Page 26 of What Whispers in the Dark
Ashamed, his gaze did not falter, spearing into where his blade had been like his mere stare could reverse time. But that was not the magic he possessed—and there was no way in Firekeeper-filled-hellhe would ask the male who did to aid him. It was a fool’s wish. The damage was hewn.
Jaw tight. “You are going to make me ask twice?” he asked, arching a brow.
Alora’s focus shifted. Her head swayed as she examined his face and stuttered, “I … I don’t know.” That starsdamned lip rolled between her teeth, and she nervously rubbed her deathmark, bunching the fabric on her upper left arm that made her appear timid—and so unlike his clever girl.
That wouldn’t do.
He took in a breath to bring out that fiery, infuriating female, but it was Alora’s voice that spoke. “You were gone all day. I saw you leaving your tent, armed. I hadn’t seen you like that since Telldaira.”
Could she feel how his heart seemingly stopped? How ink began to claim his eyes and fingertips?
Galdheir.He had gone to Galdheir. Then was captured … byher.
Face paling, the abyss misted away as his stomach threatened to hollow out. A weak, sarcastic grin climbed up his face. Refusing the memories, and instead setting the challenge, Garrik’s focus flickered to the only female that might keep his nightmares at bay, resumed his earlier mission, and taunted, “So, you missed me, then?”Sparring with her was easier than the truth. If anyone knew … if anyone found out …
As delightedly predicted, Alora snapped, “I didn’t say that.” Any lingering terror instantly melted.
Garrik chuckled, knowing he would never tire of her spirit and would only ever encourage it.He pulled a sleeve over his arm, then the other as he informed of his own torment, “I went to see Aiden in Galdheir.”Nothing else.He paused. Knowing precisely what his next words would do—craving it—he smirked, then lied, “Now that I know you cannot live a day without me, I will invite you next time.”
“You fucking disgrace.” The male who raised him clenched his fists and stormed off his golden throne. The amethyst and rubies on his spiked crown glowed with the same fury raging in his demonical eyes as he stepped onto the first marble stair.
Garrik’s hand was entirely numb, threatening to drop his sword. Every vein stabbed like shards of ice. His bones quivered, drawing attention to every trail and splatter of blood covering his forearms and dripping from his fingertips onto the polished stone floor.
He had only just relieved the poor male—a Marked One, a Mystic—of his head in front of Magnelis’s court after hours of depraved entertainment at his expense.
And now, the male prowled down from his usurped throne. The wrath in his eyes latched onto the blood pouring out from the severed head as if it were an insult.
Because, apparently, it was.
Of course, Garrik fucking knew … Not given the order for the male’s death, he had ended the misery too soon. But the male’s screams … his blood. The soul that would haunt him after …
A pressure speared through his head as Magnelis’s cruel hands clamped his skull?—
Garrik panted out a breath. He did not remember anything other than waking in his tent with Alora beside him afterward. Did not know what they did to him … his body … while he was lost in darkness.
And now, sitting in his tent, his bruises and scars,hertouch, throbbed louder than Thalon pacing in front of him. He couldonly hope that this memory would not torment him like all the rest.
Garrik’s birthdayin Chapter Forty-four should have been a celebration. But when Alora and Jade saw Thalon storm out of Garrik’s tent, both with injuries they had not possessed when they went inside, confusion rippled through the Shadow Order’s firesite. What happened inside that tent? What secrets were the males hiding?
There aretrigger warnings for both parts of this chapter.
Exhaustion thrummed over him like a tide as Alora’s laughter distracted him. Not that he wished for it to stop—ever. Not that sound dancing through his thin canvas walls that had traded the morning colors of dusk for golden shards of sunlight.Neverthat sound.
It was an effort not to react to it.
That laughter drew Thalon’s attention. Shifting his gaze in her direction, a touch of amusement ghosted his face as he prodded, “Out for a stroll this morning?” With his shoulders back and arms crossed, he leaned against Garrik’s table, a knowing grin spreading across his face.
An effort not to react to that, too.
He was a fool.
Last night … in the moonlight, kissed by the midnight breeze of that glade, he had not once thought of the consequences come dawn. Not once, with her head on his shoulder, cared about returning to camp, where everyone prepared to move out. Where everyone would be waiting … and see them return.
A starsdamnedfool.
Garrik slid his attention from his tent canvas and growled in retort as he reclined in his chair, ignoring another blissful laugh and Jade’s sharp sound of mirth.
That was … new.
