My grin slid from my face, and I narrowed my eyes at him—and across the room, I heard the sound of weapons clattering against each other. I glanced at Draven to find him glaring at Kieran too.
“Linguistically.” Kieran rolled his eyes. “The overgrown pussycat is fun to play withlinguistically.”
“You’ll be my favorite Moroi forever if you call Bastian that to his face,” Rynn said seriously before springing to her feet and trotting over to the mirror.
Kieran chuffed. “I’m already your favorite Moroi. You just let Samara pretend she is to protect her delicate sensibilities—oww!” He rubbed the back of his head where I’d smacked him. “Rude.”
“Come on.” I grabbed his arm and started tugging him towards where Rynn was waiting for us, only pausing to grab a few sheets of paper and sharpened pieces of charcoal so I could sketch out the glyph for reference.
I thrust them into the pockets of my dress before coming up short when Vail stomped over, shoving between me and Kieran. “If there is even ahintof the barrier being down when you get into that room, you get that nice ass back here immediately. The Alpha Pack isn’t going to react reasonably if they see you with Rynn.”
“You need to work on your compliments as much as your apologies.” I poked him in the chest. “And I don’t have a nice ass—I have anamazingass.”
“Sam,” Vail growled.
“Vail,” I mockingly growled back.
My heart quickened when he smiled at me before leaning down to whisper in my ear, “If you don’t bring thatamazingass back in one piece, I’m going to think of all kinds of ways to punish it.” Before I could get out a clever retort, Vail’s hand gripped the back of my head, and his lips crashed against mine in a searing kiss. Heat coursed through me as I molded my body into his.
Yes. I was still mad at him.
Yes. I was enjoying the hells out of this kiss.
As Rynn had said before, two things could be true at once.
“Stop getting distracted by dick!” Rynn barked sharply.
Vail and I broke apart, both of us breathing a little heavily.
“Also”—his eyes slid to where Kieran was now waiting with Rynn, a stupid grin on his face—“I want credit for allowing you to go with just the wolf and peacock.”
“You don’tallowme to do anything,” I sputtered, but Vail was already stalking back towards the weapons table.
Draven shook his head at him. “You almost had it but fumbled the landing.”
“Shut up,” Vail growled.
“Let’s go.” Rynn grabbed me. “Deal with your obnoxiously possessive and bossy mates later. Cade and the others are usually patrolling at this hour, and I’d like to get in and out without them noticing,” she snapped before shoving me face-first into the mirror.
“Oh fuck, that was weird.”I hopped from one foot to the other as I stared wide-eyed at the mirror. The reflective surface looked solid, but as soon as I made contact, it felt like a cold, viscous liquid slipping over my skin. My mind told me I should be dripping wet right now, but my skin was dry and unblemished.
Aside from the weird sensation, it’d been fine. Nothing like when Draven had tripped the glyph at the bottom of House Harker and my stomach had tried to relocate to my throat as we fell.
“Rynn wasn’t kidding.” Kieran glanced around the space we had landed in. “I’m not even sure Vail would have fit in here, and Draven’s ego definitely wouldn’t have.”
“I’m going to tell Draven you said that.” I peered at the completely packed shelves that I could only see parts of, thanksto the wooden crates full of more books and scrolls stacked precariously in front of them.
“Go for it.” Kieran grinned at me. “I like his punishments.”
I thought of when Draven had used his whip to tie me up in the cabin.
“Good point. Tell him I talked shit about him too.”
Kieran snorted. “This place actually makes Roth’s room look neat and tidy.” He reached out to the nearest stack of books just as Rynn stepped through the mirror.
“Don’t”—the books tumbled over with a loud crash—“touch anything,” Rynn finished tensely and looked towards the open doorway that led into another small room.
The three of us held still, waiting to see if the Alpha Pack would barge in. We were close enough to the mirror that we could make it back through and smash the one on the other side . . . probably.
