Page 54 of Necromancers Don't Raise

“Even so. You don’t like my blade? I suppose it’s true, it really has let itself go. It used to gleam and glisten like a lake at sunset, but now it’s just a cankered hunk of metal.”

The sword hissed at him, and Mercury smiled fondly at it. He was still holding his sword while he was carrying me. Why was he carrying me? I wasn’t a helpless, delicate, pathetic, naïve girl. Except that I’d accidentally stumbled on a spelled monster andgotten him injured. Yes, except for that. Also, my legs were so shaky and my arm throbbed horribly.

“You think whoever killed me knows I’m alive? But I look nothing close to how I did before.”

“Perhaps I’m mistaken, but I walked past that pile of ashes without sensing it or awakening it. You’re the one it reacted to.”

We crossed the police tape line and Bones hurried over to us.

“Master! Mistress! You’re both injured! I didn’t see anything, or I would have come!”

I looked back, and everything was precisely how it had been before we’d gone in, with piles of ashes undisturbed instead of being a cyclone on the inside. “It must be glamoured,” I said absently as I smiled at Bones’s obvious concern for someone he knew could come back to life. We were the indestructible undead together.

“What happened?” he asked as he hurried to open the back door for us.

Mercury carefully placed the sword on the floor and then climbed in with me. I cried out when I bumped my arm.

“Miss Nova? What is it?” Mercury’s frown was terrifying, but I only grabbed his own arm, turning it so I could see the gashes the creature had given him.

“They look infected. We’ll have to clean them out when we get home. I’ll bandage you if you’ll bandage me. I think my arm’s broken.” I made a face at him, because if that wasn’t a delicate, idiotic thing to do, I didn’t know what was.

He frowned as he went over the fight in his head. “I broke it when I pushed you away from the viper.” His face went pale as he stared at me, his eyes growing darker, lightning flashes coiling tighter in those fascinating orbs. “And then instead of sitting out, you shot it and tried to strangle it?”

I shrugged. Ouch. “I’ll heal soon enough. Sooner than if it poisoned me. You look absolutely awful. Are you spelled well enough?”

“I’m a dark sorcerer. My pain isn’t relevant. Why did you leap at the snake with a broken arm? I’d genuinely like to know what you were thinking.” The lightning in his eyes was so fascinating.

I pursed my lips. “Well, when I went to India, I took lessons in snake charming.”

“That was you snake charming?”

“No, I thought I’d try the neck grab. It didn’t seem to be interested in being charmed.”

“You thought you’d try it? Did you notice the difference between a snake you can hold in your hands and one you have to strangle with your whole body?”

“Those are the differences, yes. I did notice them, now that you mention it. I’ll have to take notes for my book.”

“You’re writing a book? On what?”

“The differences between reptiles in captivity versus the wild, naturally. Bones, drive quickly. Master’s face is turning weird shades of purple.”

Mercury grabbed me with his arm, the good one, and pulled me hard against his chest, somehow not hurting my injured arm, but still too tight to be perfectly cozy.

“You are too careless with your life, Miss Nova. What am I supposed to do with you?”

I blinked at him, then slid my good arm around his neck. “You should punish me by giving me a long lecture about how my behavior affects those around me, so I need to safeguard myself in order to ensure their well-being. You should make it very long and boring to really deepen the pain.”

He squeezed me again while he frowned at me. “You’ve had many such lectures?”

“Mm. My bodyguards were the best at giving them.”

“But I am an evil sorcerer, not a bodyguard. I should lock you in a tower.”

“I’m sure I could find something dangerous to do in a tower, particularly yours.”

His scowl turned thoughtful, and then he pulled me close and pressed his lips to mine. It was a shock, literally, a shock of lightning at that contact. And then there was a crack of snapping bone, and he jerked.

I gasped and pulled away to stare into those diabolical eyes. “What did you just do?” I demanded, while my heart raced and my lips buzzed. He wouldn’t kiss me because he liked me, and that sound…

---