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“No,” he replied with icy chill. Gwen heard it but didn’t believe him. She was beginning to suspect Sirus’s default mood was foul. Or grumpy, at the very least.
“You’ve had trouble with the daemons?” he said.
Did he say daemons?
“Tongues have been wagging, I see,” Levian replied with a sneer. She shrugged a single shoulder. “It’s not as bad as the gossips would have you think,” she told him. A devilish grin crept over her lush lips. “Carvatticus’s horns will grow back, after all.”
What that implied, Gwen had no clue, but it made her knees wobble. She fought the urge to clutch onto Sirus again.
“As it is,” the woman went on, “I thought it best to go on a bit of a holiday. I’ve no home in London and thought I’d make use of this one since Barith never does.” She looked appraisingly back at the house before refocusing on Sirus. “Until now…” Her eyes narrowed. “Pray tell, what has dragged you and that odious fire lizard out of the woods and all the way to London?”
“How long have you been here?” Sirus pressed, ignoring her question.
Nothing about his tone gave any indication that he and Levian were friends. Gwen wasn’t entirely sure what to make of it, or their relationship. She felt very much like a mouse hanging around a pack of wolves. In other words, far, far out of her depths.
Levian managed a strained smile. “So much for pleasantries,” she drawled.
It was only then that the woman bothered to glance in Gwen’s direction. The moment their eyes met, those violet irises flared, and a little shock spread over Gwen’s skin like a chill of static. It was extremely unsettling.
“And who might this delightful little kitten be?” Levian asked with focused interest.
“Uh—” Gwen liked it better when she was being ignored.
“This is Gwendolyn,” Sirus replied. “She is?—”
“Lovely,” Levian finished for him with a curious little smile. Gwen shifted uncomfortably.
“She’s under my protection,” he stated firmly. Gwen flushed at the forcefulness of his tone. It was like he was claiming her. A swarm of butterflies fluttered through her stomach.
The woman’s eyes widened slightly. “Is that so?” She glanced at Gwen with even more curiosity. “Well, it’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Gwendolyn.”
“Uh, hi,” she managed to croak, forcing herself to step out of Sirus’s shadow. “It’s—uh—nice to meet you.”
Levian smirked, as if she didn’t believe her at all, and turned her sharp focus back to Sirus. “I assume there’s some grand reason as to why you’ve found yourselves here, but there’s no need to keep poor Gwendolyn, or me, out in this chill. That, and I am in desperate need of a latte.” She eyed Gwen one last time with a questioning little grin, then turned with a flourish and sauntered back toward the house.
Gwen just stood there for a moment. Dumbstruck. Watching Levian glide over the lawn, then the terrace, until she’d vanished back inside. It was like watching a leaf float in a calm breeze.
“Come,” Sirus said, startling her out of her delirium. “Levian is right. The air is cold.”
It wasn’t until he said it that Gwen realized she was chilled to the bone and shivering so violently her teeth chattered. Though it seemed less to do with the cold air and more to do with everything else. These last few hours had pushed her nervous system to the edge.
Sirus moved, and Gwen shuffled after him. “Why do her eyes…” She struggled to find the words to describe it.
“She is part fae,” he explained as she caught up to him, trying not to trip on a tangle of weeds. “And a mage.”
Gwen stopped and blinked, the gears in her head moving at a snail’s pace under the weight of everything. “Like, she’s a faerie—and a wizard?”
He stopped when she did and looked back at her over his shoulder. That single look made her squirm. “Yes.”
Right. She was already hanging out with vampires and dragons, why not throw a faerie into the mix? “So you all—you’re friends?” she probed further.
“We’ve known each other for many years,” he replied flatly.
Gwen scowled. So, not friends? She also wasn’t entirely sure she liked the way he said “many.” As if it meant a lot more than a few. Possibly even more than a few decades. She swallowed, trying to pull herself together. Levian’s appearance had startled her out of her spiral of shock, but now it was creeping back up on her.
They were alone, she realized suddenly. For the first time since her apartment, when she’d first found Sirus standing in the shadows. For a moment, Gwen struggled to catch her breath as she remembered her body pressed against his. His demeanor was as cold as ice, but his body had been startlingly warm…and very, very solid.
She’s under my protection. A rush of heat spread over her cheeks. No one had ever claimed her before. It was absurd, of course. Archaic. It still made her insides turn all gooey. She shook her head, trying to clear her thoughts and focus. Gwen couldn’t totally believe it. That he was real. Yet there he stood, all tall and dark and gorgeous. “I just need—a minute,” she muttered.
