★ Wattpad Featured: #FreshReads #InHerWords2022
❝You're not taking me to bed. Ever.❞
❝...Who said it had to be on a bed?❞
A disgraced immortal and a legendary folk hero are desperate to locate a blacksmith who can break the enchanted handcuffs that...
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Sunkanmi fought herself awake, beating back the assassin who dared press a knife to her temple. Weapon never out of reach, she sliced Severance at her invisible attacker, only to realize Xosa's dark chambers were empty. Not even the god himself slept on the pillow mound she made the night before.
Sunkanmi lowered the sword in a daze. Her left temple throbbed with unclaimed pain.
The culprit: her pillow impacted with the square outline of something hard and unsuitable for easy sleeping.
Sunkanmi reached underneath her feather-stuffed pillow and pulled out a book.
But not just any book:
Songs of Ourselves.
[Is this...?]
First edition, hardbound, with original illustrations. She couldn't believe it. It couldn't be a different copy, this was undoubtedly the same book Xosa stole a week ago back in Little Stelia.
She traced the cover in wonder, marveling at the stitching.
But why? Why would Xosa gift her a book he knew she loved?
Was it a mistake?
No, there was no way Xosa could've accidentally left the book there. Besides, he didn't hide it before arriving at his chambers. Death appeared in the doorway last night looking about as certain of his surroundings as a nudist in a tailor's shop.
[Is this another trick? A game?]
Sunkanmi flipped through the margins for evidence of tampering or pranks and found the inside untouched minus a few dog-eared pages.
[Then what? A gift?]
Absolutely not. Xosa wasn't so generous. Death takes and takes. He does not provide or offer. And the gentle placement underneath her pillow, while she slept so soundly, was much too silent, too unlike him to be a provocation.
Sunkanmi's heart seized at the final option: an apology.
Was it possible that Xosa, for all of his ills, had the decency to apologize? Did he even know what he was apologizing for? And again, why would he bother if they're just going to go their separate ways in a few weeks? Why spare her a thought if they'd never see each other again?
