Page 22 of Dragon Sword

“I can’t believe you’re even suggesting doing this! You yourself said they were alive! You’d be killing them if you set them on fire!”

“If this works it will be worth it to follow the guards,” he reminded me.

I stomped my foot on the bridge. Big mistake. The whole thing shuddered. Some of the color drained from my face and even Will looked unsettled. I gave him a sheepish grin. “Sorry.”

He sighed and looked past me at the gates. “There’s no other way than to set them ablaze and hope their empty bodies lead us to the last destination.” The gates rattled so loudly that the sound echoed down the canyon.

I stepped back and pressed my back against their quivering forms. “I’m not going to let you do that, Will.”

CHAPTERFOURTEEN

Will’s eyebrows crashed down.“Step aside, Rose. I know what I’m doing.”

“And so do is which is why I can’t let you do it,” I insisted as I stretched my arms out even higher. “You’ll have to set me on fire, too.”

“Step aside, Rose,” he repeated as his fire burned brighter and hotter in his hand.

I shook my head. “I’m not going to do that.”

Will stared hard at me and I glared back at him. The tension between us was thick enough to be cut by a knife and amidst it all was the rattling of the gates. I didn’t dare take a breath until Will pursed his lips and lowered his hand. His flame vanished and he grasped his hand into a fist.

“Then we are at an impasse,” he pointed out as he lifted his gaze to the sky. “We have no way to find them other than to search the whole of the forest.”

I let out a long breath and relaxed my stiff body. “If that’s what we have to do then that’s-hey!” I found myself shoved forward as the gates opened of their own accord. Will caught me in his arms and I glared at them over my shoulder. “What was that for? I just helped you!”

The gates replied by swinging to and fro, though still keeping open. Now that they were open, I could see they led into a wall of pitch-black darkness. Whatever lay on the other side would have to be found out by traveling through the shadows.

Will lifted an eyebrow. “It appears they wish to reward you by letting you through.”

“Through to where they went?” I asked the gates. The thick slabs of wood swung again and I took that to be their way of nodding. My face lit up with a smile. I broke out of Will’s arms and raced over where I embraced one of the doors in a tight hug. “Thank you! Thank you so much!” The door stiffened before it wiggled a little. I laughed and stepped back. “No need to be shy. You’re a good pair of doors.” I half-turned to Will. “Shall we?”

Will moved forward but the moment he did the gates swung partially closed. My heart sank as I watched them tremble again, not from fear but from anger.

I clasped my hands together in front of me and looked between the pair of doors. “Please let him come with me. I can’t do this alone. I’ll get eaten, and you wouldn’t want that, would you?”

The doors seemed to deliberate between one another before they grudgingly opened. I grabbed Will’s hand and dragged him through the opening. “Thank you!”

We stepped from shadow into complete darkness and a slight chill fell over me. I was glad when Will wrapped his other hand around our joined ones and took the lead. Whatever magic the elves had used, the way was at least short as we soon stepped out of the shadows and into the gloom of the thick forest. The scent of decay permeated the air and the oppressive silence of night wrapped around us.

I jumped when something slammed behind us, and I spun around to find myself staring at a huge hunk of moss-covered rock some thirty feet wide and ten feet wide. The last remnants of the doors vanished before my eyes, leaving only a rough surface of stone where they had stood. Something about having our escape vanish made me nervous.

Will, however, was more relaxed than ever as he looped an arm around my waist and drew me against his side. I looked up to find him smiling down at me. His amusement only angered me and I pressed my hands against his chest. I pushed myself out of his hold and stepped back to glare at his bemused face.

“How could you do that to them?” I scolded him as I stabbed a finger at the stone face. “How could you threaten the lives of something just so you could follow a bunch of stupid elves into their stupid forest?”

Will’s teasing eyes studied me. “Do you really believe I would have harmed them?”

My mouth fell open. “Harm them? You were going to light them on fire and walk through their corpses! How could you be such a bloodthirsty monster to threaten them like that?”

He folded his arms over his chest and lifted his eyebrows in a playful manner. “Did I truly intend to harm them?”

I was thoroughly confused until the truth slowly dawned on me. I put my hands on my hips and narrowed my eyes at him. “Did you plan this from the start?”

“Plan what?” he asked me.

I kept my sharp look on him as I waved my hand at the spot where the doors had been. “To get me to save them from you so they’d return the favor by letting us through.”

Will looped his arm around my waist and pulled me against his side again. His eyes danced with mischief as he pressed a light kiss against my forehead. “My brilliant mate.”

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