Page 20 of Rules of Stone
Igasp. My body, trembling in anticipation of the release Tye’s deft fingers teased to the surface so skillfully, recoils at the abrupt change.
River’s ire saturates the air, overpowering the forest’s fresh scent. Sheer masculine dominance in each contour of his muscular body, his movements vibrate with a restrained violence that—despite my wishes—stokes my anxiety and arousal in equal measure. I focus on the chill breeze to clear my foggy mind. River is angry, yes, but it is a kind of fury I’d imagine the male reserves for an invading host from the dark realm, not a stray student snogging in the darkness. As it is, the intensity in River’s gray gaze is so potent, his eyes seem to glow with it.
A few paces away, Coal stands with his arms crossed over his chest.
I’ve been here before, between an angry River and glaring Coal, and a contrite Tye. But as familiar as it is—as they are—the alien coldness in their eyes is a harsh reality.
Tye shifts his weight, placing himself in the line of fire between River and me, but I need not look at River again to know there will be no reprieve. For whatever reason, the male’s attention is locked on me alone, and only I can decide whether to answer the challenge or crumple beneath it.
My chin rises. My breaths, rapid after Tye’s deft touch, escape in small puffs of steam. Meeting River’s eyes, I match him glare for glare as his command of the forested alcove, the Academy, the very air around us ripples out with absolute certainty. His command of everything—except me.
Crossing the two paces between us, River pushes Tye aside to grab my chin between thumb and forefinger. The movement sings with the self-confidence of the king River doesn’t remember he is. The veil amulet might confuse the memories, but it plainly leaves the essence of soul and experience intact. Except River’s soul now finds mine a stranger.
I pull back.
“Stand still, Cadet.” River injects the entire ocean of difference between our statuses into those three words. “I inquired what you are doing here—in explicit violation of the rules—one day after your arrival.”
“I brought her here, sir,” Tye drawls with just enough impertinence to give River no choice but to turn some of his wrath toward the male. Once assured of River’s attention, Tye pulls his shoulders back farther, raising his head in a gesture that exposes his neck more than offers a challenge. “Leralynn is an attractive woman, and I had hoped the spice of…the forbidden forest might give me the advantage I need to secure her affections. Or at least her consent.”
“It is fortunate that that spice also enticed the young woman in question to bring a sword.” Stepping out of the woods, Shade surveys the four of us. The male’s yellow eyes are so familiar that I can’t help but hold my breath in anticipation of recognition, of his long arms wrapping around my body, cocooning me in their tender warmth.
A kernel of hope rises inside me. We are a quint, strongest when together. Now that the five of us are so close…
Shade’s yellow eyes trace the outline of my body before focusing on my face. His full lips open. Shut. Shaking himself, he drags his gaze back toward River. “I think I found at least one of our wild beasts. And before you ask, there won’t be time to get Tyelor and his…companion…back behind the wall. The wind’s been carrying our scent to it, not the other way around. Anyone with a weapon should pull it now.”
I draw my sword. In my side vision, Coal nods approvingly, reaching down into his boot to toss a knife to Tye—the only one of us still unarmed. I feel the twin to Coal’s knife in my own boot, my hands aching to draw it. But I fight better with one weapon, and whatever is coming already has Shade bringing his blade to ready guard.
The trees rustle, and a familiar snort-like breathing now reaches my ears. A few moments later, not even our upwind position can mask the stench-filled calling card of the dark realm’s rodent—not that the males remember how to interpret the smell. I brace myself for the sclices, but when three dark shapes leap at us from the darkness, I find myself unable to focus, my gaze sliding off the shapes as if trying to grip grease.
Tye stumbles beside me, blood flowing from his shoulder as he shoves a shape away. A heartbeat later, a blow I don’t see coming knocks me flat onto the earth, droplets of yellow saliva streaking across my face.
I kick away the shape I can’t focus on. It yields. The sclice is lighter than I’m used to. Certainly smaller than the one who tagged my ribs back in Slait. For a heartbeat, I see the rodent before me—a scrawny elongated hog beast with a too-large lower jaw even by sclice standards. Then the heartbeat is gone, my gaze skidding away from the dark shape as the amulet around my neck heats, scalding my skin.
Stars.I freeze halfway to my feet. The veil amulet. The bloody amulet that I can’t take off in front of anyone here, lest they haul me to a prison cell or worse. Leralynn of Osprey, the human, does not see the sclices—but Lera of Lunos sees them just fine.
19
Lera
River grabs my waist, pushing me behind him as he crouches into a fighting stance.
“Don’t trust your eyes,” Coal orders, his voice low and level and so calm that I’d never think him playing with death if I wasn’t looking at it now. His eyes closed, cheekbones and jaw sharp in the moonlight, Coal dances with his sword, the pattern making the most of his prowess and immortal senses.“The beasts play tricks with the darkness.”
The beasts play tricks with your mind.
Still in front of me, River crouches, his head cocked in concentration before he strikes with his sword and dark blood spills onto the ground, the stench of it enough to make me gag. Now that I know what I should be looking at, I can make out the shapes again. Three snarling sclices with vertical-slitted eyes and back-hinged knees and too-long front limbs—all familiar, yet off. The one River just wounded is too tall but scrawny, while the one about to fall to Coal’s sword has so many fangs that its mouth looks to be permanently hinged open. My head pulses with the effort of watching them against the insistence of my amulet that I look away. The moment I relax my concentration, my gaze slips. It is as if these perverted versions of sclices have a crude veil of their own and the only reason my fae self can see them is because I already know what they are.
Branches crack behind me, the sounds as loud as thunder in the darkness. I jerk around so quickly that the earth sways, my mind groping for the slipping focus, without which I see nothing of the sclices.Too long.I’ve waited too long to strike, making myself vulnerable.I give up straining my mind in favor of swinging my sword in a full wide circle.
I hit only air.
My stomach squeezes, my hands white-knuckled around my sword. The sclice is close. So very close. My heart races. I swing again. Blindly. Wildly. Losing my footing for lack of contact.
As I stumble, a hog’s rancid breath brushes the back of my neck.
Before I can scream, a great wolf leaps from the woods, his yellow eyes flashing as he throws himself onto the shape behind me. Gray fur and darkness roll, dragging one another back into the forest’s shadows.
“Shade!” I call after him, my voice cracking from my too-dry mouth.
