Page 20 of I Destroyed the Elf Prince's Harem

“We need to get moving soon. If you don’t eat, I’ll leave you behind.” Considering how he’d shown no qualms about leaving our rescuers behind, I had little doubt that Nylian would be happy to abandon my ass, too.

Groaning, I shoved upright and started to toss my cloak off me, but stopped the moment I noticed that I’d been covered in my cloak and Nylian’s. When had he…

Nope. Just fucking nope. There was no way in hell I was going to think about any nice things the elf did for me. I didn’t have the brain capacity for it right now, and it would make me feel guilty about getting us caught by the ogres…and maybe guilty about plunging his life into hell by writing about the murder of his brother.

Without looking at the elf on my left, I plucked his cloak out of the tangle and handed it over to him before climbing to my feet. I stretched and grunted at the morass of aches and knots that filled my body.

“That’s a hell of a bruise you got,” the woman commented.

“What?” I turned toward her to find her grinning and pointing at the middle of her forehead.

My hand reached up to touch the spot on my forehead, forcing out a curse as fresh pain coursed through my head. I had a fucking knot in the center of my forehead from hitting a tree. Of course. That was great.

“Ignore her. Sit. Eat,” Nylian admonished while holding up something that appeared to be a biscuit.

“Where did you get this?” I accepted the food and dropped onto the log next to him.

“I had a bit of flour left in my bag,” the wizard admitted with a crooked grin. “It’s not much, but it’ll at least fill the hole in your stomach for a few hours.”

I took a bite out of the biscuit and had to agree that it wasn’t much. In fact, it was pretty damn bad. It was mostly flour with the slightest hint of some other spices that gave it a trace of savory flavor. I couldn’t complain, since I had no food supplies and if Nylian had any, they’d been lost when the ogres had kidnapped us.

“Thanks,” I said with the best smile I could manage while forcing down that knot of very dry dough.

“Okay, okay. All the niceties are out of the way. How about you stop ignoring me and we talk about our payment for rescuing you?” the woman snapped.

“Who are you? How did you even find us?” I asked.

“I’m Adeline Engleford, accomplished thief, occasional mercenary, and full-time badass. This is my younger brother, Jasper, who’s studying to become a wizard.” She paused and glared at the teenager on her right. “At least he was until he got kicked out of the Ashenvale Institute of the Arcane in Gushan.”

“That wasn’t my fault,” Jasper muttered under his breath while hugging what had to be a thick grimoire to his chest.

Their bickering didn’t matter because I was choking to death on the last bite of my breakfast. Nylian’s hand landed on my back several times as I gasped for air. The last bits of the bread flew into the fire, and I coughed several more times to clear my throat.

Adeline Engleford?

Here? Now?

She was supposed to become one of Nylian’s harem consorts. Except I hadn’t planned on them running into each other until after he was leaving Galinaes. And I didn’t recall her traveling with her younger brother.

“I’m fine. I’m fine,” I rasped to get Nylian to stop hitting me. My body was sore enough as it was; I didn’t need him adding to the bruises.

The elf shoved a flask under my nose and I accepted it, taking a sip of cool water. “What happened?” he inquired, one eyebrow raised at me.

“Nothing. Went down the wrong way. I’m fine.”

It was all I could say. This wasn’t the time to announce that he was supposed to fall in love with the woman and screw her brains out while they were on the run from the royal guards of Galinaes. That seemed tasteless. Particularly in front of Adeline’s little brother.

Of course, this could be an excellent development. Maybe the story was trying to fix itself, since I’d messed things up and derailed Nylian from acquiring three other consorts. This time, I’d have the chance to stand back and enjoy the show. If I remembered correctly, Nylian and Adeline were supposed to have a rocky, adversarial love affair. She was brazen and stubborn, constantly locking horns with Nylian, who was accustomed to having his way. Yes, this was going to be very interesting to watch.

“As fun as this has been, Jasper and I need to get on our way. To do that, we need you to pay the three hundred and fifty gold pieces you owe us,” Adeline stated. She thrust her hand out before her, palm up, and smiled tightly at us both.

“Uh…” I replied, my brain frantically bouncing between the fact that I wasn’t carrying that kind of money and that they couldn’t be allowed to leave now. If they left, there was no chance of Nylian and Adeline falling in love.

This was supposed to be a goddamn action-adventure, fantasy harem book, but that wouldn’t happen if there was no goddamn harem. Nylian needed to get on the fucking ball. He was missing three consorts, and if he didn’t get off his ass, he was going to lose a fourth.

“And as I told you earlier, I don’t have that kind of money on me,” Nylian said as he took the flask from me and screwed the lid on.

“What about him?” Adeline’s hand moved from resting in front of Nylian to me.

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