Page 143 of By the Moonbeam and the Mist
“What?”
“You don’t need to do any apologizing, Rayna. You didn’t do anything wrong.”
“But,” I started, “I knew involving you in… in all of this might put you in danger and—”
“—and I accepted that danger,” Dazmine said, her chin tilted high. “I bullied you, threatened you, and used you just like you used me, so don’t get all self-pitying on me now. Okay?”
I nodded, but it didn’t stop the guilt from digging deeper into my gut. I purposely hadn’t told Emelle or Lander or Rodhi about anything going on in—
I froze, horrified.
Rodhi.
If Dazmine disappeared out of thin air, Lexington was bound to interrogate the shit out of everyone in the house… and Rodhi would be in just as much danger as any of us. Not because of my secrets, but because of his own.
“Rayna, no.”
Steeler’s eyes had widened as he caught on to what I was thinking. Mentally, he snarled my way,even if Lexington didn’t know Dazmine was with you, he’s going to be pissed when he gets here and he can’t find her. Don’t throw yourself into that fray.
I already failed to protect one friend,I said, already backing up.I’m not abandoning another one.
Steeler leaned forward as if poised to snatch me away.
Garvis hasn’t taught you how to protect somebody else’s mind from an actual invasion, Rayna. That’s fifth-year magic…
…so I’ll try my best to protect Rodhi in whatever way I can until you can take Dazmine to the ship and then come back, I snapped.
In theory, that would only take a handful of seconds. Realistically, though, we both knew he couldn’t just WalkDazmine to a pirate ship and immediately abandon her to come back for Rodhi and me. That would almost be worse than dropping her into the middle of the ocean.
Steeler opened his mouth to argue, his eyes flashing with something carnal and possessive, but I just said, “You told me you were learning to trust me! Show me that you can do that now.”
His pupils widened at that word.Trust.
Had he ever truly trusted me before—that I could handle myself in the face of danger?Couldhe? Enough to let go, even for a second? Not in the way he’d done last year, where he’d left me like a butterfly in a tank for him to protect from the outside, but in a way that would unleash me like the hurricane he’d always said I was?
As if it caused him indescribable pain, Steeler dipped his head. Dazmine glanced at him, then back at me, and nodded, too.
Nodding back, I turned and sprinted downstairs.
I didn’t have to look over my shoulder to know he’d done it: Walked away with Dazmine just like I’d asked. The absence of his dark, fathomless presence left an ache against my heart, but the knowledge that both of them were out of the danger zone was a palpably sweet relief on my tongue.
I nearly stumbled over the lower lace of my dress as I barged into the Element Wielder foyer and pushed into the throng, desperate for any signs of a boy with a goofy grin all over his carefree face.
“Rayna! What are you—”
“Have you seen Rodhi?” I panted, fighting my way to Emelle as soon as I heard her voice. She looked beautiful tonight—clad in a silver dress with hooped earrings winking like starlight in her hair—and Lander looked just as handsome in a silver tie beside her.
“Um.” Emelle squinted over my head. “I think he went somewhere over th—”
BOOM.
The entire room shook as the front doors blasted open and a group of Good Council elites stormed inside.
Kitterfol led the front, his cloak flowing behind him in a flash of scarlet that matched the livid blood vessels popping in his eyes.
The conversation in the room crashed into deathly pale silence. The musical instruments overhead stopped playing. Every drunken, confused gaze turned to Lexington and the three other elites behind him.
“Where,” Kitterfol said in a tone that oozed venom in every syllable, “is Ms. Dazmine Temperton?”
