Page 88 of Stolen
I have one second to be crazily jealous, but Shade’s gaze is averted, and he already had that same whip of magic dress him in leather and armor.
His wings are back, too. Dark and powerful, and I know I should be afraid, but I’m not.
When he is wearing his true Demon form, Alaric looks like a dark angel.
Like a Fairy King or some dark pirate.
Magic and strength seem to wrap around his body like the cloak of a warlord.
The glyphs on his skin are everywhere now, and seem to glow brighter as he stalks forward.
“Myrrin,” he says, turning to me. “You’re safe here. Shade will stay with you.”
“Wait, what’s happening?” My voice cracks a little, and I hate it. I hate the sound of my own fear, brittle and raw. “Who are they? What exactly do the SoulTakers want? Are people going to die? Are you walking right into danger?”
His expression flickers.
Just for a second.
But it’s enough.
Anger. Regret. Worry. And something even deeper than that.
The need to protect.
It carves itself across his face before he pulls the mask back down, smoothing it into the composed, unreadable mask of the Lord of the Eyrie.
“I will not let them reach you,” he says, and his voice is iron wrapped in velvet. “They want fear. They want dreams. Souls to fuel their dark power. And they will get neither from the Eyrie.”
I push the covers off and swing my legs over the side of the bed, ignoring the fact that I’m still wearing this beautiful, but the gossamer-thin dress he conjured around me.
Lovely, but I’m usually a yoga pants and t-shirts kind of gal.
“I want to come with you. Maybe I can help.”
I don’t know how—shit, I don’t know anything except that the idea of him going out there alone makes my chest cave in.
“No, my viyella. You must remain in the keep.”
He moves to a large armoire that hadn’t even registered before.
It’s made of some kind of dark wood and I wonder if it’s sentient because it seems to open and close drawers before he touches it.
It’s carved with shifting glyphs that seem to glow faintly when he gets close, and inside them are all manner of things.
He waves his hands, and the two largest doors open, and inside I see shelves of glass vials, pouches, polished stones, and blades that shimmer with quiet menace.
The scent of sandalwood, smoke, and steel fills the air as he selects a few items with terrifying precision.
Powders. Oils. Tiny bottles that crackle faintly with static.
He attaches them to the belt now wrapped around his waist, sheathing a pair of wicked-looking knives at his back and slipping a longer curved blade across his chest.
He’s dressing for war.
And not just any war.
His kind of war.
