Page 110 of Claimed By Fangs and Darkness
Fuck.
Time was up. My usually sharp mind was scrambled when I needed it most.
Storming the place would put Evie in danger. I would only pull that move if it were obvious she was already in peril.
And itwasn’tobvious. What had happened wasn’t clear at all.
I stared at the front gate, glamoured by shadow. It was three minutes past her deadline. At five, I’d write to Harmony.
I said every prayer and curse in my vocabulary.
A shaky breath left my lungs.
Evie was moving closer. I could feel it through the bond, even if I couldn’t see her yet.
I slipped the journal and pen back into my pocket.
The gate opened, and I finally saw her. Aster touched her hand, and darkness bled from my shaking form. Evie frowned as she pulled away from him, her body language clearly indicating discomfort. Not that Aster gave a fuck.
A bandage was wrapped around one hand, a book of some sort in the other.
The guards let her pass through the gate. The moment she left my line of sight, I moved quickly to meet her.
When Evie took off running, my heart ached with hers, knowing it was a clear response to resurfaced trauma. I let her move the way her body needed to move as I tracked her.
I let her crumble and flood the earth with her tears.
And when I could sense that she was out of air, heaving and hurting and needing to return to safety, I appeared before her.
My glamour dropped. I stood, masked, as shadows circled.
Evie immediately ran into my arms. Worse than the scent of her fear was the lingering scent of fresh blood.
I pulled back even as Evie clung to me. I scanned her body quickly.
“I—broke a glass,” Evie gasped. Her face was streaked with tears, and her lower lip trembled. “I’m okay. But I broke a glass, and I cut myself.”
She was okay. My angel was okay.
I studied her again. But when she melted back into my chest and clung there, I gave up entirely. I held her tight and kissed the top of her head.
The book she was holding pressed up against my back. When we finally parted again, I reached for it.
Evie shrunk, as if with shame.
“Tales of Aracynthia,” I read.
It was an ancient book of bedtime stories. They were a touch dark, recommended for older kids. Most involved stories of faeries and portals to other realms, the unseen becoming seen, myth bleeding into reality. Classic Evie themes.
I looked down at her red, tear-stricken cheeks.
“It was a book I stole when Mama took me into Florimell to help her shop,” Evie said, her voice quivering. “Hewas there, apparently, when I was seven or maybe eight. Mama destroyed the book and punished me for taking it. I didn’t know that he’d seen me so young, that he knew much about me at all.”
Anger was its own current, and I was grateful for my mask now as I stared down at Evie. It concealed the curl of my lip and monstrous rage in my eyes from her.
“I don’t remember much of anything,” she said softly. “I didn’t know I conjured storms as a child. I didn’t know that they were?—”
The words melted away as Evie grew less and less rooted to reality. She shuddered, and I sensed her immediate blood pressure drop.
