The Serpent and the Wings of Night (Crowns of Nyaxia Book 1)

“Do you want to change this world, little serpent? Then climb your cage until you are so high no one can catch you. Break its bars and make them your weapons. Nothing is sharper. I know because I did it.”

You’re worried about my self-control? How sweet.” He leaned close enough that I felt his words skitter over my cheek. I didn’t know why I didn’t move.

“I have plenty of self-control, Oraya,” he murmured. “Don’t you worry about me.”

Goosebumps rose on the back of my neck.

The food still sat, long cold, on the tables, while the blood dotted plates and tablecloths in dribbles and spatters of drying crimson.

It’s just…” Her eyes drifted to the sky, far away in thought. “I spent a lot of time alone, before. I didn’t realize how important it was to really have someone. To have someone who would just—who would kill for you. You know?”

And Raihn looked like he was probably very good at sex

You’ll be easy to kill later, he had told me.

Like hell I would

And I meant it. I had overreacted to his overprotective grumbling. I owed everything that I was to Vincent, and I never forgot that

I had no choice, I wanted to say, but I swallowed those words before they made it to my lips. I knew better. Vincent believed that you always had a choice, and if you found yourself in a position where you didn’t, you’d made a very poor one earlier that put you there. Either way, you had no one to blame but yourself

My eyes narrowed. “Useless things like Asteris?”

The corner of his mouth quirked. “Exactly like that.”

But you are still human,” he said quietly. “And that means that in here, you are prey. You’ll always be prey. No matter how good you are with those fancy weapons.”

The truth, of course. But maybe he didn’t realize that I knew how to be prey. I’d been doing it my entire life