Josephine's voice kills any man who hears it-except for the assassin sent to capture her for the king that's been chasing her all her life...but what happens when he decides he doesn't want to hand her over and keep her for himself instead?
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Everyone on the boat was frozen, every particle of dust stuck in the air as if the moment had been captured and then saved to look in on for another time.
Black tendrils of swirling shadows were interwoven through the air, almost like the blackness was the sole reason for the standstill of time, their pulsing, writhing masses stretching through any and everything on the boat.
One tried to curl up my ankle but I kicked it away and it dissipated into the air, seeping into the atmosphere as if it had never even existed at all.
"What did you do to them? Fix them."
The god standing behind me chuckled softly, the sound causing chills to erupt on my arms and a shiver to traverse down my spine.
"So demanding you are, my betrothed. Ask to come with me."
The breath from his achingly deep voice stirred the small hairs by my ear as the heated force of his body emanated through me and burned directly down to my core.
"What? I don't want to come with you."
"No? Then how else are you going to find your sister and her newborn son? Her husband as well? And let's not forget your dear uncle, who I'm sure you'd love to pay a visit to. Imagine walking into his stronghold with a god on your arm. Can you picture it?"
The sway of his voice lulled me into a deep sense of peace, almost as if I weren't in my body anymore, but standing at the front door to my uncle's estate with this all powerful god standing at my side.
The fear in my uncle's eyes was palpable and delicious. For this god to strike such terror into his heart would truly be a sight to behold...but I didn't just want him to be fearful of the god—no, I wanted him to fear me.
Another husky, low laugh from the being behind me and I nearly jumped to the ceiling.
"How...how did you do that? How can you get into my mind so easily?"
"A mind filled with grief and trauma is an easier mind to compel than one that has never faced any hardship at all. There's nothing I can give to those who are content; but those who seek vengeance? Retribution? Perhaps even atonement or relief. Those are the minds easiest to walk, and your torment tastes like honey to me."
"You enter my mind at will, you harness shadows as easily as others with their limbs. You're not Nicos. So, are you him? The...the God of Shadow and Death? Are you Kyan?"
All at once, his presence disappeared from behind me, but as I turned around to face him, there was no one in his spot.
Instead, a swirling mass of black shadows remained with only a pair of icy blue eyes in the center where his head should have been.
The shadows seemed to collapse in on themselves before reforming, creating a vacuum of power that continuously replenished itself.
"I kept calling you the shadow man because I didn't know your real name. If I had known you were a god interfering with my mind, I might've reacted a bit differently."
