I don't know how long I stayed crumpled on the floor of that little cottage, my neck throbbing with pain and my lungs still burning with every breath.
Maybe minutes.
Maybe hours.
But then I heard the door open again.
My heart stopped.
He'd come back.
His footsteps — those heavy footsteps I'd learned to recognize — crossed the room. Stopped in front of me.
I looked up with effort, bracing myself to see those eyes still red, that fury that hadn't subsided.
But his eyes had gone back to green. Sage green. Human.
Almost.
He didn't say a word. He grabbed me by the arm — not gently, but not with the violence of before either — and pulled me to my feet.
"We're going back," he said simply.
And he dragged me out.
He hauled me back to the manor with a grip on my arm that I knew would le
