Page 60 of Tasteful Anarchy and Tangled Auras
Chapter 20
Adelaide
Iwake in my bed, a fluffy blanket tucked to my chin. The room is dark, lit only by the flickering of candles. I breathe a sigh of relief when I feel for my mates’ bonds and they are both strong and near. The door opens, and in pour my mates. I grin to see them. They look relieved, like it was me who nearly died in an explosion. My lips purse as I struggle to sit up.
Bryn sits on the bed and helps me. “Easy, a chroí.”
Ossy’s eyes brim with tears, and he gingerly sits near my legs and touches my face. “I thought I lost you.”
I snort. “You? Thought you lost? Me?” I am, once again, irrationally annoyed.
My annoyance level only increases as they both chuckle.
“Yeah, she’s feeling fine,” Bryn murmurs into my hair, holding me to him.
I huff. “Of course I am. What exactly happened this afternoon?”
They laugh again. “You’ve been out for two days,” Ossy answers.
“What?”
Bryn’s haughty voice makes me melt. “Well, you did rip away someone’s aura, take it into yourself, recalibrate it, then feed it to an almost-dead male.”
“I guess when you put it like that....” I sigh. “She’s dead?”
“Alys? Dead as a doornail,” Ossy says softly, as if I’m going to be upset.
“Good. Fuck her.”
My mates seem surprised at my response. “Look, there are a lot of people I’d sacrifice to keep you two alive, but she was on the ‘sacrifice for fun’ list.”
Bryn blinks slowly. “Bloodthirsty little female. If we hadn’t been blessed by the Morrigan, I’d be worried it was Alys’s aura affecting you.”
“You weren’t around for all the torment she heaped upon me as a child. But you know she was angling to kill me.”
Ossy nods. “She was a terrible Fae. It’s fine.”
My mind starts running ahead. “Who told her to come to the Temple?”
“I’m not sure,” Bryn says. “But they wanted her to die in the explosions.”
“So they are EA. Or a splinter cell.”
He nods. “They wantedyouto die as well. And the four Fae from the lower council. The centrists, the non-radicals.”
Ossy hands me a glass of water. “So we can assume—”
The door busts open and I jump, but it’s just Rory.
I start sobbing immediately.
“Damn, don’t do that!” he sobs as well and flings himself into bed with the three of us. I wrap my arms around his neck.
