“Lycanthropes,” he corrected.
Controlling the eye roll, I said, “Thelycanthropesyou want to release.”
“That’s not the question you want to ask, is it, little minx?”
His smile bared the edges of his teeth, reminding me that they could shift to fangs—and were as dangerous as vampire fangs. Heat wisped over the spot on my neck where he’d tested them.
He turned to face me, his shoulder nearly brushing mine. “I’m not easily swayed by a beautiful woman or evasivequestions. Be direct with me. I value that far more than I ever will manipulation.”
I held his unrelenting gaze. “I’m not trying to manipulate you. It would be in our best interest to trust each other, but you only offer tidbits of information about things you believe I need to know. Trusting you is very difficult when you do that.” It felt like each step we took toward getting to know each other and him opening up, he’d take ten hops away. “I want to know about the war, Goddess Annessa, the lycanthropes, and your realm. I want to know it all. No detail is too insignificant.”
Especially any information about the goddess who, at the very mention of her name, caused so much wistful sorrow.
I couldn’t be the only one hearing the breathiness of my words. Cirrian was beautiful from afar. He was breathtaking this close up. His immersive amber eyes were increasingly hard to hold, but averting mine from them was just as difficult. I was drawn to him, and his magic, which was simultaneously turbulent and comforting. Logic should have pricked at my protective instincts, urging me to retreat, but logic had taken a hiatus. I wanted to be closer. Needed to be closer. Take in all aspects of him and his magic. Wield it. Own it. Become one with it and him. I questioned if my desire was from the symbiotic relationship between our magic. Even when I didn’t have full access to mine, did it see him as kindred?
I caught myself slowly leaning into him. With great effort, I snatched my gaze from his. They dropped to his lips—his alluring lips. Inviting. Tantalizing.
I surrendered to temptation, crushing my mouth against his with a ferocity that surprised us both. His tongue invaded, tasting of wine and desire as he pressed me back onto the sofa. Arching beneath him, my thighs instinctively parted as his weight settled between them. Pressing closer to his hardness, I was desperate to feel more of him.
His lips were velvet heat devouring mine. Each deliberate stroke of his tongue sent heat racing through me. A moan escaped me when he caught my lower lip between his teeth. His eyes locked with mine. Wells of amber fire. Dark, commanding, promising pleasure I feared and craved.
Cirrian’s fingers dug into my shirt, then slipped beneath, caressing my skin. I gasped at the contact, my body responding with shameless need. I twisted my fingers through his hair, yanking him closer, desperate to consume more of him. Magic crackled around us. Tendrils of magic swirled around me, caressing my exposed skin with phantom touches, intensifying every sensation. Heat blazed between my legs where he was nestled.
My body wanted more, but reason prevailed. Ending our kiss. Our gentle pants filled the room. He shifted, giving me space to slide out from under him. My body raged against the denial of pleasure, and there was no way to hide it. I stood, and so did he. His smirk felt like a taunt and a challenge that I ignored. As I straightened my clothes, I looked around the room, giving myself a reminder of where we were. Diehle’s home. The residence of a demon Cirrian had killed. His morbid fate resurfaced along with the many facets of Cirrian that I couldn’t ignore.
He’d closed the distance I’d put between us. His fingers languidly traced along my jaw and ended at my chin, lifting it to meet his eyes. His amber eyes had darkened; the hunter-green coloring around them deepened. His pupils were still dilated with desire.
“Tell me about Goddess Annessa and the war,” I pressed.
The question, like frigid water, cooled any heat between us.
“Very well, Kara.” Releasing my chin, he rested his forehead against mine. Slowly, he lifted his hand to my face, his thumb stroking my cheek with surprising tenderness. “She was theruler of Gyaneth. We had been together for nearly eighty years. I loved her and”—pain flickered across his features—“she loved me, too. But not more than the people of her land—the lycans.”
He sighed. “She had a mild temper but could be driven to anger when it came to the lycanthropes. She protected them at all costs.” His lips beveled to a hard frown. “She remained neutral during many of the conflicts we were involved in. And she would have done the same in the conflict between us and the draveths. She never would have allowed them to enter the war if I hadn’t requested that of her. It was a conflict we couldn’t afford to lose, because the draveths had acquired magic over the centuries, omni-magic. Magic like yours. We would have lost our advantage, and no realm would have been safe from them. Not even this one. The lycans entering the conflict did something to Annessa. She despised the violence and cruelty her people needed to unleash to help us defeat them.”
He dropped onto the sofa, turning away from me to look at the collection of books he’d set aside. He didn’t move fast enough for me to miss the helplessness in his face. “We expelled the draveths from our realm. Their final act of cruelty and rebellion was performing their own nefarious spell. I thought it was a counterspell to prevent their exile, until the lycans around us disappeared. Every last one of them.”
His hand washed over his face. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a fragmented piece of mica. “Annessa’s connection to them helped us find the realm where they were imprisoned. It took years. None of our magic worked to free them. The inability to release them gradually destroyed her. I couldn’t do anything about it.” Cirrian’s gaze drifted away, lost in memories.
“She blamed you?” From his pained expression, I knew the answer.
“Her sorrow became my prison. It was unbearable watching a deity with such immense power reduced to powerlessness. Ibelieved part of her blamed us for their imprisonment.” His voice dropped to a desperate whisper. “She accused me of pushing for violence when diplomacy would have sufficed. I argued that diplomacy always fails when the ultimate goal is power. And I accused her of weakness.”
A bitter smile twisted his lips. “The irony is that in her absence, because of my efforts to free the lycanthropes, I became what she’d feared—ruthless when necessary.”
I waited for more, but he seemed hesitant to continue. “You believe she chose to leave her land because she couldn’t release the lycanthropes?”
He shook his head. “No. I believe she left to search for a way to free them and—” His lips pressed into a rigid line as if he was fending off the worddied.
I felt I understood his sorrow and determination. It wasn’t just that he wanted to release his friends, he also needed to succeed where his lost love had failed.
Turning to the books, I stacked the four he’d chosen that contained spells he believed would work and returned the ones that were of no use to the bookcase. “Where do you want to start?” I asked.
He looked through the books again and put one aside. “I can’t guarantee you’d survive this one,” he admitted. I didn’t bother looking over the book in the unfamiliar language and tried not to dwell on the fact that the spell was ever an option for him.
Picking up another book, he scanned over the spell before his eyes lifted to meet mine. “This one won’t be comfortable. I don’t believe it will be painful. It will unbind you from all magic that isn’t yours.” He frowned at the words. I really wished I knew what they said although it was probably better I didn’t. “Rather than a surgical extraction, it will be a blunt demolition of dissimilar magic. Any remnants of your protective spell as well, since I don’t believe that was part of your magic.” It seemedlike we possessed the same curiosity about the protective spell that had saved me from the draveth.
“How do you want to proceed?” he asked. Moving closer to him, my fingers brushed over the script, as if touching it would invoke some language translation.
