“It’s not my fault you haven’t been training her right.” His smile was a dangerous weapon, and he wielded it with deadly accuracy. My nails bit into my palms as I curled my hands into tight fists. Again, I was struck by the level of fury surging through my limbs. It was mine, and yet... I closed my eyes for a moment, and the heartbond burned through my consciousness, shimmering gold and sturdy as always, but this time, it felt stronger. A little tighter. I could still sense a wall at Rorik’s end, but it felt weaker somehow. Fucking fantastic. Our control was slipping. Again. Slowly, I opened my eyes, but Rorik wasn’t looking at me anymore. He was scowling at Lydia.
“You’re absolutely correct,” she said with a perilous grin of her own. “If you would be intimate with her instead of aWaterstone...” She took a step toward Rorik, and I watched in fascination as her glamour rippled away to reveal her bestial features. I’d never seen them before. At the silver fete, the most she’d shown were pointed teeth and ears, but this Lydia was fearsome. Iridescent scales rippled down her cheekbones and along her neck, even coating the length of her arms. Her fangs protruded past her lips, and her eyes took on the reflective sheen of a cat. Scaled wings exploded from her back and stretched wide, and the earth at her feet bloomed into hundreds of tiny white flowers. The air sang with her magic, and a fresh, floral aroma filled my senses.
Rorik’s magic, as sharp as the summer sun, flared in response. “Careful, Lydia.”
“I can do incredible things, but I cannot teach someone how to access magic from their heartbond when their partner refuses to share.” Even the shape of her words seemed to change, elongating as if on the tail end of a hiss. She glanced past him to the quickly fading form of Ossanna. “Or perhaps you regret your decision?”
Rorik didn’t even bother with his own glamour. His hard tone was warning enough. “You wouldn’t understand.”
“Just leave us alone,” I said through clenched teeth.
“I tried, Edira. You’re the one who came crawling back here.” He rounded his glare on me, and his sinister grin revealed the tips of his fangs. “I thought I taught you how to run.”
Anger snapped in me. One moment I was thinking clearly, suppressing the bubbling mess of emotions threatening to explode, and the next I was lunging. I thought of nothing except hitting that damn face of his and hopefully taking a few teeth with me. His eyes widened as I moved, and while I still missed, he barely had a chance to shift to the side before I went sailing past him. His dark laugh rumbled from somewhere in his chest as he rolled his neck from side to side.
“Go inside, Lydia. I’ll take it from here.”
Lydia’s gaze shifted from him to me. All I could do was grimace, and my fists trembled by my sides. A dull ringing was pounding in my ears. She watched me for a long moment when mischief sparked through her eyes. With an easy flick of her wrist, her glamour fell back into place, and she left without another word.
“Come on, Edira.” Rorik beckoned to me with the slightest curl of his fingers and a wicked smirk. “Let’s see if you remember anything I taught you.”
Everything in me demanded I take the bait, but I forced myself to hold steady. My eyes tore apart every tense muscle in his body. “You haven’t changed a bit.”
“Did you want me to?” He cocked his head to the side. “I’ve always been exactly what I said I was. Nothing more, nothing less. Tell me, why are you so angry?”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Heat colored my words, and I stepped toward him. He didn’t retreat. “I’m furious that after everything I’ve done for you and your family, you won’t help me.”
“I am trying to help you,” he growled.
“Really? I must have missed that,” I hissed. “Because the only person I see you spending any time with is Ossanna, and she’s not the one trying to save you.”
An emotion I couldn’t name flashed in his eyes, but I felt its heat down the heartbond. “You shouldn’t be jealous of her.”
“You knownothingabout what I feel.”
“That’s right. I suppose I wasn’t privy to your innermost desires like my darling deceased brother was.”
Indignation roared through me, and I lost all semblance of control. I launched myself at Rorik. I knew he’d expect me to come at him again, so rather than aim a punch at his face, I simply threw my entire body into his center. He wasn’t prepared for me to wrap around him, and I took us both tumbling to the ground. His head smacked against the earth, and he let out an audible grunt as I pinned him beneath my weight. Shock made him slow to react as he blinked up at me. Pressing my thighs tight on either side of his hips, I sat on top of him and threw punch after punch against his chest.
His ribs shuddered beneath me, and I thought I was finally,finally,doing some sort of damage to his precious ego, when I realized that rumbling was nothing more than a laugh.
“Edira—”
“Shut up!” I screamed.
He caught my wrists midair and snared them in his hands. Then, with one obnoxiously fluid move, he flipped us so my back was pinned to the earth and he was poised above me. With ease, he pressed my wrists to the ground above my head. My chest heaved uselessly as I writhed beneath him, and a dangerous, tantalizing heat filled his stare.
“Stop it,” he murmured.
His breath was warm against my neck, and gooseflesh rippled across my skin. A sudden awareness clicked in my mind and doused the fire raging through my veins. All I could see was his broad chest and the exposed length of his neck. All I could feel were his hips pressing down against mine and the delicious pressure of my hands bound by his above my head. Heat flared in my cheeks, and I swallowed.
He watched it all. “I’m going to let go now.”
All I could do was nod.
Slowly, he released my hands and then shifted off me. I hated how much I immediately missed the weight of his body.
“Sorry.”
