinked at me, his face curiously still.
    “Rape?” He examined me, as if the thought hadn’t occurred to him, his gaze lingering on my lips. “Isn’t that rather prosaic?”
    “I’ve found most men are.”
    “Have you?”
    I didn’t answer. It had sounded good.
    “You mistake me, Andromeda. My plans reach farther than a bit of a tumble in the meadow, enticing as the thought might be. Our current position is simply serendipity.”
    His words chilled me in a way that the prospect of attempted rape hadn’t. Rape I could fight and likely win, if I kept my head.
    “You’ll have a hard time taking me hostage,” I sneered with deliberate contempt, “unless your pack of mutts will help you drag me off to whatever prison you have in mind.”
    The right side of his mouth lifted in a half smile, creasing the blood.
    “It’s true. I hadn’t expected this opportunity and I’m ill prepared. I hadn’t thought that—” He sighed. Amused chagrin crossed his face. “Is it too late to woo you into coming with me willingly?”
    I laughed, the sound harsh as the cawing of a crow.
    “Do I look feebleminded to you?”
    He examined me, considering. “Foolish, perhaps. Certainly overconfident. But no”—he sighed again, as if pressed by a great weight—“not likely to trust me. Yet.”
    “Trust!” I spat. “You’re the feebleminded one.”
    “Look at me, Andromeda,” he commanded, sapphire glints hypnotic in his dark eyes. “I’ve been looking for you. Don’t you recognize anything about me?”
    I couldn’t help but look. The press of his hard body, the searing heat of his skin, the eyes like midnight and twilight wrapped together—they reminded me of something. A wolf howled, lonely, my mind. The ocean surged, swirling blue depths sinking into deepest black.
    Under the waves, deep under the sea
Sands dissolve the cicatrix of thee.
Cobalt crabs pluck at deep-frozen lies
Eating the corpses of what she denies.
    The images, as with the words of the song, ate at me, blurring the edges of who I knew myself to be. Salena. He’d mentioned my mother. What did that mean?
    “I’ve never seen you before in my life,” I whispered. It felt like a lie.
    Was that Fiona’s nicker in the background? I seized on that. My horse, my life at Ordnung. That was true. Real.
    “No. But I thought you would know me anyway.”
    “You didn’t recognize me—you thought I was both of my sisters.”
    “Did Salena teach you nothing?”
    “My mother died,” I snapped.
    “Believe me, I know. Her death caused a number of problems.”
    “I’m so sorry that the greatest tragedy in my life gave you annoyance.”
    The half smile twisted his lips. “More than you can conceive. I’ll make you a deal. Give me a kiss.”
    I didn’t reply. My dagger hand had gone