With a huff, she drew her cloak over her hair, but it did little good, the crimson silk drawing the eye as much as her golden hair had.
I called upon my shadows and cloaked her in them, and she gave a muffled cry as my shadows molded themselves to her form.
The feel of her body under my shadows made a shiver ripple through me, and I shook my head swiftly to disperse it.
I had to stay focused. This was about proving a point.
When the mage turned to walk further into the streets of the village, Elena made to follow.
“Quick, he’s getting away!” she cried, her dagger already in her hand.
“Wait, we cannot follow him,” I murmured. She ignored me, forcing me to clutch her upper arm in my hand. She shook free, her eyes blazing.
“Youcan’t follow him, but I can,” she said, glaring at me. “Stay in the forest then, while I catch him.”
I grabbed her again, my shadows moving instinctively to bind her again. “Quiet,” I hissed. “You’re not going anywhere.”
She turned betrayed eyes on me, before slashing at my arms with her dagger, her sunlight powers sparking down the blade.Her blade had bitten through my shadows, sunlight sparking along its edge, and the sting of it still thrummed in my arm. She fought like a creature aflame, her defiance a furnace. My shadows dispersed as I hissed in pain. I would heal soon enough, but it was enough to distract me and loosen my hold on her.
Elena pushed me back with one powerful heave of her shoulder, slipping past me and running for the village. I caught her at the last moment, slamming her back against the trees.
“Stop it,” I hissed, flattening myself against her struggling form. She was going to give us away. “You’ll bring him back on us with your noise.”
Her eyes—those golden, molten eyes—flared with something sharper than fear. Fury. Pride. An infuriating refusal to bend. She tried to buck against me, her wrists jerking against the shadows I’d summoned to bind her. My shadows knew her warmth, her shape; they wrapped themselves greedily around her, and for a dangerous moment I almost envied them.
Elena struggled, trying to buck me off her body, and I pressed harder against her, trapping her in the cradle of my body.
“Get off me, you bastard,” she snarled, flailing against my hold.
“Language!” I tutted, widening my eyes in mock surprise. “You don’t look very much like the calm, gentle Sun Priestess now,” I taunted, just to watch her golden eyes narrow in anger.
When I pushed her back against the tree behind her, the priestess’s hand flashed out. The point of her dagger went for my throat before I knocked it aside with a grunt.
The dagger fell to the forest floor with a soft thud, and my shadows flashed out instinctively to wrap around her wrists, fastening them to the tree behind her.
“You have no right to touch me,” she spat, her voice low and venomous. “You are nothing but a coward hiding behind tricks and darkness.”
A coward. I laughed under my breath, though there was no humor in it. “If I were a coward, priestess, I would have let you run straight into the mage’s hands. Do you even know what you were charging toward? Do you know what sigil he carved on that house? Or were you so blinded by your need to be righteous that you forgot how to think?”
Her jaw clenched, and for the first time she hesitated. Just a flicker, but I saw it. I pressed closer, my voice dropping to a whisper at her ear. “That sigil was a mark of ownership. He will know every breath that family takes now. He will find them anywhere, drag them back if they run. And you would have stormed straight into his arms.”
She froze beneath me, her breath catching. Slowly, she lifted her gaze to mine, and for the briefest heartbeat there was no fury there—only the shadow of doubt. Then it was gone, buried beneath her stubborn defiance. “If what you say is true, then all the more reason to stop him. Waiting solves nothing.”
“Waiting,” I said, forcing calm into my tone, “means we learn more before we act. He will return. He must. And when he does, we will be ready.”
Her lips parted as if to retort, but I silenced her with the press of my shadows, tightening them just enough to remind her she was bound. The sensation of her body struggling beneath mine was… dangerous. Distracting. It had been a century since I had allowed myself to be this close to another being, and the Sun Priestess of all people was the last one I should find myself pressed against.
And yet… the warmth of her, the wild hammering of her pulse where her throat brushed the back of my hand—it pulled at something I thought long dead within me.
Her breasts were flattened against me, and her warm breath puffed across my lips as we stared at each other for long moments, the moment charged and silent between us.
Shadows curled between us like serpents, and for a long moment, I could not tell if I wanted to throttle her or kiss her. Perhaps both.
She noticed it too. I saw the flicker in her eyes, the flush that rose to her cheeks despite her scowl. She masked it with anger, but her body betrayed her, chest rising fast, breath quickening. She was fire—furious, untamed fire—and I was the shadow that should have smothered her.
Instead, I found myself feeding on her heat, unable to draw back.
Finally, she wiggled her fingers, sending a little zap of her magic my way.
