Sold To The Cruel Prince

Aveline jerked her hand back at once.

The creature in the cage let out a low, warning growl, its eyes fixing on her with unsettling focus.

"You’re not supposed to be here," Kael said as he stepped closer.

His voice made her stiffen.

There was something wrong about it, something colder than the last time she had spoken to him, that day at her childhood home. Back then, he had seemed merely strange. Now he sounded like someone she would rather meet in the dark from a very safe distance.

Aveline turned slowly.

At that moment, the monster behind her seemed less frightening than the man she had come to think of as the Shadow Spider.

"I’m not?" she asked, lifting her chin despite the fear prickling along her skin.

She did not feel like offering civility to hostility.

Behind her, the creature growled again, deeper this time. In front of her, Kael moved closer still, until the space between them felt uncomfortably thin. He didn’t look that hostile anymore, or maybe the shadows under his eyes and chin hid everything.

"Were you trying to set them free?" he asked.

Aveline blinked, then frowned.

That thought had never even crossed her mind. She was scared of them. Deeply, honestly scared of them. She was not the kind of fool who would release something with claws like that just to see whether it might decide to spare her.

His form came to her view again, as she focused. He didn’t look impressed with her.

"Why would I?" she asked.

Kael’s gaze did not soften.

"Don’t you feel sorry for them?" he asked, his tone low and almost persuasive. "These pitiful things. Twisted, yes, but they still feel pain, just like you and I."

Aveline stared at him.

The growl behind her rose louder, harsher.

Kael stepped closer again, far too close for comfort now. She could see the faint curve of his lips, almost as if he expected her to understand him. Or agree with him.

"How do you know that?" she asked.

"Do you know why we’re bringing them to Greenvale?" he asked instead.

Aveline’s brows drew together. Curiosity stirred in her as it always did, even when fear urged her to keep quiet.

"We have an auditorium," he said, and a wicked smile touched his mouth. "It is called the Valosseum. Our criminals are made to fight creatures like these. No loss for anyone."

Aveline’s hands curled into fists.

So that was it.

She had thought perhaps these beasts had attacked travelers, or destroyed villages, or done something terrible enough to justify being caged and dragged through the forest like cargo. But if they had been an immediate threat, they would have been killed on the spot. Not transported. Not studied. Not saved for spectacle.

In a way, the truth struck closer to home than she wanted to admit.

She could not help but see the parallel.

The chains. The cages. The helplessness.

Not so long ago, she herself had knelt with her hands bound, stripped of choice, made to feel as though her fear was part of the entertainment. These creatures were being dragged toward a different kind of cruelty, but cruelty all the same.

Still, pity was one thing.

Action was another.

Her eyes moved over the cages, over the sharp claws and jagged teeth. One careless movement from any of them and she would be bone and regret. She was not foolish enough to pretend otherwise.

She felt pity for them, yes. But to feel pity, she had to believe she stood on some higher ground than the thing she pitied.

And she was not sure she did. She was not so different from them.

The thought settled uneasily in her chest.

Then she noticed it... Kael’s shadow.

It bent strangely beneath the moonlight, not quite matching the shape of his body. It twisted where it should have stayed still, as if it belonged to something else entirely.

Aveline’s eyes narrowed.

For a brief, curious moment, she wondered if Kael might be like her too. If that was why the crown prince kept him so close. If that was why his darkness seemed almost alive.

"You should step into the light a little more, Shadow Spider," she said, and turned away before he could answer.

A horrible sound rose behind her then: sharp, twisted, almost like a wail. Aveline did not look back.

She only wanted to be away from him now.

Kael watched her leave, and his hands slowly clenched at his sides. He had thought her pity would be easy to invoke.

She was a woman. A wounded one. Surely she would sympathize with creatures that had also been dragged, chained, and made into objects.

That had been one way to make his liege wary of her. Theron disliked misplaced mercy. He would not take kindly to a woman who tried to free dangerous creatures out of sentiment.

Of course, Aveline did not need to know the full truth.

These monsters had indeed ruined lives. They were studied because they had to be. Some were used in war. Others were used in testing. Their bodies could be harvested for medicines, their behavior observed, their strengths measured. One of them could save twenty humans.

Theron valued human life above all else.

That was the point.

Kael had expected her to falter. To be frightened, yes, but also moved. Instead, she had looked at him with that sharp little face of hers, seen through the wrongness of his words, and slipped right past his attempt without so much as stumbling.

He stared into the dark after her, irritation tightening in his chest.

He could not believe she had refused to fall for it. Maybe he should try harder. Maybe he needed to push her further. It would have been easier if she had simply done as he expected. Then he would not have to consider more extreme measures.

Kael’s expression darkened.

Should I take her life?

The thought came so coldly that even he paused beneath it.

He followed her to see what she was up to. He was never going to stop investigating her. She needs to be cut off from his liege’s side.