Burnt Silver

by H A Titus

  I gritted my teeth and let her force my arm down. I couldn't have shot Gren anyway. But I glanced over at Josh. "Please tell me that was the fake and not the real thing."

  Josh got up, wincing and holding his shoulder. He looked over at Aileen. "You got it, right?"

  She smiled and tossed him the stone.

  I tried not to laugh. So they had found time to switch it. I handed the pistol back to Josh, the tension in my tense muscles fading. "C'mon. Let's get moving before everyone inside wakes up."

  CHAPTER 33

  JOSH

  We couldn't all fit into Eliaster's car, so with a nod that said he knew I could handle it, we split up. Cori slid into the passenger seat of the supercar with Eliaster, and I followed Aileen to the garage, where she unlocked the doors of a dark blue, squarish Bentley.

  I scrambled in. We were quiet as she accelerated after Eliaster. As we approached the gate, I gripped the armrest—would we have a problem here?

  "Relax. This thing is only glamoured to deal with people trying to enter."

  Sure enough, both cars passed through without a hitch. I let myself sag back against the seat and breathed out a deep sigh. Then I chuckled. The sound came out a bit distorted.

  Aileen bit her lower lip, but a laugh escaped anyway. She rubbed her hand against her face, smudging mascara under her eyes. "I can't believe we pulled that off."

  I couldn't either. I rubbed my jaw and uncurled my fingers from the stone. My blood left smears on the white surface. I stiffened, bracing for the flashback. The motion set jabs of pain throughout my body.

  Aileen's hand closed around my wrist. "You okay?"

  I glanced at her, startled. She didn't look at me. Her eyes were on the road. I looked down at the stone again. Whether my pain and Aileen had sufficiently distracted me, or if was something else, the flashback didn't hit.

  I was okay.

  "What comes next?" she asked quietly.

  "What d'ya mean?"

  "What do you plan to do with the stone, now that you got one away from the Lucht?"

  "Not sure. I don't think Eliaster ever thought that far ahead. But Roe will know what to do with it more than us."

  Aileen smiled, risking a quick glance at me. Her amber eyes sparkled in the dim light of the car's dashboard. "Well, whatever happens, I'm glad we could help. And … I'm glad you took a chance on us, Josh."

  I shifted my arm so that instead of holding my wrist, her fingers rested in my palm. I glanced up at her. She didn't look over at me this time, but a faint touch of a smile teased at the corner of her lips. I squeezed her hand. A frisson of energy, smaller this time, ran through my my hand and arm, as if I was touching a live electrical wire. "Me too."

  She pulled her hand away, placing it on the wheel. Had she felt it this time too? I studied her face, but there was nothing to indicate she'd felt anything weird.

  I closed my eyes and relaxed back into the seat. We'd done it. We'd taken a pathstone right from under the Lucht Leanuna's noses. If Larae, Blodheyr, and Llew hadn't been angry enough at us before, this would definitely paint targets on our backs. Hopefully we'd find a safe place for the stone. And hopefully we wouldn't get in trouble with anyone else.

  But honestly? At the moment, it didn't matter. For once, it just felt really good to win.

  EPILOGUE

  JOSH

  One Week Later…

  I stood on the porch of the small house, shifting the weight of the box of books on my hip as I struggled to knock at the front door.

  Eliaster snorted and pushed me to the side. "You're worse than a colt. Let me." He rapped on the doorframe.

  A woman's voice called, "Just a second!" Footsteps rushed towards us, and a minute later the door opened and Patricia smiled out at us, her freckled face framed by wild, dark curls. She grinned and called over her shoulder, "Josh is here, Aileen!"

  "What am I, chopped liver?" Eliaster muttered.

  Down the short, bright hallway, Aileen appeared in a doorway, blinking sleepily as she clutched a coffee cup in one hand. "What…" Her eyes widened. "Patricia!" she hissed. "I'm in my pajamas!" She clunked her coffee cup on the counter and darted out of sight.

  "Oh, I'm sure Josh won't mind at all, would you, Josh?" Eliaster shot a wicked grin at me over his shoulder as he stepped into the house.

  My face felt like it was on fire. "Shut up, idiot." I shoved the box of books at him and wriggled out of my jacket, hanging it on the peg by the front door.

  The house was smaller than I'd expected for something owned by the faoladh. Just ahead of us there was a kitchen, with a living room to the right. The hallway took a sharp left down to what I assumed were the bedrooms and bathroom. Cozy, but small.

  Patricia caught the question in my eyes and smiled. "The faoladh own this whole subdivision," she explained, motioning for us to go into the kitchen. "This is designed for guests, mostly, or members who prefer to live a bit more isolated lives." She tapped the top of the box in Eliaster's arms. "What's this?"

  "Books." Eliaster rolled his eyes. "Last time Josh and Liam talked, they somehow got on the subject of books, and how Cori had been browsing the bookstores around town. So Josh decided he should loan him some fantasy novels, and they got to talking, and…well." He lifted the box, shrugging. "I think they got carried away."

  The kitchen actually wasn't as small as it had first looked, with a breakfast nook to one side and a big bay window that looked out to an unfenced backyard scattered with a small flower bed, a vegetable garden, and the thick Ozark woods not far away. Eliaster put the box of books on the table and we took seats in the breakfast nook as Patricia served us coffee and she and Eliaster chatted about the pack.

  A few minutes later, Aileen reappeared, now dressed in jeans and simple tee, running her fingers through her rumpled curls. I smiled at the "Bite Me" slogan, complete with vampire fangs, on her t-shirt.

  "That's a bit on the nose, isn't it?" I asked.

  She glanced down, then grinned. "Yeah, well. Haven't run into vampires yet, so I think I'm safe for now."

  "Hey, where are you guys going?" I asked as Eliaster and Patricia started for the back door.

  Eliaster jerked his thumb at the door. "Liam called on the way over and wanted to talk to me."

  I raised an eyebrow. How true was this, exactly?

  He gave me an overly-sweet grin. "Don't do anything I wouldn't do."

  "Doggone it, Eliaster," I muttered, feeling my face flame up again.

  He snickered and ducked out the back door. Patricia shook her head and followed him.

  I stared down at my coffee mug, suddenly unsure of what I was going to say. Hi, I think you're cute, let's get to know each other better? That was stupid. She'd just essentially lost her father and her brother—and even if her father was an abusive jerk, it was still a major life change. I needed to be sensitive to that.

  Aileen suddenly reached over and gripped my hand, squeezing gently. I jumped.

  "How're you feeling?" she asked.

  I smiled and looked up at her. "Do I look that bad?"

  She studied me for a moment, a small wrinkle of concern appearing between her eyebrows. She moved her hand from my fingers to my wrist, brushing both my bracelet and my scar.

  Warmth spread across my hand and arm, and my breath caught.

  "Have you and Roe figured out anything about this yet?"

  I shook my head.

  Aileen made eye contact with me, a warm almost-brown tone flickering through her eyes. "Do you want me to help?"

  I blinked, surprised.

  After a second, she shook her head. "Sorry. Never mind."

  "No…" I put my free hand over hers, tightened my fingers so she couldn't pull her hand away. "No, I'm sorry. I was just surprised, is all. Help me with…figuring out what exactly the bracelet is?"

  Aileen bit her lip. "What is it, what it's doing to you…" She hesitated, then said, "You know you blocked the worst of Gren's light blast, right?"

  I thought ba
ck, trying to remember that moment. I'd blocked Drake from throwing more glamour at Eliaster, then I'd heard Aileen shout to close our eyes. I'd turned away from Gren, and wrapped my arms around my head. I remembered feeling a blow to my back, like I'd just been sucker-punched, and a bright light I could see even with my eyes squeezed tightly shut.

  Then I'd grabbed Eliaster, dragging him outside.

  Just remembering it made my stomach twist.

  "Gren used all the glamour he'd been storing for three months for that blast," Aileen said quietly. "He didn't target Cori or me, but everyone else in that room should've been on their backs like Blodheyr, Larae, Altru, and Drake."

  Drake, now. Not ‘Da'.

  "But you stayed up. And even though Eliaster got knocked over, he wasn't unconscious. He should've been, but you were between him and Gren. It's not just that you're a human, Josh. You're using glamour strong enough to block my father. The Airgeads some of the strongest glamourists out there."

  My stomach knotted. "You think that's a bad thing?"

  "No," she said, drawing the word out a bit. "But it's an unknown. And with glamour, unknowns make me nervous." She tightened her fingers. "I'll help you figure it out. I owe you, for getting Cori and me out of there even when things went badly. I don't think any of us were expecting that fight."

  I snorted. "You don't owe me anything."

  She looked up at me, startled.

  "I'm not doing this whole trading favors thing with you, Aileen," I said. "I know that's how fae usually operate, but I don't do that with my friends. I would be glad for your help. But we're not trading information or favors any more, all right?"

  The corner of her lips turned up into a half smile. "Okay," she said. "I can work with that."

  Yeah. So could I.

  If you enjoyed this book, please remember to rate and review on Amazon and/or Goodreads! Reviews mean a lot to authors, and are one of the ways you can help support my effort to bring you more fabulous stories. (And if you're interested in other ways, please sign up for my newsletter and find me online!)

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  So I guess I should start out the acknowledgements with an apology.

  When I published Forged Steel back in 2015, I thought I was ready to go. I had everything planned out. I would have all the books out by 2020 and be on to other series.

  Well…yeah, we know how that worked out. Between a nine-month break during my rough third pregnancy, a disrupted schedule once the new baby was born, burn out, and a severe case of Sequelitis, it's just been in the last year or so that I'd been able to face this book again, even though I still adored Josh, Eliaster, Aileen, and the host of other characters that populate this world.

  If it wasn't for the fans that kept gently prodding me, I'm not sure I would've ever gotten this second book out in the world. So, you guys—thank you!

  To Justin, my husband, who has never stopped encouraging me to chase my dreams, and my boys, who consistently remind of the everyday magic in the real world. I promise I love you guys even if dinner ends up being late six nights out of seven. ;)

  To my critique partners, J.J. Johnson and S.D. Grimm (who is also my fabulous editor and a member of my Paladins)—thank you guys for helping me iron out all the (many, many) bumpy parts of this book.

  The Paladins, my writing/D&D/framily group…guys, where even to start. Thank you for reading false starts, for listening to my rants, for sending me funny memes when I was having a bad day, and for providing fun creative breaks through our D&D games and Minecraft calls.

  You're all fantastic!

  H. A. Titus can usually be found with her nose stuck in a book or spinning story worlds in her head.

  She loves mythology, RPGS, and a good cup of coffee or tea. She lives in Missouri with her weather mage husband and two supervillain sons (don't mind the robotic dinosaurs, they're friendly) who enjoy dragging her into real life adventures.

  Some claim she is half fae, but that's just unfounded rumor.

  When she's not reading or writing, she enjoys mountain biking and hiking.

  She can be found online at hatitus.com, Facebook, and Instagram.