Page 40 of A Sword of Ice
“They’re alive. Small, but alive.” The fire Fae’s cheeks were bright, golden-brown skin darkening to a reddish hue.
“Okay, is that supposed to mean something to me?” She didn’t want to admit to these strangers that it did. A majority of her life, she’d fought with the Resistance to take her home back. They’d lost, and it was one of the darkest days of her life, to watch everything she loved fall to the hands of greed and selfishness.
Now this fire Fae was here, telling her that what she’d said goodbye to so long ago was alive?
Her first instinct was to pick up a sword and fight at their side again.
But she eyed their uniforms warily. What were a couple of Fae doing wearing the emperor’s colors?
“It’s a long story,” Shula said, as if reading her mind, shuffling from one foot to another. It was a shy, vulnerable gesture, so quick and gone in a flash before she steeled her spine, matching Iona’s defensive stance. “The point is, you’re an Elemental, and the Resistance needs your help.”
Iona scoffed, though the sound was merely for show. The truth was, she didn’t precisely know what she should be feeling with these revelations except abject shock. “So we can fight another losing battle?” Shula opened her mouth to argue, but Iona continued before she could. “Look, how do I even know you’re telling the truth? Why would I blindly trust either of you?” Her gaze strayed to the orange-headed Fae, who was vibrating with tension, his green eyes swallowing her up in his heated gaze. She pulled back from that, trying to ignore the bite of magic and pull emanating from him, and turned back to Shula. “From where I’m standing, the both of you look like enemies.”
A slivering sensation rolled down her back, Mana berating her for all that, no doubt. She always followed Mana’s instincts, always. She’d seen what had happened when she ignored it, but even so, she felt wary about them.
Even more so when the ginger Fae stormed past Shula, nearly knocking her to the side, and stomped close to Iona. She gasped at his proximity and stepped back. The anger rolling off his body was a palpable thing and crashed over her body like the waves of a black ocean. His muscles bulged against leather and steel, the veins on his neck standing out, looking ready to snap.
He was pissed. Because she’d kneed him? Well, he’d grabbed her first, and she wasn’t going to apologize for that. She tried to stand her ground, but he was too intimidating, too close, too much.
She stepped back until her back pressed tightly against the cold walls of the building behind her.
He loomed over her, everything about him threatening.
“Julius!” Shula snapped a warning, but he didn’t listen to his companion.
He pressed close. Their bodies touched, every hard inch of him against every soft inch of her. There was no crevice for wind to blow through between them. He bent. She was tall, but he was taller, lowering a fraction. She caught the flare of his nostrils as he breathed her in. His hand lifted and instinct and fear had her magic shooting out.
A block of ice covered that hand that reached for her. He looked at it, like it was a nuisance, and with a flex of his fingers, the ice broke into fragmented shards around them.
Holy Mana.
Fuck.
Her thighs shifted at that display of strength and she leaned back against the wall.
The male—Julius—seemed angrier, but when his hand lifted again, it wasn’t to strike her, but to grip her at the back of the neck and drag her close. Her body, treacherous thing that it was, followed with little fight.
The feel of his fingers digging into her skin should have been a warning, but all Iona felt was a rapid-building warmth flowing through her veins. She stood on the tips of her toes as he tugged her closer until his nose grazed against the tip of hers.
Their eyes met, her palms pressing against his chest, unsure if she wanted to shove him away or keep herself steady as he pulled her closer.
Probably to keep her steady.
Because the next moment, she felt the slamming sensation of magic snap deep into her soul. Something similar to when she’d met her familiar but sharper, more aggressive and demanding, falling into place right next to her soul.
Julius must have felt it too, because it brought a smile to his lips before he growled out a single word that tilted Iona’s world off its axis.
“Mate.”
And then his lips came crashing down on hers, and all she knew was the taste of his tongue, the scrape of his teeth, as their magic and a sliver of their souls nestled together in an unbreakable bond that was a gift from Mana itself.
22
The Bonds of Mana
He tasted like magic and smelt even better. He gave off a woodsy scent. Like earth and grass and leather and ale.
He was dominating, and she was aware of everything. Of the way his blunt nails dug into the back of her neck, the way he held her tightly against him while caging her against the wall. Of the scrape of his canines against her lips right before his tongue delved into her mouth, slashing against her own like he was asserting dominance.
