Page 42 of The Iron Fae
"You'll be safe tonight. I promise."
The temperature is steadily dropping with the setting sun and I’m suddenly very aware of the chill coating my once sweat dampened skin.
"I didn't pack a blanket," I confess.
"You won't need one."
Finally, Kai crosses his legs and squats down until he's sitting in front of me. He picks at his nails looking almost bashful. I squint trying to process if I should be worried that he's hitting on me now.
"What do you mean?"
"I can do this..." He reaches out and presses his fingers against my wrist.
Heat bubbles in my veins. Every rushing pulse pushes the heat through the rest of my body. It's hot but not scorching. Magic that doesn't burn but soothes... like a blanket. Even the wall behind me seems to soften.
I give him a lazy smile. "Are you trying to put me to sleep right now."
He leans to check the sun outside. If it's at all above the horizon the mountain has totally blocked it from our view. I can't even make out the tree tops or the ground that we made on our journey today. It's just black. Everything is dark.
I close my eyes. Dark. Everything is dark. Dark enough that I could just go to sleep. When he speaks, I only crack one eye for him.
"No, but you should rest because we'll be up bright and early tomorrow and I'm sure unlocking your powers is going to be some sort of trip for you."
"Uh-huh." I nod, closing my eyes, content to sleep against the wall. "I didn't know you had this sort of power."
"I've got all sorts of things that you don't know about me," he whispers.
Eleven
Zeve
"We're here!"Rowan calls.
"Where exactly is here?" I pull myself up, clambering, cautiously up the rocks. The higher we rise the less trees are sprouting. Dust has begun to fill the air, it clings to us like ash. I can even taste it, like burnt raw dirt, on my tongue.
"Does the seer live here?" I ask.
Rowan stops at the mouth of another cave. The entrance to it is so slender, I'm not sure that either of the Fae are going to be able to fit through. Even I'll need to suck in and crush my boobs against me to make it between that tiny opening.
"The seer lives here," Kai says mostly to the sky.
Dark clouds are forming around the mountain range. The flash of light and the following boom an eerie threat of what is to come. I pray it's just my own paranoia. This isn't foreshadowing. Right?
"Do we knock?" I swallow the lump in my throat.
Rowan offers me his hand on the final step I have to make up the landing he balances on. He holds my hand gently. I'd like to say it has something to do with the right hook I'd shared with him the day before. More likely though, it has to do with the conversation the two were having when I woke up. Not a minute after Rowan had trudged over to me looking like a child who'd just gotten grounded and apologized for his less than princely behavior. He promised not to ask for sexual favors anymore but insisted he couldn't turn off the flirting. 'It's just who he is as a person.'
I decided that the apology was enough and put the entire thing behind us. And sure enough, when I glanced down at my knuckles a healthy purple bruise covered the back of my hand. At least now I could admit to having punched royalty. That has to mean something, right?
Next on the list. Kill Queen Cordelia.
What a fucking leap.
Kai had chosen to watch us from behind. Mostly so that Rowan didn't get another chance to look at my ass. At no point when I turned back to Kai did I find him watching my rear-end. He's probably missing Jase. I miss Jase.
I chew on my nail thinking back to my cousin. It'd hardly been weeks since I'd seen him but it feels like years. It wouldn't be forever though, I reminded myself. And if our Fae genes had anything to do with it, we would have forever to live together.
Kai presses his face against the crack. He takes a deep breath in then pulls away quickly. "The seer lives here alright."
