Page 31 of Realm of Wind and Vines
I almost weep with relief.
The tension bleeds out of his body as I decrease that wildfire of pain inside him until it’s nothing more than a tiny spark.
His breathing evens out, and the tense crease between his eyebrows smoothens.
Keeping my arms around him, I continue pouring magic into him to take his pain away.
If he could just wake up and tell me what to do, I could heal him directly. I could give him all of my magic and fix him right now. But because I don’t know how it works, all I can do is to liethere uselessly next to him and take away his pain. A temporary fix to deal with the symptoms when I should have been able to fix the entire root cause. Simply because I don’t know how.
Goddess above, there is so much I don’t know. So much knowledge I don’t have, so many lies I’ve been told, so many skills I lack. All because I’ve been trapped inside that one city and fed lies all my life. How am I supposed to keep Draven safe when I’m this weak? This pathetic?
I need to get stronger. Smarter. Better. More ruthless.
And I need to do it fast.
Because no one will ever hurt him like this again. I will make fucking sure of it.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Arguing voices drift through the air. I scowl in annoyance and nestle closer to the warm, muscular body next to me while exhaustion tries to pull me back to sleep. A familiar scent, like night mist and embers, fills my lungs with every breath. It feels so natural. So?—
I jerk upright.
Morning sunlight streams in through the cave opening and illuminates the dark gray stone around me.
That sense of familiar comfort is immediately replaced by panic.
Mabona’s tits, I must have passed out. I was up all night, using my magic to take away Draven’s pain. But my own body must have given in to exhaustion eventually.
Blinking against the sudden light, I snap my gaze to the warm, muscular body that I was nestled against just moments ago.
Draven is still lying on his back, his chest rising and falling with a steady rhythm. The slashes across his chest and the holes in his side have stopped bleeding. But they’re still awfully deep. Even with his rapid healing pace, one night wouldn’t be enough to fix something like this.
My gaze flits up to the source of the arguing voices that woke me up. Orion is sitting on the ground, inspecting the slash across his thigh, which looks to have mostly healed. I glance down at the arrow wound in my side to find it almost fully healed as well before I return my gaze to Orion. Only a step away from him, Isera is shoving her legs into her pants. The black leather rustles and creaks with her angry movements.
“I don’t know why you’re so upset,” Orion is saying, a sly smile curving his wicked mouth. “You’re the one who was cuddling me.”
Isera shoots him a glare so cold that it almost gives the entire cave frostbite. “I was not cuddling you.”
“You had your arms around me.”
She yanks her pants up. “I was trying to push you off.”
“You were also lying with your cheek against my chest.”
“Because when I had my back against you, that tiny little dagger you keep in your underwear was poking me in the back.”
Orion’s mouth drops open, and incredulity pulses across his face. “Tiny littledagger?”
While buttoning her pants, she gives him a taunting look of challenge. “Yes.”
He shoots to his feet. And then winces when it makes his not fully healed wound stretch. He shakes his leg slightly as if to make the pain disperse.
Still only in his underwear, he draws himself up to his full height. It’s the first time I’ve seen the Unseelie King in this state of undress, and I have to admit, it surprises me how toned his body is. In contrast to the almost slightly feminine beauty of his face, his body is made up entirely of lean muscles. It makes him look lethal. And he towers over Isera as he advances on her.
“You take that back,” he demands, prowling closer.
Isera, who had bent down to pick up her shirt, is forced to abandon that mission and instead scramble back to avoid beingmowed down by him. She has barely managed to stand up straight again when her back hits the cave wall.
