Page 31 of Gold & Shadow

“They’ll stop once we get moving,” I promised, adjusting the pack on his back and checking my daggers.

“I don’t mind it, Kjære,” he said gently, his eyes soft as he looked at me. “They’re very like you.”

“You take that back,” I demanded, trying not to smile as Orson chuffed a laugh. I was strangely glad he couldn’t shift right now. A feral part of me didn’t particularly like the idea of my mate getting naked anywhere near my sisters.

My mate. The words thunked into my heart like they had always been there, something missing that had been recovered. I swallowed.

“What’s wrong?” Orson asked, nudging me. “If you’re thinking what I hope you’re thinking, we definitely don’t have time for it now. I’d also be far too big for you as a bear.”

“You beast,” I said, giving him an exasperated look.

“I’myourbeast,“ he corrected, his breath warm on my face. “Don’t leave me alone with your sisters, Kjære. I won’t remember myself. Izzy will skin me if I eat them.”

“I’ve got you,” I promised, stroking his muzzle and kissing his nose. “You’d make a terrible rug, anyway.”

I turned away from him, motioning to my sisters to join us. “I’ll keep us wrapped in shadows until we arrive at the offices,” I said, reviewing the plan we had made to make sure we missed nothing. “Sera, you’ll disguise us to look like the guards when we are inside, and Mora, you’ll wipe the memories of anyone who sees us.”

“This plan feels overkill,” Sera drawled, toying with her own dagger. Izzy had made sure all of us learned to use them when we began taking on criminal work, just in case our magic ever failed us. She was the best, having been taught the longest by Father, but all of us had a knack for daggers.

They were extremely effective when thrown by shadows, and I kept several on me when I worked.

“Better prepared than dead,” I said, earning a shrug from my petulant younger sister. “If anything goes wrong, the two of you use your magic to get out of there,” I added, looking between the twins. “No reckless heroics.”

“I think your bear is the one who should be getting this lecture,” Mora said, giving me a knowing look.

I scowled. “This was a mistake.”

“Oh, lighten up, Lis,” Sera hissed. “We’re Nightshades. We’ll besuperprofessional.”

“Famous last words,” Orson growled, his muzzle twitching suspiciously. “Let’s go.”

Chapter 16

Victor’s building was in a wealthy part of town, all the houses and businesses respectably shuttered for the night. The antiques shop, which served as the front for his illegal collection of artifacts, was dark and locked, but light in the windows in the two floors above told me he was there.

Dark dealings were best done at night, after all.

The streets were dark and slushy with trampled snow, although they would probably be white again by morning. Therewas no guard at the front door, as such a thing would look too suspicious, but I was sure we would encounter one at the door to the back room and stairs when we entered, so I kept the shadows around us for as long as possible.

“Sera,” I hissed, spearing out a shadow to begin working on the lock. “I need you to make us blend in when we go inside. A blob of shadows moving around will be just as conspicuous as all of us without a disguise.”

“On it,” Sera hissed, moving her hand delicately as she wrapped the illusion around us. She had tried to explain it to me once, the process of bending light to show what she wanted seen, but I couldn’t really understand it. In a way, it sounded like the opposite of what I did, dispersing the light to cloak us in darkness.

I kept my hand on Orson’s neck, afraid he might go full-bear if I lost contact with him.

A click told me that my shadows had freed the lock mechanism, and I gently pulled the door open, wincing when a bell announced our presence,

“Who’s there?” shouted a male voice from the darkness,

Fuck, we’d already been noticed and it had been less than ten seconds.

“Mora,” I hissed.

“We need to get closer for me to wipe his memory,” she hissed back. “Sera, move the illusion with us.”

“I hear you whispering,” called the voice, sounding fearful now as a guard moved toward the seemingly empty doorway. Sera was a good illusionweaver. I knew we were completely hidden. “Come out now!”

Mora reached out when the guard got near enough, gripping his wrist tightly and whispering under her breath. The guard’s face went slack.