Days.
All that mattered was Holt.
Eventually his blood stilled, congealing on his neck and the stones beneath. The crystal necklace he always wore was tinged a deep red, almost black, from his lifeblood running down his chest.
I decided that, maybe, I would die there, too.
What’s the point. My father is dead. The town is occupied by rebels. My mentor lied to me. Ben is gone, most likely dead. We’re probably all going to die here, anyway.
Nothing was as it seemed anymore.
The sun rose higher in the sky before falling beneath the horizon, the stars and the moon coming out and a wolf howled somewhere in the night.
Still, I lay next to Holt. Memorizing his face, his deep-chocolate eyes. The way his laughter boomed, the way his eyes crinkled at the corners when he smiled. The way pride shone across his face whenever I puzzled through something. The way his arms felt around me. Like I was safe, like I was protected, like I was cherished, like I was wanted, like I wasloved.
They will pay, Holt. They will all pay.
The rebels for what they did to him. The blond man for not stepping in to stop the madness. The Warlord and his Mages for creating the conflict in the first place.
Eventually exhaustion overtook me, dragging my eyelids shut against my will and pulling me into a sleep full of terror, blood, and death.
Chapter 32
Lex
Iflexed my neck, twisting my head from one side to the other in an attempt to relieve the tension that started in time with our shift. Which, by my estimation, was nearly ten hours ago.
Almost time.
I breathed a sigh of relief at the idea that I only had two hours left in this ten-by-six box they called the “guard house.” I wasn’t even sure the purpose of it anymore, we hadn’t had an attack this far north in . . . a millennium? Longer?
Sasori would know.
My Vessel, or one of them, loved random “fun facts” about the history of the places we lived or visited. Before we were permanently stationed in Vespera with the majority of Lord d’Refan’s original Mage force, we traveled about, securing territories and cities for Lord d’Refan and searching for something—though we never actually toldwhat—and all the while Sasori would give Ilyas and me random tidbits about each place.
It was simultaneously annoying and endearing.
“Hey, Sasori,” I called, pushing back in my chair so the front two legs reached off the ground and I balanced on the back two.
“Hey, Lex,” she called back, her cat-shaped almond eyes on the cards in front of her. Ilyas and Sasori were playing one of the numerous card gamesthat they both insisted werestimulating. I hated cards. It was all luck with little strategy and not something that held my interest for long periods of time.
So I stared at the ceiling, or counted the bricks in the walls, or thought about fucking one or both of them, and they played cards.
“When was the last time this guard house was actually used as, you know, a guard house?”
“Really, Lex? You want her to spit random facts at us now? Once she starts you know she doesn’t stop,” Ilyas, my second Vessel, grumbled good-naturedly.
Sasori simply rolled her eyes at us. After seventeen years as a Bonded triad, we were more than acquainted with each other’s quirks and senses of humor.
“Well, if we’re speaking in technicalities, it’s in use right now.” Sasori threw down two of her cards and Ilyas thumped his head on the table with a dramatic groan.
“Why do you always win?” Ilyas’ grumble was almost inaudible as he threw his cards across the table at Sasori. She gathered them up with barely restrained glee, always more than happy to hand Ilyas his ass at cards. Her mind was as sharp as her cheekbones, and she flexed her intelligence often. Both Ilyas and I found it attractive. While neither of us were necessarily dumb, we also weren’t nearly as intelligent as Sasori. She grew up in Samyr, a Northern Allied Territory on the western coast, to a family of merchants, which allowed her an education most people couldn’t afford.
I lazily perused her body as she leaned across the table to gather the remainder of Ilyas’ cards. Her pin-straight raven-colored hair was tightly wound into two braids that reached her mid-back and they swayed each time her lithe, yet strong, frame reached for a card on the table. Her skin was a stunning milk-white that only grew paler during the winter. Her lips were constantly large and puffy, and I couldn’t help but think about them wrapped around my dick.
“But, if you’re asking historically, I guess the last time would have been back in the Sundering. Which was . . . about a millennia ago, give or take a few years.” Her voice, and answer to my mundane history question, brought me out of my unabashed staring, and I caught a slight smirk on Ilyas’ lips as if he knew my earlier thoughts.
“I knew it!” I thumped my chair back onto four legs, my smile triumphant.
