“They don’t even make good wives or mothers—much less queens,” Pix continued, building steam to her rant. “They don’t know how to take care of themselves—protect and save themselves—who would trust an entire kingdom to these girls? They’re just career brides! How could they be anything else when they’ve never been out in the world—never had to deal with it? They’ve never lived, not really. All they know is their small, little woodland prisons.”
“And whose fault is that?” Phillip countered as he sidled up against the boxes to face her. “It’s people like you who put them in there, locking them away for some,” he shook his head as he spat out, “nefarious reason.” He ignored her impertinent snort. “If the roles were reversed, you’d do the same.”
Pix stopped, bounding off her box so fast Phillip recoiled instinctively. Looking at her, he wished he could back up a bit more, could sink and hide in the storage room’s shadowed space. The tension coming off of the tiny pixie towering over his bound, pretty helpless form crackled around her, causing her hair to literally swirl like some menacing storm cloud in the lamplight. He swallowed hard as he stared into her sharp, glittering black eyes that glowed like lightning ready to strike.
When finally she spoke, her voice was disturbingly soft and calm, such a contrast from her form, like the deadly quiet before a tempest. “No one,” she all but whispered as she bent at the waist to lean over him, “could ever put me in a cage. I’d kill them first.”
He stared into her electric eyes and shivered at the truth he saw there, remembering the way her wand sank sickly into the huge, hard, scaly water beast. Phillip recalled the exhilarated, predatory look on her face when the Great River Bull had bled water onto the thirsty ground. Involuntarily, his gaze faltered at the memory as a chill swept over him.
Catching himself, he steeled his gaze, forcing it to bravely meet hers again.
But it was too late.
She’d seen. She’d grinningly caught that flicker of fear and Phillip knew she wasn’t the type of girl who ever gave things back. She would keep it—clutch and claw into that small bit of him—feeding off of it. Making herself strong on his brief moment of weakness.
She stood tall again, her wings waving in smug victory. “That’s the real difference between those twittering girls and me,” she told him, her tone dark and low. “I don’t need anyone to be my savior.”
Forcing his voice not to waver—unwilling to give up any more of himself to her—he asked, “So you’re punishing them for being weak?”
“No,” she said with a dismissive shake of her head as she hopped back up on her box, her back turned to him even as her voice echoed through the quiet space, “I’m just not going to reward them for not being strong either.”
READ CHAPTER FIVE HERE SOON
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