Page 84 of A House of Fangs & Deceit

“Waiting on you.”

Argh.

I eyed his dangling hand and took off at a run. This time, I waited until the last possible second and then pushed up off the ground with every ounce of strength I could muster.

My fingers brushed against his wrist, and his large hand locked onto my right forearm. After awkwardly swinging for another moment, and feeling like my arm was going to get wrenched out of its socket, I managed to grab onto his arm with my left hand.

Once Vail was confident my grip was secure, he started pulling me up. Holy shit, he was strong. He pulled me up like I weighed nothing at all. It was a little uncomfortable wiggling through the small opening, but we managed to get me out a lot easier than I thought.

“Thanks,” I mumbled, taking a step back as soon as my feet were on the ground.

Vail clearly didn’t like touching me or having me around, so the least I could do was not press him on it. Unless, of course, I lost my temper. Then rational thinking went right out the window.

Vail didn’t acknowledge my thanks and instead swiped the three obsidian pieces off the ground and headed over to the horses where he secured them in the saddlebags. I sighed and walked over to Zosa, who butted me gently with her head, and then I prepared myself for another silent ride back.

I hoped Rynn’s excursion had gone as smoothly as ours. Even if she didn’t find anything, I didn’t care as long as she made it back safely.

Without waiting for Vail, I spurred Zosa forward and headed home, to where hopefully Roth could provide us with some answers once they looked over what we had found.

Chapter Twenty

Alaric

“If you tapthat thing one more time, I’m going to stab you with it,” Roth said in a voice so calm that it took me a moment to register their threat.

I dropped the pencil that I’d been methodically drumming against the table, and it rolled before coming to a rest against a stack of scrolls.

“Sorry,” I grunted. “Just a little keyed up today.”

Roth glared at me for another second before returning their focus to the book in front of them.

The book had the symbol we’d been looking for, and they were working on translating the text now, but it took time. I was eager to look at it, but Roth was likely faster at translating than me, so I let them have it. Plus, I wasn’t ashamed to admit that Roth terrified me a little.

I couldn’t exactly explain why. Physically, they were no threat to me, but Roth was just so intense about everything. Plus, they used blood magic with ease more than any other person I’d ever met.

Sure, it was mostly to help them navigate around the library and be more productive with their research, but thoseribbons they had wrapped around their forearms could easily be used to restrain someone.

And I was pretty sure their enchanted quill could at the very least gouge out some eyes.

“Is it Samara who has you worried or Kieran?” they asked, not taking their eyes off the page they were reading.

The familiar thread of tension that formed every time Kieran left tugged a little. But now it felt like that thread was split in two, and I was trying very hard not to think about who was at the end of the second one.

“I’m always concerned about Kieran when he leaves House Harker,” I admitted. “But he travels fairly often to visit the other Houses and occasionally the Velesians. It doesn’t mean I don’t worry about him, but he’s traveling on well-known roads and stopping at outposts along the way.”

The Sovereign House was probably the safest place to be in all of Lunaria. Aside from the impressive blood wards, they had the highest number of rangers out of the Houses. Kieran would be fine… once he made it there.

Absently, I picked the pencil up and started to tap it before a growl rumbled out of Roth and I hastily put it down again. I glanced at the nearest window.

The sun hadn’t even started to set yet. There was plenty of time for Samara and Vail to make it back safely.

“And Samara?” Roth prompted.

I stared at the pencil, unsure how to answer that question. Samara confused the hell out of me, and I didn’t like it. It was why I always sniped at her in a desperate attempt to maintain some distance between us.

“Samara is the Heir of House Harker,” I hedged. “Her safety will always be of concern to me.”

That got Roth to raise their head and arch an eyebrow at me. “You are so full of shit.”

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