Page 75 of The Shadow Wand

I struggle to catch my breath, still rasping through my lungs. I hoist myself up and away from the balcony and follow them, hearing their voices below, the cool breeze coming in from the ocean chilling my face and neck.

I make my way down two levels and crouch behind a stone trunk as their voices become audible from the balcony’s far end.

“...throw away your entire career forwhat?” Lachlan’s harsh voice demands. “A girl who doesn’t want you?”

“She’smine.”

“She was all but Damion’s before you stormed into the fasting, threatening everyone in the room. For a girl who had to be forcibly restrained to fast to you. Vyvian Damonplayedyou! To get you to fast to a girl that no one but Damion would have wanted. Did I raise you to be such a fool?”

He saved me. Lukas saved me. Holy Ancient One, he saved me from being fasted to Damion Bane.Nausea churns in my stomach as a dizzying clarity descends.

“She’s a troublemaker and a whore,” his father continues. “One step up from a Selkie—”

“Careful.” Lukas’s voice is low and threatening.

They’re both quiet for a moment, and I’ve a sense of both the tension simmering on the air and that Lachlan Grey is intimidated by his son.

“You are a fool,” Lachlan finally says. “This girl is a traitor to her own kind. Is this your way of thumbing your nose at our traditions? I know you didn’t want to be fasted, but to make such a mockery of asacred rite, choosing a girl who has disgraced herself in such a wanton, disgusting manner, from a family full ofrace traitors...”

“Are you finished?” Lukas’s voice has become cold, disinterested.

“No, I’mnotdone,” Lachlan snaps angrily. “Youwill notkill Damion Bane.Promiseme!”

“If he touches her again, Iwillkill him,” Lukas answers calmly, irrefutably.

Again, they’re quiet.

“You should have let Damion have her,” Lachlan bites out, as if through clenched teeth. “He’d have beaten some sense into her. I suggest you do just that.”

There’s the sound of footsteps, and Lachlan storms by without noticing me, making his way to the descending staircase. And then Lukas strides into view.

He catches sight of me and stops dead in his tracks.

I freeze, wholly unprepared to face him, my heart pounding against my chest.

Fire power blasts through his lines and out toward me, his face taking on a look that’s so impassioned it stuns me. “Elloren, are you all right?”

So much power is swirling through my lines in response to his that I’m light-headed. “I am,” I force out with a stiff nod.

He extends his hand to me, his gaze fervent. “Come inside with me,” he offers as I’m encircled by his out-of-control flame.

My fire leaps toward his, and for a moment I want nothing more than to clasp his wand hand to mine and surrender to our all-encompassing, magical pull.

But I hesitate.

Our fire power is running feverishly hot, and I can feel Lukas’s emotion in it, blazing just as hot and raw.

I curl my wand hand into a tight fist and press it to my side, fighting against our draw. Because if our wand hands touch and he gets a full sense of my power, I know that he’ll likely realize, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that I’m the next Black Witch.

CHAPTER FIVE

ALLY

ELLOREN GARDNER

Sixth Month

Valgard, Gardneria

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