Page 146 of What Lies Within Masks & Shadows

Who knew darkness could ever feel like …this?

Smokeshadows misted away.

Alora materialized as her born form. She should’ve been angry, but as she stared at a wooden door instead of the boards of a staircase, somehow, she found it in herself to be a little grateful.

They had dawned to a door a few levels up. A tendril was whorling in Garrik’s hand, producing a brass key as simple as the building they were standing in. He sunk it into the lock and twisted it. The movement created grinding sounds like rusted, old metal groaning against metal before the hinges squealed, allowing the door to drift open.

“Where are we?” She stopped a few feet away, unable to see inside.

“Not camp.” Gripping his side, the muscles in his forearm bulged as he held the door open for her to pass.

“Why?”

“Because neither you nor I wish to return tonight. Plus, I like it here.”

“Here?” Alora frowned, turning her mouth up in disgust. “Why?”

Garrik sighed. “No one bothers me here. Now, are you going to go inside, or will you be staying out here tonight?” He motioned with his head to go inside the room.

And she did. Hesitantly, but she did.

The room was nothing special. In fact, it wasn’t anything she would expect a commoner to reside in, let alone a prince.Especiallynot a High Prince. The wooden floor creaked with every step, scuffed and dirty, caked with dust that left boot prints on its surface.

Sparse, basic furniture filled in the room. A dresser, with a mirror, covered in dust along the wall to her left. A crumbling fireplace with no wood, only ash, laid cold and empty beside it. A filthy green chair with a large rip down its back sat near a half-fogged window. A door to their right that seemed to be a bathroom.

No artwork of any kind on the peeling cream walls and an old, fraying rug sat near?—

Her cheeks heated.

A bed. Barely large enough to hold Garrik, waited near the window.

“Mighty presumptuous of you, High Prince.” Alora frowned, her eyes settling on the sheets as she crossed her arms.

“I am not fucking you, so do not ask.” A muscle flexed in Garrik’s cheek as he bolted the door behind him, walking straight to the bathroom without a second glance at her.

“I wasn’t going to,” she murmured, willing the burning temper rising in her head to calm. Tempted to throw anything within arm’s reach at him.

Instead, she stomped forward to the dresser. Pointing her finger against a candle until her flames sparked and lit it beforetossing herself onto the bed, coughing from the incredible cloud of dust misting off it.

At least it wasn’t camp.

And the only sounds were the water splashing in the bathroom and the whistling of the wind against the window.

“No one knows of this place. I would like to keep it that way,” he called.

She ignored him. Dancing her feet over the edge of the bed, Alora pulled her obsidian dagger from its sheath. Laying the tip into her finger as she swirled it. The soft candlelight created matted white light against its blade and sent glistening flares off the crystal gem on the handle.

Curses and grunts hissed from the bathroom. Enough that she swung herself up to sit and lean, scanning the open door of the bathroom. Garrik was shirtless. The dancing glow from the candle cast shadows across his skin. Long streams of blood extended from a deep wound across his scarred ribs, down the V of muscles, and drenched his pant line as he held a needle between his fingers.

Alora felt her cheeks tingle and her head spin.

Garrik’s eyes jerked her way.

Placing the needle between full lips and maintaining one hand on his wound, he leaned back and closed the door with his free hand.

Fine.She didn’t want to see him anyway.

Laying back on the bed once more, the mattress dipping and croaking from her weight, Alora examined the dagger as she had a thousand times before.

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