A Bond of Hate

My fingers tighten around the guard’s throat, feeling the frantic pulse beneath my grip, his breath rasping as I squeeze the life out of him.  The door to the cell creaks open, and I glance up, expecting to see another guard coming to pry me off this one. But instead, I see him. Caspian. My heart skips a beat—out of habit, not out of any remaining affection for the man standing in the doorway. The man who once held my heart in his hands just as I now hold this guard’s life in mine. Before he shattered it into a thousand pieces. His voice is cold, and commanding. “Let him go, Farryn.” A slow smile spreads across my lips. I look up at him, still holding the guard in my grasp. Caspian, in all his regal glory, looks just as he did the last time I saw him—imposing, powerful, every inch the King he’s become. But there’s something different in his unnaturally purple eyes, a hardness that wasn’t there before. He despises me now, I can see that clearly. But I’ve never cared much for his opinion. With a mocking tilt of my head, I release the guard. He crumples to the ground, gasping for breath, his hands clutching at his bruised throat. I watch him for a moment, a cruel satisfaction curling in my chest, then turn my attention back to Caspian. “The king has arrived.” I purr, pressing myself against the bars, to get a better look at him. “Tell me, which god did I rub off in my previous life to deserve the very honour?” Caspian’s face remains stoic, but there’s a flicker of something—irritation, perhaps?—in his eyes. “If that God only knew just how sticky those fingers are, he wouldn’t be foolish enough to let you anywhere near his cock.” “You did,” I retort, my voice dripping with venom. “Yes, well, that was before. If I’d known that the woman whom I was sharing a bed with was an impulsive klepto with clinically sociopathic tendencies and a personality that could drive a monk to murder, I’d have checked the return policy,” he says, his tone as dry as his humour. I scoffed about to open my mouth for a retort when he cuts me off. Rudely. “While entertaining as this is, Farryn, I didn’t risk the psychological trauma to sit here and trade insults.” “No? ” I say, “Then, why am I here then?” He doesn’t answer right away, his gaze lingering on me longer than it should. His eyes drop to my lips, and for the first time, I see a crack in his armour. He notices the cut on my lower lip, the one that still stings with every word I speak. Before I can react, he’s in front of me, closer than he’s been in years, his hand reaching through the bars to tilt my chin up. His thumb brushes over the wound, gentle, almost tender. For a heartbeat, all the anger, all the hatred I’ve been holding onto melts away. “Who did this to you, Farryn?” His voice is softer now, my name on his lips sending butterflies fluttering in my stomach. Damn him. I rip my chin from his grasp, hating myself for the way my heart pounds, for the way his touch still affects me. “No one,” I snap, the lie slipping easily from my tongue. “I fell.” His eyes narrow, the first real emotion I’ve seen since he walked into this dungeon. “Was it one of my guards?” Now it’s my turn to glare. “Let’s not pretend like you give a s**t about me, Caspian. Not when you had your men hunt me down and imprison me on charges none of you have felt the need to share. Let’s not pretend, alright? We’ve done enough of that during our relationship.” We stare at each other for a long moment, the air between us thick with all the things left unsaid. The tension is almost unbearable, every breath I take laced with memories of what we used to be, what we could have been. But those memories are nothing more than ghosts now, haunting the space between us. Finally, he nods, the cold mask slipping back into place. “I need your help with something only a person with your set of skills can accomplish.” I c**k an eyebrow, crossing my arms as best I can with the bars in the way. “My set of skills? And what skills would those be?” He meets my gaze, his expression unreadable. “You’re going to help me catch a thief.”