Without quite knowing what I was doing, I kept moving. My feet carried me almost all the way down the long main corridor, my slippers almost silent on the flagstone floor, until I reached the corner.
This was it—I was certain that if I turned the corner, I would see the short hallway with its door that led outside the castle. Should I turn it? Should I go and see if Griffin was there?
The key at my throat was urging me on eagerly and to be honest, I wanted to see him myself. I knew it was crazy and ridiculous—he had expressly warned me to leave him alone and all my friends had said he was bad news—not to mention extremely dangerous. Also, I couldn’t forget the way his fangs had gleamed in the dim light the night before.
But all of that didn’t stop me from wanting to see him—wanting to talk to him—even though I knew it was stupid and unsafe. I just couldn’t seem to help myself—I felt as drawn to the tall Nocturne as the key was to his lock.
As I stood there indecisively, someone came around the corner I had been debating on turning and headed right towards me.
I started back, putting a hand to my pounding heart. I couldn’t see their face in the dimness of the corridor but I could tell whoever it was had to be male from his sheer height. Was it Griffin?
“Hello there,” a deep, gravely voice snarled as he saw me. “I was hoping I’d find you out here.”
The tall shadow stepped into a dim patch of moonlight coming through a nearby window. I felt my stomach clench like an icy fist as I saw his face.
It wasn’t Griffin—it was Sanchez.
29
I turned to run but he already had me by the arm and was dragging me towards him.
“Come here!” he barked, glaring at me. “Come here and fix what you did!”
“What? What are you talking about?” I gasped. “I didn’t…didn’t do anything to you!”
I tried to twist away from him but his grip on my upper arm was too tight—I was definitely going to have a bruise tomorrow. But right now that was the last of my worries. The big Drake’s eyes were glowing an angry yellow in the dim hallway and I was pretty sure if I got out of this with just a bruise, I would consider myself extremely lucky.
“You call this not doing anything? Look at me,” he snarled, his face contorted with anger in the moonlight. “Look what you did to me, you little bruja!”
I saw that he was pointing with his free hand to his left cheek—the same cheek I had slapped that morning in PE after he pissed me off being nasty to Kaitlyn.
To my shock, I saw that my handprint was still there—a perfectly defined outline of my palm and fingers, splayed across his beefy cheek and the side of his face. Only instead of being an angry red, as it had appeared that morning, it was now a dark royal blue. A blue handprint that stood out on his skin like a sign.
It looked strange and out of place—like a tattoo or a bizarre bruise. Or like maybe someone had played a prank on him and drawn a blue hand on his face while he was drunk or asleep at a party. But no one else had done this to him—no one but me.
I did that, I realized, with a sick lurch of fear in the pit of my stomach. I marked him that way—but how?
Vaguely I remembered the feeling of my anger taking physical form when I’d hit him—the feeling that some kind of power or energy had transferred itself from me to the big Drake standing in front of me. But of course I hadn’t done it on purpose—it had just happened—the anger pouring out of me and into Sanchez.
Just the way the pain had poured from my mom into me. There was a connection there somewhere but I didn’t have the knowledge or experience to see it clearly. I was still so new to the magical world. I didn’t know…
“Well?” Sanchez demanded, shaking me angrily until my teeth clicked together on the tip of my tongue.
The sharp pain seemed to bring me out of the trance I’d somehow fallen into. I tasted the hot metallic flavor of blood and winced as I spit it out to one side.
“I don’t even know how I did that in the first place,” I said, glaring up at him. “So I sure as hell don’t know how to take it away.”
It was the wrong thing to say. But then, I don’t think there was a right thing to say at that moment. I know Sanchez certainly didn’t believe me.
“You little puta!” he growled, snarling right in my face so I could feel his hot, fetid breath on my cheeks. “You’re going to be sorry—so fucking sorry if you don’t fix this!”