Page 172 of What Lies Within Masks & Shadows

Rolling her lips between her teeth, Alora backed away with a warmth of scarlet on her cheeks.Not in the slightest. Just couldn’t burn the mighty prince on his birthday.

Garrik scoffed inside her mind before tossing the ring to Jade, who caught it one-handed, still staring at his arm. “Satisfied?” He raised an eyebrow as his shadows swallowed the torch.

Jade cocked her hip, gritting her teeth. The ring slipped across her finger, and she held it in front of her, frowning. “It isn’t at all my color.”

Alora shook her head and chuckled. “You’re welcome, Jade.”

Garrik extended the shield far beyond camp, and dancing deep into the night sky was a glow of raging bonfires kissing starlight.

Alora tried not to gape as bursts of bright colors guided her with every step. Teeming with displays of loud, crackling and booming magic, over and over, the horizon ignited with exploding stars, shapes, and patterns. Expanding in prisms ofcolor until they would rain down into dying embers on the faeries who were utterly awestruck by the sight.

Alora was captivated, reaching the crest of the hill above the valley. Even as she descended, it was difficult to keep her eyes off the spectacle that waited below.

Faeries with fire magic had ignited the bonfires in their special color. The brightest blues, purples, greens—every color imaginable burned the pyres. And around them … she’d seen the army as a whole. Their battle-black armor was one considerable force marching through the kingdom like an unrelenting river seen from a cliff. Had seen the tents flooding the terrain until they looked like clouds in the sky. But never like this. Never so many dancing inside the alluring melodies of music and drinking without a single care within their High Prince’s protection.

Together, they would wash the land of impurities, a relentless force ofpossibility. Because this kind of joy didn’t sprout under boots of tyranny. It was forged in the footprints of destruction left behind.

Not one scrap of armor in sight, Alora took in the celebration. Every Dragon was decorated in finery fit for a royal banquet. Panels of extravagant, flowing and loose fabrics hung from females twirling barefoot. Males in embellished tunics and pants, no swords at their side. And where grand marble and golden ballrooms should be, incredible bonfires were strewn along the landscape, and silhouettes of different shapes and forms danced across the trampled grass.

It seemed the entire camp had congregated. The sea before her settled a slow, anxious ache inside her fingers when she scanned, looking for any familiar face.

Before long, she joined in with a few females from Jade’s battalion.

Alora danced wildly around the bonfire born of her white flames. Sparking embers swirled her like blazebugs—or snow. She spun and leapt with complete abandon. One with the glittering sparks that flurried on the air currents. Minutes—hours—went by as she lost herself to the magnetic blaze, her body moving freely in fiery harmony until fatigue gripped her muscles and her mouth cried out with thirst.

Giggling, almost blissfully drunk from song and dance, Alora weaved through the celebration, her eyes set on one of the many tables overflowing with refreshments.

Then she spotted him.

Like a timid beast caged, Garrik stood surrounded by chattering faces, each pining for his attention.

Alora was twenty feet away when Calla, the rose-gold skinned faerie, threw her arms around his neck. And she watched as Garrik flashed her his High Prince smile and respectfully pulled an arms-length away, tugging at his tunic before accepting a small rose-petal wrapped gift. Soon after, the male who she was sure alerted Garrik about Haiden’s outburst, Draven, led the Nightfall pack of wolf shifters rolling barrels of ale to his boots. Garrik flashed the same grin and flicked his wrist, engulfing the barrels in Smokeshadows before they misted away and reappeared by the drinks.

A gravelly female voice stole her attention.

“Stars above, is that what I think it is?” Over by tables brimming with food and crowded by Dragons, Jade shrieked and ran to one covered in desserts and sweets. One particularly delectable round cake sat high on a stand, its brown icing glistened in the bonfire’s warm light. “Chocolate! Every single one of you will have to fight me for this. I’m not sharing.”

Though weapons were far and few between, Jade managed to pull a concealed dagger from her boot, jam it into the cake in afew messy slices, and skewer a piece to bring up to her mouth. All before anyone around could say a word in challenge.

A soft grin lifted on Alora’s face as she scanned back to where Garrik had been. In such a short time, he had vanished. Something like a silver tether drew her eyes to the tree line.

In the darkness, Garrik strolled in the opposite direction of camp.

It didn’t take long until she had weaved through the crowds and fires and caught up to him. “Trying to sneak away?” she called out, chuckling as she bounded up to his back.

Garrik glanced over his shoulder, and a small smirk twisted up his face, a darkened bottle in his hand. “How could I sneak away? It would seem that you always find me.” His voice was soft, inviting.

Alora panted in a breath, wiping a small line of sweat from her hairline. “What are you doing out here? Shouldn’t the male of honor be down there?” she asked and dropped down to the grass to sit, draping her forearm over a bent knee to catch her breath.

Flames reflecting in his eyes, Garrik scanned to the trees behind them. His ring clanked against the bottle, drawing her attention. He opened his mouth to speak, and flicked his head from the trees to the bottle before Smokeshadows tendriled around his hand, swallowing up the bottle and leaving his palm empty.

Then his footsteps drew near, wandering beside her before dropping to the cool grass, wincing at the bend of his ribs, and reclined, just as she was. “It is much quieter here.”

Incredible laughter echoed from the celebration. Jade was dancing. Spinning and twirling and bellowing with pure exhilaration as Thalon locked his palms around her wrists, spinning her in fast circles inside a circlet of bonfires, sparking their embers and smoke into the night sky.

Sparks and ash and smoke touched her skin, and Jade spun without a single care. Without a single flinch.

Alora grinned, marveling at the sight, and caught a gentle gleam in Garrik’s eye as he watched her, too.

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