Page 30 of A Dance With Fire
Clay smirked. “How you feeling, old man?” He clapped his hand against Uric’s shoulder. He felt frail and wrinkled. It was a rare sight to see an old Fae. Old as in wrinkled with age. The truth was, Fae were immortal, so every time Clay saw Uric with imperfections on his skin, he snorted out his laughter. “The arthritis treating you okay?”
Uric flipped him a vulgar gesture and wobbled away after Valerio and Ryker, who were already storming through the cluster of trees and towards the rundown safe house beyond.
The Resistance, as Clay liked to call it, much to everyone’s annoyance, had safe houses scattered throughout all of Illyk. In the human lands, at least.
It was too dangerous to travel across the Ley Line that separated human soil from what had once been the Tir na Faie. What once had been thriving, magical lands were nothing but desolate, dangerous grounds now which the Fae avoided at all costs.
They instead hid out as much as they could. In human safe houses, their numbers depleting thanks to the tyrant Emperor of Illyk.
It was the Resistance who helped find Fae of all kinds and protected them from the emperor’s soldiers. Without the Resistance, the Fae would surely perish.
Clay swaggered after his friends in confident steps, untying the deplorable, smelly cloak as he went. He hated wearing the damn thing, but it was necessary on stealth missions like the one they’d just gone on. It was imperative that they hide their identities. The more the humans knew of them, the more danger they were in.
They already had Prince Valerio’s mug slashed all over WANTED posters as a result of an incident thathadn’tbeen Clay’s fault.
He would deny culpability until he drew his last breath, no matter what anyone else said.
The little cabin was sequestered in the woods. A broken-down thing with a shabby roof and broken-down door, vines clung up the sides of it, wrapping around the rotting wood like a lover’s caress. It was scarcely inhabited at the moment, with only a few members of the Resistance and Fae they’d saved in the past month. They would move locations soon, and he knew even now they were all getting ready.
Valerio stepped up to the door and knocked a four-note pattern that had it opening to him immediately. It was their secret code.
Valerio strode through first and Ryker followed, the giant mammoth of a man growling for the blacksmith as he strode inside. The cat that had been perched on his shoulder jumped down and disappeared down a hallway. Uric left; not to rest, but to follow Ryker, and so Clay did the same.
He couldn’t hold back his curiosity.
It wasn’t every day they rescued a beautiful woman from the clutches of humans, and at a temple no less. Even rarer for her to be an Elemental Fae like Davina had claimed she was.
Of course, they had yet to see her power when she was bound in iron, but the blacksmith could get that off of her quickly.
Ryker went into one of the few rooms he used as an infirmary. It smelt moldy, making Clay wrinkle his nose upon entering, but that couldn’t be helped.
It wasn’t as if they had many options lately. They couldn’t stroll up to a hostel out in Dana and demand their best room to allow her to rest.
Still, Clay winced as Ryker gently lowered the Fire Dancer to a thin, torn up pallet on the ground. The chains clanked as they fell into a pile on the ground. When Ryker stood back up, it was to unclasp the cloak from his body and toss it into the corner.
The four of them, Valerio, Ryker, Uric, and Clay surrounded her. Clay cocked his head to the side, a smirk on his mouth. “She’s kinda pretty.”
Valerio scoffed without humor. “Mana’s sake, Clay. Have you no shame? She’s fainted.”
“Yeah, at least wait until she wakes up before you shower her with your infamous charm,” Uric added.
Clay shrugged. “Hey, it’s not my fault women flock to me.” And he didn’t doubt that she would too. He knew very well what he looked like; more handsome than this sorry lot, at least. Although Prince Valerio did rival him in beauty, no one really looked twice at the Prince of Seelie because he wore such a grave expression all the time that frightened them.
Clay, however, exuded sex and charm.
He’d caught the way this Fae had looked at him when she realized his beauty wasn’t glamor.
Every woman looked at him like that. He relished in it, honestly.
“Where’s the fucking blacksmith?” Ryker growled. “I can’t heal her with all that iron…”
Huh. That was the most Ryker had spoken today.
“Someone’s already gone to fetch him, don’t worry.”
On cue, the softest knock came on the walls. They turned and the blacksmith entered. The little human man looked nervously around the room until his eyes settled on the Fire Dancer, his expressive eyes taking in the manacles on her hands.
“So?” Valerio asked imperiously, causing the blacksmith to flinch. “Can you do it or not?” He didn’t even have to ask what it was he wanted. The answer was obvious.
