Page 24 of The Shadow Fae Rhapsody
“Oh gods!”
The lethal inferno spreads, wiping out everything in its path. Heat fills every particle, every space between them as it blazes through the tunnel.
I lay myself on top of Shade to cover him since he has no protective barrier. Hopefully the assassin’s Grimsbane attire can shield him from this fury of hell. One second I hear the shrieking of hundreds of those dark beasts, the next nothing. Still the fire burns, like the wrath of an angry god.
When it finally smothers, I tilt my head up, opening my eyes. Embers float around us kissing my skin. They would have burned me if it weren’t for this swirling shadow, faithfully protecting me to the very end. I can hardly inhale a single breath. The air is too hot, sizzling. Each breath sends fire scorching through my lungs.
I run my hands over my body. Everything is intact but my throat feels raw, parched.
Water in the sewer route below hisses with a steam. It’s completely dried out. The rat demons—beast, every one of them has perished into nothingness.
A man stands amidst the ashes and smoke. Unconquerable and eternally powerful.
I take in a shaky breath. “Svenn…?”
The vampire turns to my voice. Just a glimpse of him and my heart sparks to life.
“Hello there, I was hoping to see you,” the sorcerer greets him. That merry, high-pitched tone is stained with success and triumph despite the death of his rat creatures. Dread coils in me at the possibility that this is a trap. Maybe his plan was always to get Svenn here.
“I welcome you fellow shadow tamer. We share the same power, for I too have killed a Yseldral in the past—”
Svenn walks past the eyeball to kneel at my side. The darkness in his eyes lightens and I see the relief coloring his features. “There you are, sweetheart.”
He pulls me close and I gasp. I lean into his steadying warmth and inhale his cool, ocean breeze scent deep into my lungs. His arm slips around me, stroking my hair over and over. I like it here.
It’s so safe.
I listen to the pounding in his chest, the beating in there is almost as loud as mine. Just as I am about to memorize the melody of that beat, he pulls away. He snatches my chin and tilts my face, forcing me to look at him.
Heat burns my cheeks, hotter than the flames from earlier. I love the attention. I love it when he touches my hair. I love it when he touches me everywhere.
Svenn strokes my bruised arm with his knuckles. “What’s this?”
“It’s just a graze,” I dismiss quickly so he will keep touching me.
Hug me again. Hug me again.
“They hurt you?” he asks. His voice is unruffled but his eyes scream violence and chaos.
“No—”
“That thing… tried to kill your wife,” Shade coughs out with the last remnants of his consciousness.
Svenn lowers his gaze to the assassin beside me as if he had just noticed the Grimsbane’s presence. When those smoldering dark eyes lift again, I see the danger in them.
The eyes of a true predator.
Some primal part of me, the survival instinct that has helped me survived Astefar, tells me to run and hide.
I freeze when he rises to his imposing height.
“There is no place for you among the elves.” The chilling voice of the sorcerer assaults my ear. “Leave those lesser beings and join us.”
The eyeball goes as still as death the moment Svenn arrives in front of it. I see the reflection of my husband’s handsome features on the gleaming watery surface.
“I shall grant you powers beyond your imagining,” the sorcerer pledges in the same lark and light-hearted tone.
Svenn’s expression remains unreadable. I can’t tell if he is angry or curious.
