“So,” Vex said, his voice a rumbling boom that cut through the annoying buzz of the crowd, “you’re shopping for the big event, are you?” His tail flicked as he spoke, and I had to curl my fingers into fists to stop myself from grabbing it, seeing what that tawny fur would feel like against my palm.
“There’re about three dozen ingredients required for the spell,” I grumbled, reaching up to push white bangs off my sweaty forehead. Vex beat me to it, using his fingers to swipe the hair away from my eyes. I felt my cheeks flame. “And about ten that we’re having trouble getting ahold of.”
“Well, you came to the right man,” Vexer told me, the sunshine catching on his hair and bathing it in a rich auburn color that made my stomach feel tight. “Whatever you need, we can find a way to get it.”
“That’s good,” Jasinda said, popping up next to us and gesturing for Matz to step forward. “We just got an exceptional deal on the ever-dark flowers, but there are a few herbs from Nalahari, a mineral from Scythia, black earth from Rúnda …”
“All of which I can procure,” Vex said, curling his thumbs under his leather belt and grinning. “Not a problem.” The crowd parted naturally around him, not a single soul daring to brush any of his brown and white feathers.
“… and silver ash from Vaenn.”
“Good luck on that last one,” a cold voice said, and I flicked my gaze over to find Dyre, the lost prince, walking by in his Royal College Uniform, the shadow fox curled around his shoulders. “You’ll never get into Vaenn. Or if you do, you’ll never get back out again.”
He kept walking, breezing past us with his fluffy purple tail poofing out arrogantly behind him. I wasn’t sure how something could poof arrogantly, but that’s exactly what it was doing. I reached out and grabbed it in my fist, stopping him short and drawing this sound from his throat that was halfway between a squeak and a shout.
Dyre whirled on me, the fox on his shoulders howling with laughter.
“She’s got you by the tail!” it chortled as Dyre’s bronze eyes locked on mine and he gave a violent sort of scowl. “She must have as big a crush on you as you have on her!”
Releasing his tail, I stumbled back and right into Vex’s massive chest. His huge hands steadied me as I stared down at my open palm and realized what I’d just done. The equivalent of grabbing some chick’s boob to get her attention. Oh gods above and below!
“S-sorry,” I stuttered as Dyre’s eyes burned with an inner fire. He looked at me like he wanted to kill me.
“He’s been crushing on you since he saw you fight—” the small fox said, pausing only when Dyre clamped his hand over the beast’s head and squeezed.
“Shut up, you prick,” he ground out, his lavender hair shimmering in the sunshine. It was such a pretty color, a sign of Dyre’s kitsune heritage, an entire race who could trace their lineage to the fox god, Inari. They weren’t demigods like Everess and Air—their blood was far too diluted—but most of the natives in Vaenn were kitsune through and through. They didn’t have a lot of mixed races there, not like we did in Amerin.
“What were you saying about the silver ash?” Jasinda asked, pushing the conversation back in a scholarly direction. Good for her. All I wanted to do was crawl into a hole and die. I’d just grabbed some strange prince’s private place in the middle of the market! That was sure to cause some sort of scandal.
“Silver ash is impossible to get now,” Dyre growled out, holding the fluff of his purple and white tail against his chest and sneering at me. “It’s a mineral collected from the mines in the farthest northern corner of Vaenn, and I don’t know what you’ve heard, but there’s not really much of Vaenn left anymore.”
“You’re in the queen’s confidence it seems?” Jas asked, but Dyre just narrowed his eyes and didn’t bother to answer. He was however, wearing a royal crest pin on his uniform, the same as Air had worn, a sign of royal favor. It meant that Everess was aware of his presence, and was probably working with him to find out what the Hell had happened in Vaenn and why the flub all these shadow creatures were pouring down from the north. “So you know what we need the spell for? This is important, Your Majesty.”
“Right. That’s nice. But the level of importance doesn’t change the fact that Vaenn is an impenetrable nightmare right now. Silver ash isn’t often traded anyway—it’s a mostly useless mineral. Years ago, they used to make eyeshadow out of it. But then people started going blind.” Dyre’s eyes turned back to mine and held there. “Nobody wants or needs silver ash anymore. Try to find some old lady with an ancient stash of makeup. Otherwise, you’re shit out of luck.” He mumbled something else under his breath in Vaennish and then turned with the intention of leaving us behind.
“Have lunch with us?” Jas blurted and Dyre paused, glancing over his shoulder.
“No thanks,” he growled, giving me yet another violent sort of glare.
“That’d be lovely, thank you!” the small fox said, leaping off his brother’s shoulders and into my arms, curling up in a ball against my chest. “I’m famished!”
“Get over here,” Dyre snarled through clenched teeth, but the fox ignored him, glancing up at me with copper eyes.
“My name is Trubble,” he said, waving his nine tails seductively. “And my brother wants to mate with you.”
Dyre was worse company than Talon, who wouldn’t stop making inappropriate jokes about the state of my three meat sandwich, comparing the pink folds to … you don’t want to know. But at least he was friendly and smiling, his tattooed arms bulging as he played with the small braid on the side of his head … Ugh. My hormones were so out of whack! I so desperately wanted to see Air, but he had to stay hidden from other spirit whisperers. And it sucked. We’d had the best sex of my life last night and I didn’t even get to hold his hand.
My chest ached, that same stretched feeling from before taking over again, just like it had right after Haversey and Hellim had tangled together inside of me. That’s how I felt right now, except instead of being empty, I was full, rife with emotion for Airmienan that I wanted to get out but couldn’t.
“Can you please stop scowling at me?” I asked Dyre as I held my sandwich in tight fingers and glared right back. “It was your brother that accepted our lunch invitation. We didn’t make you come.”
“We’re bound together,” Dyre said, sulking and glaring at anything that moved. He was a surly sort, that was for sure. I almost liked him for it? I don’t know. I must be going insane.
I scooted a little closer to Vex and let his muscular thigh warm up all my cold places. We exchanged a glance, his gray eyes holding my gold ones hostage. He dropped a tattooed hand down and squeezed my knee in a way that was so comforting, I was tempted to crawl into his lap, curl up, and put my head against his broad chest. He just brought that out of me, I guess.
“Sad but true,” Trubble said, taking a bite off his own plate and swallowing a chunk of bread and meat. “I’m as bound to him as your ghosts are to you. It makes for such a boring life, you know. He never does anything fun. Also, he’s a virgin.”
My cheeks heated as all eyes at the table turned to look at Dyre who was now clenching his fork and looking about two breaths away from stabbing his brother with it. His brother who was a shadow. That meant his mother had, at some point, slept with a spirit and become pregnant. Dyre was kitsune, all the way through; his looks made that obvious.
“Don’t try and deny it: you are a virgin. He’s never had his dick touched, sucked, or fucked.”
“I’m going to murder you in your sleep,” Dyre snarled, flashing slightly pointed canines. The sight made me miss Air’s teeth. His canines were even more pointed while the rest of his teeth were just slightly sharper than a human’s or an angel’s would ever be. Personally, I found them adorable.
“Can you please just draw us a map to these mines?” Jasinda was begging, taking a piece of parchment paper, an inkwell, and a quill pen from Matz’s bag and trying to pass them over to Dyre. I figured she
had some ulterior motive for inviting him to lunch. He wasn’t exactly the talkative type.
“No,” Dyre repeated for the hundredth time, sitting up and crossing his arms over his chest, his katana sticking up over his right shoulder. “I’m not sending a bunch of idiots to their deaths in search of something they’ll never find.”
“He has a point,” Vex said, drawing my attention over to him. His wings were lifted high and as I watched, he shook them out and lowered them to the floor for a rest. “Trade with Vaenn is banned right now. Nobody crosses the border or if they do, they don’t come back. Three different members of the Travelers’ Guild have risked it in the last month, and they’re all missing now.”
With a sigh, I swiped a hand over my face.
No silver ash meant no spell.
The gods were pretty specific in their requirements.
“So we get the queen to make an announcement asking for all Amerin citizens to deliver any silver ash they have to the castle,” I said, feeling tired and heavy all of a sudden. I didn’t want to admit it to myself, but the fact that Vexer was going to be leaving this evening to collect some of the items on our list made me feel sick. I didn’t want him to go. Flub, I wanted him to come back to the house with us and crawl into bed with me and Air …
Crud. I really did like this guy, huh?
Talon saw the perplexed expression on my face and gave a slow dramatic nod and a wink. If he hadn’t been wearing an entire bandolier covered in poison, I’d have punched him right in the family jewels.
But … he was right.
He was so flubbing right.
“That’s the most logical course of action,” Vex said, finishing his drink and brushing the crumbs from his lap. “Try that first and if it doesn’t work, then we consider a more dangerous course of action.”
“We?” I asked, looking up at his face.
“You think I would abandon you now, Brynn?” he asked, and … even though he was supposed to be a stranger … I felt a surge of warmth inside. Vex reached out with one of his large hands and cupped the side of my face. Without even meaning to, I leaned into the touch. “Besides, I’m an Amerin citizen now, and I have a duty to the crown.” He smiled at me, the edges of his eyes crinkling just before the corner of his mouth curved up in a slight smirk.
We both knew he wasn’t doing any of this for the queen.
“I should probably get going,” Vex said, dropping his hand from my face and leaving a suddenly cold space where his palm had been. He stood up from the table, nodded at my companions, and then held out a hand. “Come outside with me for a moment?” he asked, and I smiled, taking his giant hand and watching as my own bronze-skinned one was enveloped completely.
A shiver of pleasure passed through me as Vex pulled me outside and into the shady outdoor seating area. Leaning back against the side of the restaurant, I sighed as Vexer put a palm on either side of me, using his massive wings to give us a moment of privacy.
“I can’t stop thinking about that kiss yesterday,” he whispered as I swallowed hard and looked into his eyes. He stared at me like I was his. Half of me was thrilled, and the other half felt a natural sort of need to rebel. I wanted him, too, but he would have to be mine. “I thought about it all night, when I touched myself.”
“I had sex with Airmienan,” I blurted, because the most important part of being a good wife was being honest with one’s husbands about what happened with their compeers—the other men they shared a spouse with. I mean, not that I thought anyone was my husband or even future husband or whatever. I was still reserving judgment, even when it came to marrying Air. But still. Honesty right out the gate never hurt anyone.
“I don’t care about that,” Vex growled, but he was gritting his teeth, and the muscles in his neck were taut with strain. I reached a hand out and put my palm against the side of his throat.
“Yes, you do. Griffins are monogamous, right?”
“They are,” he replied carefully, his gray eyes glittering dangerously. I had a feeling that Air was lucky to be invisible right now or Vex might’ve tried to punch him. After a moment, the big man reached up and brushed hair away from my face. “And if I could, I’d have you as my mate … and mine alone.” Vexer exhaled, smelling sweet and fragrant and wild. When he leaned in closer and used his giant body to push mine against the wall, my heart went crazy, beating so fast that I felt dizzy. “But I would also never want to cause you pain. You’re in love with the prince, and I don’t care.”
Vex reached down and curled his fingers against hip, pulling my pelvis against him. I could feel the thick, hard warmth of his arousal through his pants, and my nipples pebbled in response. Using his other hand, he threaded his fingers into my hair and dropped his mouth to mine.
Holy ship! I thought as he took me with a possessive neediness that had me melting into his touch. Crud, I’m losing this battle, aren’t I? I wondered, but there was no fight left in me, not when Vex was grinding me into the wall with the hardness of his erection.
“I’m going to miss you,” he whispered as he broke our kiss apart far sooner than I wanted.
“How long will you be gone?” I asked, trying to act like I didn’t give two flubs either way. But to be honest, I gave a whole Hell of a lot of flubs. This guy … he’d become like an anchor in my world, tying me to the living when I was constantly surrounded by the dead.
“A week or so?” he guessed, his eyes half-lidded and heavy with sex. If he’d asked me right then to come with him to an inn … I’m not sure that I’d have said no. “I’ll come back as quick as I can. And then, me and you … we’re going to have a proper date.”
“A proper date, huh?” I asked, practicing a haughty lift of my chin the way Elijah and Air always did. “Who said I wanted to date you? I don’t even know you.”
“But you will,” Vex said as he took a step back and sighed, his jaw tight with the strain of holding back. I could see it written all over him, this desperate, achy want for me. This guy was determined as Hell; I had to give him that. “We’ll get to know each other, Brynn of Haversey. And you’ll come to like me, I promise.”
“Maybe I already like you, Vexer of Reisender,” I quipped and he smiled, this big, feral wild sort of smile that promised that if I did actually submit to his whims, that I’d enjoy it a whole flub of a lot. “Now get on with you. The sooner you go, the sooner you can come back to me.”
Neither of us missed the way I’d phrased that particular statement.
As soon as we were back on the Royal College Campus, Airmienan reappeared at my side, looking a tad … flustered. Clearly, he wasn’t into Vexer. But he’d also offered to have the man brought to my bed last night, so I reached down and curled my fingers with his.
Talk about a selfless act …
“You should still stay out of sight,” I whispered, but this place was a ghost town—at least for now. In a few days’ time, students and staff would flood the campus in preparation for orientation week, but today, it was just us.
“Playing with fire,” Talon murmured as Jasinda fingered her spirit charm and watched me and the prince with a secretive little smile playing on her lips. As soon as I saw it, I blushed which only made her smile wider.
“Well, well,” Elijah purred in that lazy way of his, nodding his chin in the direction of the big stone building where we’d met the professor yesterday. “Look who it is.”
Speak of Hellim's demon and he will appear …
“Good afternoon,” Professor Cross said, standing on the bottom step with his hands in the pockets of his breeches, his blue-green eyes taking our little group in with unabashed curiosity. “What are you kids up to today?”
“Kids?” Elijah asked, looking the man up and down, pausing for just a moment to shove his torn shirtsleeve back up to his shoulder. “I’m twenty-three. How old can you possibly be? We look the same age.”
“You think?” the professor asked, slicking his fingers through his hair again. It seriously stood strai
ght up in black spikes, teased to attention by the mind whisperer’s long fingers. If the thought reading and the murmurings of prophetic visions weren’t enough to give his profession away, Spicer Cross wore the god Verstand’s symbol around his throat, a piece of metal in the shape of an eye. “I’m thirty years old, son.”
“Oh please,” Elijah said with a harsh laugh. “You’re thirty? You mean now, after having been dead for a while?”
“Does it matter?” the professor asked, giving Eli a curious look. “You have a prophecy of blood and ice to worry about.”
“Is this what you were murmuring about yesterday?” Talon asked, standing there with his hands on his hips, his tattoos a brilliant storm of color down both muscular arms. He was projecting hard and to the untrained eye, he might actually appear to be alive. Glancing over at the prince in his shimmering white-blue haze made me want to take him to my bedroom again, see him light up in all the right places.
“It was,” the professor said, taking his loose tie off of his head and opening a few more buttons on his shirt, like he was hot or something. But ghosts don’t get hot unless they touch the living. I wondered if he was doing it out of habit, reacting to the harsh beams of the sun falling over us. “All of you are going to be involved in something awful, something with blood and ice. But it’s not the right time yet.”
“When will it be the right time?” Air demanded, nostrils flaring slightly.
The professor just shrugged, nice and loose and unconcerned about his ominous declaration.
“I might not know until it’s too late,” he said, his eyes traveling across the sea of faces in front of him. “My magic is unpredictable at best. Mostly it’s just a whole lot more trouble than it’s worth.” He paused for a moment and then pointed at Jasinda. “But silver ash, I can definitely help you with.”
I flicked a glance over to my handler and then turned to face the professor.
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