Page 42 of Fae Exile

“I’m much better,” Xeno said just as I realized I didn’t see Reed.

Eyes stretching again in premature panic, I opened my mouth to ask.

“Reed’s up in the trees, keeping watch,” offered Xeno, the friend who knew me better than anyone else alive.

Another stress lifted, and I allowed myself to smile tentatively, finally turning fully toward him.

I sat on a cloak spread out on top of the umbrac muck, which in the light of day was worse than it had been in the dark. Now I could make out the individual membranes and pieces of the monsters—a few tentacles here, a bit of an eyeball there, a lump of sludge I didn’t care to identify…

“I wouldn’t look too closely if I were you,” Xeno said.

I scrunched up my nose. “Or breathe too deeply either. It’srank.”

“I think some of that’s us.”

Lifting a forearm, which was slathered in what looked like tar, to my nose, I inhaled ... and gagged, then swiftly lowered my arm while Xeno chuckled. “Guess I won’t be doing that again,” I said.

“Not till we get someplace where we can strip and scrub this gunk off us.”

“When will that be?” I asked with a bit of an indulgent whine. “If it’s not soon, we’ll end up as gross as those umbracs.”

“Doubtful.” Xeno’s brow furrowed, none of his usual playfulness present.

I sobered and inched closer across the cloak, really taking in my friend now that I knew everyone else here was safe. I placed a hand on his knee before realizing it was bare beneath the gunk, but then I didn’t want to remove it when there’d be no other reason for it than remembering how, for many years now, he’d wanted more than friendship.

Forcing myself to hold my hand steady, I gazed up at him. “Seriously, how are you?”

He wore his boots and what looked like shorts he’d borrowed—based on how tightly they clung to his muscles—and nothing else. He’d likely shredded his clothes when he’d shifted the night before up in the treetops.

One of his cheekbones was badly bruised, a mottled array of blue, purple, and yellow peeking out behind flecks of grime. Another, a dark slash the width of a whipping tentacle, echoed the line of his collarbone. The depressions of dozens—perhaps hundreds—of cuts beneath the sludge peppered his arms, hands, chest, abdomen, and thighs.

Similar in age, we’d been companions all our lives. Even so, Nightguard cycled through only two settings:freezing, andholy-shit-it’s-fucking freezing, and even for the dragon shifters who withstood the cold so much better than I, we didn’t often frolic around with scant clothing. In fact, we didn’t frolic at all. And when I’d craved the feel of running water and convinced myself to dip under the waterfall for a shower, the only possible consideration had been to get in and out as quickly as possible before I froze into an icicle.

After the heat of an intense bout of exercises, I’d seen Xeno without his shirt on before, but never up close like this. Even the few times we’d kissed, our clothes had remained on, too concerned we’d be discovered first by Zako and later by Malessa, who’d so vocally disapproved of our mingling beyond what my chores required.

Up close, he was one ripple of solid muscle after another, and tight all over. Brawny as all dragon shifters were, his muscles were bulkier than the fae’s.

Than Rush’s.

The comparison arrived unbidden, but then I couldn’t stop comparing the two men. Objectively, with his perfect strong body, chiseled fierce features, lush full lips, and piercing blue-green eyes, Xeno was a striking specimen by any reasonable standards.

Rush, however ... was somehow even more beautiful, more mesmerizing, wholly captivating. Icravedhim in a way I didn’t think I could ever crave the man at my side.

I felt my nostrils flare in annoyance at how easily Rush’s face and body coalesced in my memory, an unwelcome intrusion that still somehow bewitched me.

Xeno squeezed my hand, still atop his knee, and I discovered myself staring blankly at the general expanse of his chest, no longer seeing the man right before me.

“You didn’t hear a thing I said, did you?” he asked.

Ferociously, I huffed.Fucking Rush. “No, I didn’t, and I’m so sorry, Xeno. I really want to know how you’re doing—needto know, truly.” The fact that he was still cut up when his healing was so advanced indicated how badly he’d been injured.

Shoving Rush from my thoughts so hard the imaginary version of him stumbled on his way out, I patted Xeno’s hand atop mine, easing myself onto the log next to him and rubbing my neck some more, gazing toward Pru and Saffron, who continued to play together. No doubt, soon enough the dragonling would realize I was awake and whine to join me.

“I’m fine,” Xeno said.

I snorted. “You’renotfine or you wouldn’t have a scratch on you.”

“You’ve got scratches and cuts all over you,” he pointed out.

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