“You have heard it said, I imagine, that behind every successful man is a woman? You will be that woman. Something to help soften my…image.”
He turned away again, his footsteps indicating that he was walking away, and panic gripped her. “Wait!”
He stopped. “A servant will come and show you to your room.”
She imagined by “room” he meant “dungeon.” Another shiver wound through her, fear spiking her blood, making her feel like she had been drugged. “At least let me see you.” She refused to think of him as a monster looming around in the darkness. That would only give him more power. He was just a man. As she had been ranting earlier, he was probably a man with a weak chin.
A man who was afraid to show himself because he was cowardly. Because he was the kind of tyrant who wouldn’t allow anyone to say anything about him that wasn’t expressly approved by him. She had nothing to fear from this man. And when she saw his face, she would know that for sure.
“If you insist.” Footsteps moved toward her, and his shape became clearer as he drew closer. Then one foot moved into the pool of light at the center of the room. Followed by the rest of him.
She had been right in her assessment of him as large. He was almost monstrous in stature, broad and impossibly tall. But if his height weren’t enough to make her shiver in fear, his face would have accomplished it.
She had been wrong. He did not have a weak chin. Neither did he have a rounded jaw. No, there was something utterly perfect about his bone structure, which made the damage done to his features seem like a blasphemy shouted in a church.
His skin was golden brown, and it was ruined. Deep grooves taken from his face, a deep slash cutting through one eye. Deep enough that she wondered if he had vision on the side. He might have smiled, but it was difficult to say. The scar tissue at his mouth, so heavy on the one side, kept his lips from tipping up fully.
In that moment, she was certain that she had not been taken captive by a man. No, she had been taken captive by a beast.