Radiant Shadows. Melissa Marr

Чтение книги онлайн.

      Contents

       Cover

       Title Page

      PROLOGUE

      CHAPTER 1

      CHAPTER 2

      CHAPTER 3

      CHAPTER 4

      CHAPTER 5

      CHAPTER 6

      CHAPTER 7

      CHAPTER 8

       CHAPTER 9

       CHAPTER 10

       CHAPTER 11

       CHAPTER 12

       CHAPTER 13

       CHAPTER 14

       CHAPTER 15

       CHAPTER 16

       CHAPTER 17

       CHAPTER 18

       CHAPTER 19

       CHAPTER 20

       CHAPTER 21

       CHAPTER 22

       CHAPTER 23

       CHAPTER 24

       CHAPTER 25

       CHAPTER 26

       CHAPTER 27

       CHAPTER 28

       CHAPTER 29

       CHAPTER 30

       CHAPTER 31

      CHAPTER 32

      CHAPTER 33

      CHAPTER 34

      CHAPTER 35

      EPILOGUE

      ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

      Also by Melissa Marr

      Copyright

       About the Publisher

       PROLOGUE

      LATE 1800s

      Devlin stood immobile as the spectral girl approached. The plume of her hat and the dark ringlets that framed her face were motionless, despite the breeze that swept over the field. The air did not touch her; consequently, he was unsure if he could.

      “I seem to be dreaming or, mayhaps, lost,” she murmured.

      “Indeed.”

      “I was resting over”—she gestured behind her, frowned, and gave him a shaky smile—“in the cave that seems to have vanished. Am I still resting?”

      The girl presented Devlin with a dilemma. All those uninvited to Faerie were to be brought before the High Queen—or dispatched if he deemed them threats. His function was to assure order, to do what best served the good of Faerie.

      “In a cave?” he prompted.

      “My guardian and I had a quarrel.” She shivered and folded her arms over her chest. The dress she wore was not this season’s fashionable attire, but it wasn’t horribly outdated.

      When he didn’t reply, she added, “You look like a gentleman. I don’t suppose your manor is near here? Your mother or sisters? Not that my aunt expects me to make much of a match, but she would be … displeased if I were to be found unchaperoned in the company of a gentleman.”

      “I am not a gentleman.”

      She blanched.

      “And meeting my mother-sisters is not something I’d wish on the innocent,” he added. “You should turn back. Call this a bad dream. Go away from here.”

      The girl looked around at the field; her gaze took in the landscape of Faerie—the spider-silk hammocks that hung in the trees, the pink-and-gold-tinted sky that the queen had fashioned for the day—and then settled on him.

      Devlin did not move as she observed him. She did not falter at the sight of his opalescent hair or inhuman eyes; she did not flinch at his angular features or otherworldly stillness. He wasn’t sure what reaction he expected: he’d never been viewed as he truly was by a mortal. Over in their world, he wore a glamour to appear like them. Here, he was known for what he was, the Queen’s Bloodied Hands. The girl’s assessment was a singular event.

      Her cheeks became pink as she boldly stared at him. “You certainly look like a kind man.”

      “I am not.” He stepped toward her. “I exist to keep order for the queen of Faerie. I am neither kind nor a man.”

      The girl fainted.

      Devlin leaped forward to catch her and knelt on the ground, arms empty—as her form settled inside of his skin. He couldn’t hold the insubstantial, but she apparently could take residence in his body as if it were her own.

      Her voice was in his head. Sir?

      He couldn’t move: his body wasn’t his to control. He was still inside of himself, but he was not animating his body. The girl’s spectral form had filled his skin as if it were her own body.

      Can you move? he asked.

      Of course! She sat up and, in doing so, left his body.

      He swallowed against the burst of peculiar emotions СКАЧАТЬ