Page 21 of Light Magic

“Oh, I remember.” And I was so done with this conversation. No matter what he did, his actions were laced with bad intentions.

I walked up to the wall displaying dozens of swords and picked up one that seemed the size of my old Celestial Blade, though it definitely weighed more.

It was okay, though. I could fight like this.

I headed to the door. “You don’t need to babysit me. I can go by myself.”

“And get lost in this place?” He followed me out and when I didn’t stop, he dashed forward and stepped in my way, making me stop. “Stop being childish.”

I flinched. “I’m not being?—!”

He gave me a look and I shut my mouth. Perhaps I was being childish, but I was being childish because he irritated me in a way nothing else had ever done before.

No, I was better than this. I was a freaking angel!

I inhaled deeply and nodded. “All right. Lead the way.”

With a smug twist of his lips, Levi continued down the hallway, and it was all I could do not to kick his ass and curse his existence.

No, Ariella, think happy thoughts! Forget about the trickster demon in front of you.

It was hard to forget about him when he covered my entire sight with his tall frame and wide shoulders. A perfect frame that I had seen naked, that I had touched, and relished.

By the light, had it gotten hot in here?

Levi groaned.

What was his problem?

I shook my head, pushing those thoughts away. Now was not the time to think about that. Even though it had been a delicious night. Damn, I hadn’t really allowed myself to think about that night, but now, with the subject of the story right in front of me, it was hard not to.

It had been sex, but it had been so, so good. I hadn’t had a lot of experience before, but I was sure Levi’s performance could be considered one of the best, if there was a rank for such a thing.

It was a shame we hated each other; otherwise, we could repeat the?—

Levi spun suddenly, and I almost bumped into him. He loomed over me, glowering. “Sweetheart, can you …” His words faded and he looked over my shoulder, his eyes going wide for half a second, then narrowing. “Turn very slowly,” he whispered.

Oh, shit. I turned on my heels, slowly like Levi had asked, and inhaled deeply when I saw a handful of glowing eyes in the darkness of the hallway behind us.

“What are they?” I asked, just as low.

“Imps.”

The candles along the hallway flickered on, their light dim as if to not startle the little demons, but enough for us to see there were more than a handful, all of them along the walls, watching us with curious, hungry eyes.

They were all waist height, gray-skinned, with bared pointy teeth, and huge yellow catlike eyes.

I held tighter to the sword’s hilt, and beside me Levi called his darkfire.

Together, the little imps let out a skin-crawling snarl and hopped toward us on their large feet.

Levi let out several darkfire bolts, and I swung my sword. The weight felt strange in my hands, but after a few strikes, I got used to it. The imps were easy to kill, but there were too many, and when we got one down, two skipped to us in its place.

“We can’t kill them all,” Levi said, as he started aiming at the imps' legs and arms, to injure them instead of killing.

“Easier said than done.” I groaned as three came at me at the same time. I spun out of range of one, swung my sword upward, slashing the side of another, and kicked the third one in the head, making it crash into the wall.

The vines knotted along the walls reached out and wrapped around it, keeping it in place.

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