A light in the flame

“I want to see her,” Kolis added. “Get a good look at who has captured my nephew’s…attention.”

The hollows of Nyktos’s cheeks deepened as the veins beneath his eyes began to fill with a faint glow of eather, and I knew something bad was about to happen. My senses tingled with the knowledge. And I didn’t think I was the only one who felt the violent storm brewing within Nyktos. Attes had turned from his slouched brother, angling his body toward Nyktos’s.

I didn’t give myself time to think. I quickly stepped to the side, revealing myself fully. Nyktos’s swift inhale fell like ice against my skin, but I didn’t tremble as I stood there, hands at my sides. I didn’t panic as I watched that churning mass of golden light swirl around Kolis’s legs. I breathed.

“There she is,” Kolis drawled, and then he was right in front of me, having shadowstepped.

Muscles tensed all along my spine as I fought the urge to recoil from the eather that drifted over the hem of my skirt. I stared at his chest—his bare chest, keeping my gaze lowered as one would in the presence of such a Primal. There were…shimmers of gold in his bronze flesh, a pattern of sweeps and swirls.

“Lift your eyes to mine,” he whispered. Coaxed. Urged.

Muscles obeyed even as my stomach and chest hollowed. A compulsion. It was a compulsion—an u

The breath I took snagged in my throat as I saw Kolis. Not from a distance. Not how he was depicted in paintings or stone. There was no mistaking the similarities between him and Nyktos. Yet, somehow, even with their shared features, the differences were striking.

Nyktos’s beauty was harsh and icy, a silvery sculpture of hard angles and unyielding lines come alive in an almost terrifying ma

But those features, the strong curve of his jaw, the high, arched cheekbones, and the lush, wide mouth…things that were so wild and unfettered on Nyktos, were utter perfection on Kolis—golden and warm. His beauty beguiled you. Welcomed you to look closer, to stare and be comforted. Coaxed you to come near.

They were the same yet opposites, one whose beauty had been designed to be infinite in its finality, to strike fear in your heart. And the other whose beauty was nothing more than a pretense. A façade. A trap.

Silvery eyes flecked with wisps of gold tracked over my features slowly, intensely. My skin began to prickle and crawl, but I showed nothing because I felt nothing as I stood before the beast that had started all of this.

The one I had spent my life training to kill.

“I’ve been told your name is Sera?” Kolis asked as I glanced up, taking note of his crown—a series of swords made of diamonds and gold, the center ending in the shape of a sun and its rays. “Is it short for anything?”

Uncertainty rose. I didn’t know if I should tell the truth, but I thought that fewer lies meant less possibilities of being caught in one. Even a small lie could cause closer inspection. “Seraphena, Your Majesty.”

“Seraphena,” he repeated, curling his lips inward. “A name that burns. Interesting. I’ve also been told you’re a godling.” The shimmery swirls moved up his throat and over his jaw, bleeding through his flesh until they formed a crackling, winged mask like those painted on the others’ faces. “She does not feel like one.”

“She is a godling,” Nyktos answered. “Father is a god. Mother is mortal.”

Gold hair brushed his cheek and shoulder as he tilted his head. The crown remained straight. “There is too much eather in her for that to be the case.”

“Perhaps you’re sensing my blood. She has quite a bit of that in her,” Nyktos said. Normally, that smug tone would’ve grated on each and every one of my nerves.

But I understood the mission here.

“I see. I also see you’ve been charmed. Clever, Nephew,” Kolis noted, an amused look playing across his lips as he continued staring at me. “Your hair is…captivating,” the false King murmured, and I remembered what Gemma and Aios had said about his favorites. They were all either fair or red-haired. He lifted his hand—

Nyktos was like a strike of lightning, capturing Kolis’s wrist before even a single finger could touch a strand of my hair.

My heart lurched.

Kolis slowly turned his head to Nyktos. None of the guards moved as the false King looked down to where Nyktos’s hand clasped his wrist and then back to Nyktos’s eyes.

“I do not wish for her to be touched.” Nyktos’s voice deepened. “She is mine.”

I bit the inside of my cheek.

“And if I wish to touch her?” Kolis asked, so quietly I barely heard him.

Nyktos smiled, and my stomach tumbled at the mockery of such a gesture. “I will do to you what you have done to those who dare to touch those who belong to you.”

My jaw began to ache from how hard I kept my mouth clamped shut. Those who belonged to him. His favorites. The ones Aios had said were caged.

“He’s quite possessive of this one,” Attes added from where he sat, half-reclined, half-sprawled. “Threatened to rip out my eyes at least three times.”

I wasn’t sure that helped.

Nyktos’s smile increased, revealing a hint of his fangs, and I definitely didn’t think that helped. “That threat is more of a promise,” he replied as he still held Kolis’s stare. “She is not to be touched. By anyone but me.”

A long, tense moment passed, then one side of Kolis’s lips tipped up. I felt no relief, only more tension. “Nephew,” Kolis purred, the gold swirling through his irises. “You…please me.”

What?

“But you should release me,” Kolis went on, “before I become displeased.”

Nyktos lifted one finger at a time, dropping the false King’s wrist.

The smile on Kolis’s face grew as he eyed his nephew. “This side of you…” His chin lifted as he inhaled deeply. “I always enjoy it when I see it come out.” He flicked a too-lingering gaze toward me. “This should be, at the very least, entertaining.”

I was begi

Nyktos smirked, though, turning his back on the false King. He took my hand, folding his arm around my waist. His gaze didn’t touch mine as he said, “May we both sit?”

“You may do as you like.”

Nyktos guided me to the settee, returning us to the same position as before with me placed in the vee of his legs. I turned my head, but Kolis watched. Stared. At us. At me. And it was only then that I allowed myself to feel any sort of relief.

I didn’t look like Sotoria. Because Kolis didn’t recognize me.

A faint tremor went through me as Kolis returned to his throne upon the dais, tendrils of golden eather trailing behind him. Nyktos gently squeezed my side as I exhaled heavily, resting a hand on his knee. Nektas had been right. Luck was, for once, on our side. At least, with this. Everything else? I wasn’t so sure.

Kolis was still watching me, staring, his head tilted, yet the crown not slipping an inch as his fingers rapped on the gilded arms of his throne. “My feelings are hurt, Nyktos,” he began. “I would’ve thought you would have sought my approval for such a…joyous event—your union with the fiery Seraphena.”

“I didn’t think you’d have much interest in such an event,” Nyktos replied as he dragged his thumb back and forth on the side of my waist. “I figured you were far too busy for such a request.”

“You figured wrong.” Kolis gave a close-lipped smile. “It is a show of respect that you, of all people, should’ve known was due me.”

“Then I apologize,” Nyktos said.