Gleam: The dark fantasy romance TikTok sensation that’s sold over a million copies (Plated Prisoner Book 3)

The camp atmosphere is exactly how I remember it.

Soldiers are gathered around the motley fires, leather tents dusted with snow while the scent of smoke and cooked meat chars the air.

The deeper into camp we go, the more soldiers notice me as we pass by, and I quickly become self-conscious at the way their eyes follow me. It’s not quite as contentious as it was before when I was a prisoner in their eyes, but there’s something definitively wary in their expressions.

Not that I can blame them—I can only imagine what they think of me, have no idea what they’ve been told or if there’s camp gossip. One group we pass goes completely silent, voices cutting off mid-sentence when they notice me. I try to send them a quick smile, but they look away.

“Do they hate me?” I ask, unable to staunch the question from leaking out.

“For the most part, they don’t trust you,” Lu answers as we walk side-by-side. “They never will, so long as they see you as Midas’s pet.”

Nodding, I repress the urge to pull up my hood and cover my face. I don’t want to look like I’m concealing anything or that I have anything to be ashamed of. It wouldn’t do me any good with this crowd.

Instead, I keep my chin up, my shoulders back, let my ribbons trail after me in the snow, their golden ends playing and jumping over the glittering ground. If I’m going to try and fit in here, to earn the trust or at least tolerance of these soldiers, I can’t do it by hiding.

Beside me, Lu gives a nod, like I’ve made the right move, which fuels my determination. As we continue picking our way past tightly packed-in tents, a woman comes up who I recognize. Inga, the soldier who ran into Judd and me when we stole the wine barrel back from Lu’s right flank. I still can’t get over the embarrassment I felt when Judd told her I had women’s troubles. The prick.

Just like then, Inga has a flop of brown spirals on her head and a wooden pipe stuck behind her ear. She comes up on Lu’s other side, falling into step with us.

“How did the training go?” Lu asks her by way of greeting.

“It went well. Got some of the new routines down before I let them go off into the city for the night.”

“Good,” Lu replies. “Why don’t you go into the city yourself? You’ve earned it.”

“Thanks, but I’d rather stay here. Ranhold doesn’t appeal to me. Too bloody cold. And have you seen the corsets the women wear here?” Inga asks, lip curling up in distaste.

“Right?” I exclaim, leaning around Lu to see her. “They’re terrible. I’m not sure how anyone breathes in this kingdom.”

“The clothing in Fourth is much better,” Inga tells me.

Lu casts her a droll look. “You don’t wear civilian clothing. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you out of your uniform.”

The woman looks down at her black leathers, fingers patting the brown straps that crisscross at the front. “They’re comfortable. Got them broken in just the way I like.”

Lu snorts.

Inga plucks up the pipe from her ear. “Need anything else, Lu?”

“No, go relax. Thanks, Inga.”

She nods and then looks at me. “See you around, Gildy.” With a wave, she walks off, joining a rowdy group of soldiers playing cards.

“Your nickname for me really caught on,” I grumble. Lu’s grin widens.

Soon, she and I get past all of the close-knit clusters of tents. The privacy is instantly more prominent, the breathing room of empty space given to a larger tent that I recognize immediately. There’s a fire burning several feet in front of it, and a familiar group is gathered around. They’re sitting on stumps of wood and talking quietly, and a smile instantly appears on my lips.

The moment I step forward, a pair of black eyes dart up to meet mine, and just that look steals the breath from my chest. He’s in his Rip form, and my stomach does a little flip at the sight. His pale face glows orange from the flickering flames in front of him, but the charge between us burns hotter.

Lu notices my steps falter, and she looks over at me with a frown. “Feet broken?”

“What? No.”

She glances from me to Slade and back again and then rolls her eyes and mutters something that I don’t catch. I can’t, because I’m still staring at Slade. I can’t help it. Not when he’s looking at me like that.

The slow drag of his attention is like the stroke of his fingertip against my bare skin. Which, after last night, I know very, very well. The look in his eye somehow reflects every single erotic thing we did together, making a blush rise to my cheeks. Slade quirks up one side of his mouth.

That smirk.

Oh Divine, that smirk.

“Gildy! Get the hell over here!”

My attention wrenches away to Judd, who’s waving me over. With a little embarrassment, I realize Lu has already walked off without me even noticing. Tucking some loose hair behind my ear, I head over to their fire, avoiding the puddles of melted snow on the ground.

“Thought I was going to have to drag you over,” Judd says with a grin as he leans over a barrel and pours out some wine. “Here.”

I take the tin cup gratefully and give it an indulgent sniff before I breathe out in a smile. “You’re good to me, Mustard.”

Judd grimaces and rubs at his mustard-seed hair. “It’s not that yellow.”

I cock a brow. “Listen, I’m gold, okay? Don’t whine to me.”

He laughs, and his tan complexion makes his teeth stand out white and bright. “Fair enough.”

When he starts filling up more cups of wine, I turn around, all too aware of Slade’s attention on me. Instead of letting myself get caught up in his gaze again, I watch Osrik yank off the roasted meat that’s cooking over the fire and start to peel chunks off of it.

The big brute is wearing a leather vest, with straps wound around his massive biceps, and his brown hair is hanging down loose around his shoulders. His scowl is as fierce as ever, but at least he gives me a nod in greeting instead of threatening my life. It’s a big improvement since the time we first met.

Judd passes my line of sight and gives wine to the others, and my gaze zeroes in on Slade again. He’s still watching me, his aura smoky, reaching toward me with tendril fingers of a dark want. In answer, my ribbons begin to inch closer, slithering on the ground, tugging me forward until I stand right in front of him.

“Hi,” I blurt out.

Hi? That’s what I say?

This male bent my body in all sorts of ways last night, brought me more pleasure than I’ve ever experienced, and I just stand here awkwardly and say hi?

His lips twitch in amusement. “Hello, Goldfinch.”

He doesn’t say it. He practically purrs it. So instead of hearing a simple greeting, I’m hearing him whisper filthy things into my ear. I’m feeling his hot breath against my neck, seeing the lines of his abs hidden beneath his leathers.

I’m staring again. I know I am, and yet, I just can’t stop, because there’s this energy rippling from him that’s filled with lust and affection, and I wouldn’t be able to break away from it even if I wanted to.

He was in his kingly form last night…but what would it be like to be with him while he’s in this Rip form? What would it be like to feel the tips of his spikes above his brow, or press my lips to the murky streak of gray scales along the tops of his cheeks? Would he tease me with that hint of fang by dragging it along my—

“Leg or breast?”

My head snaps in the direction of Osrik’s voice, and my cheeks flame. “What?”

His brown eyes blink impatiently beneath bushy brows. “Leg or breast?” he grunts, pointing to the meat he’s tearing apart.

“Oh. Uh…leg?”

He nods before ripping off the biggest damn leg from some poor animal he probably hunted down himself with his bare hands.

I stuff my gloves in my pocket and then grab the hunk he passes over. I have to grip the end of the leg bone in both hands just to hold it up. I’m no food snob, but this is a little ridiculous.

Taking pity on me, Slade relieves me of the giant leg and tears a strip of meat off, before he hands over the much more manageable slice. “Thanks.” I sit down on the empty stump of wood just beside him and then bite into the meat, which practically melts in my mouth.

“Os, stop tearing into it like that. You’re massacring it,” Lu gripes. The three of them sit a few feet away from us, the firelight making their uniforms brighten.

He glowers. “What’s wrong with it?”

“Looks a bit like something a pack of rabid wolves have been at,” Judd says helpfully. Before Osrik can so much as shoot a glare his way, the mustard-haired Wrath smoothly shoves a cup of wine in his direction.

Osrik swipes up the cup before shoving a hunk of meat in Judd’s direction in return, making fat go dripping all over the ground. “You’re lucky I’m thirsty.”

Judd grins and sits next to Lu, making her shove over on her stump. “Did I say you could sit here?” she asks with an arched brow.

“Well, if I try to share a stump with Os, he’ll probably tear my legs off and roast them over the spit.”

Lu tilts her head contemplatively. “True.”

Osrik grunts, teeth gnashing onto a bite of smoked skin that crackles as he chews. But he doesn’t disagree.

I watch in amusement as I finish my food and drink my fill, all while relishing their easy interactions. It makes me relax bit by bit until I find that I’m just…enjoying myself. I’m not on edge. Not having to watch what I do or say. I don’t have to play a part. I can simply be myself and not look over my shoulder. We might be on Ranhold’s front doorstep, but in this moment, I feel an ocean away.

“I take it you and Lu had no trouble coming out here?” Slade asks me.

Using the snow at my feet, I wipe my hands the best I can before I hold them up to the fire to thaw them out. “No. Nice trick she has, by the way.”

“It is,” he replies simply before taking a drink from his cup and stretching out his legs in front of him.

“Do all of your Wrath have tricks?”

He gives me a mischievous look. “Guess you’ll have to find out.”

One glance at Osrik still mauling his food and I’m not sure I want to know.

Lowering my voice, I ask, “Do they…know?”

Amusement dances in his eyes. “Do they know what exactly? That we…”

“No,” I hiss, darting a look at the others. Luckily, they’re occupied with making fun of Judd about something.

Slade grins, and I know the ass did it on purpose. The fact that Fake Rip might or might not have heard some things is embarrassing enough as it is. “Not that. Do they know that you change coats?” I ask pointedly.

He snorts. “Yes, they know I change forms. They’re the only ones, apart from you.”

Emotion swells in my chest like water soaked up into a sponge, until I’m saturated with a flattered sense of humbling pride that he let me into his small circle of people who he trusts with his secret.

“Poor guy, huh?” Judd cuts in, proving that they are, in fact, eavesdropping. “Has to choose between spikes coming out of his ass, or magic lines down his…unmentionables.”

My brows pull together in a frown. “He doesn’t have magic lines on his—” I cut myself off, but it’s too late. Lu chokes on her wine.

Judd barks out a laugh. “Ha! Told you!” he exclaims, slapping his knee with delight. “Pay up, Os.”

Mortified, I bury my face into my hands. “Oh goddess.”

“Don’t feel too bad, Gildy,” Judd tells me. “We always know everything about everything. I even know how many times Os takes a shit every day.” Osrik shoots him a glare. “Four, in case you were wondering.”

Gross.noveldrama

“I wasn’t,” I mumble against my hands, still keeping my face buried in them. It seems safer, considering the direction of the conversation.

“Hey, Judd?” Slade calls, and I peek out from between my fingers.

He perks up, looking pleased with himself. “Yeah, Commander?”

“Shut up.”

A quick nod precedes Judd’s cheerful reply. “Yep, will do.”

I laugh against my palms until Slade’s firm fingers wrap around mine and tug them away from my face. “Don’t mind Judd. He can’t help but be an unendurable prick.”

“It’s true,” Lu chirps. “He thrives on it.”

“Yeah, but I keep you lot entertained,” Judd defends.

Shaking my head, I turn back to Slade and look him over cautiously. “So…just to be clear, you don’t have a spike that comes out of your ass, right?”

Lu, Judd, and Osrik all howl in laughter.

Slade just sighs. “No ass spikes to speak of.”

Bright side.

“So, are you still glad you came out to camp?” Lu asks with a smirk on her face.

“Apart from all the ass and shit talk? Definitely,” I reply, and the others grin at me, as if that was the right thing to say.

The easygoing camaraderie between them all is visceral, filling me with a sense of comfortable friendship that I’ve never experienced before in my life. There’s no underlying bitterness or competitiveness in the way they joke with one another. There’s no sense of jealousy or resentment. Instead, there’s an intense certainty about them. As if they’re family, that they know each other inside and out, and even when they’re mocking or joking, I can feel the loyalty they have for one another.

“So, you’re Rip tonight,” I note, looking over the spikes jutting up from Slade’s uniform.

“I am.” He glances down as two of my ribbons start toying with the laces of his boot, and his lips quirk. “Little flirts.”

I shrug, because I give up on trying to hold back the cheeky things. “Do you change forms a lot?” I ask curiously.

“Sometimes it’s necessary. But other times, I do it when I don’t feel like being the king and dealing with everything that comes with it.”

“It’s like an escape for you.”

He nods. “It’s not always easy being King Rot,” he replies sardonically, but I can see the edge of bitter truth to that, and my heart aches for him. I can’t imagine what he carries on his back as not only a monarch, but a feared one. Sometimes even a despised one.

“I can understand that. I actually envy it,” I admit quietly, watching my ribbons continue to twirl around his shoes and ankles playfully. “If I could stop being the gold girl even just for a night, I’d jump at the chance to not be me.”

Slade’s finger and thumb suddenly come up to grip my chin, and he pulls my face to look at him, his intense eyes boring into me. “Never say that,” he rumbles, the timbre of his voice pitched in firm demand. “The world would be a dreary place without your light.”

My chest constricts, something warm scattering over me with the brush of his thumb.

“Shit,” Judd says in a groan. “Rip is being fucking cute, and it’s making me want to vomit.”

Another sigh passes through Slade’s lips as he drops his hold from my chin. “Hey, Lu?”

“Yeah, Commander?”

“Smack Judd for me.”

Quicker than Judd can dodge, she smacks him on the back of the head, making him grunt. “Ow! Why are you so violent?”

Lu flashes him a grin that’s all teeth. “Because it makes me happy.”

I can’t stifle the laugh that bubbles out of me.

“Come on, Mustard,” Osrik grunts as he gets to his feet, yanking up Judd by his sleeve. “Let’s go find some more wine for Lu. She’s always much nicer after she has a few pints.”

“That’s true,” she agrees.

The three of them wander off, and then it’s just Spikey Slade and me alone in the company of a wisping fire with fingers that taper up toward the icy sky.

“So…Goldfinch.” His voice has gone gravelly and decadent, his dark aura coiling around me. The look he gives me is both indulgent and sensual, and it makes my stomach spark with embers of heat. “Now that we’re alone, what should we do?”

The words may be a question, but his voice already has the answer, and it matches mine.

A coy smile appears on my face. “I have a few ideas.”