Yes, of course. Smart. Obviously, she should ask. The odds were in her favor—there was only a one in three chance she was in a waking nightmare.
A door banged open, and the raucous sound of laughter and spirited chatter filled the hall.
Shite, shite, shite. “Nyri, which?—”
“Ah, I was just coming to find you, Luna.”
His voice was a gravelly dream, a tingle of pleasure running up her spine as she slowly turned, even while a sharp dread threatened to eat her alive.
Stars and arses, would you make up your mind?
Hard to do when the sight of Brand emptied that mind of all thought, stealing her breath and her reason in equal parts.
He was shirtless. Swaggering. Barefoot. Covered in dust and grass and wood chips from the practice ground. Drenched in sweat, beads of it dripping from the ends of his hair to streak down through the mess and soak into the low waist of his short trousers. Dragging a linen rag across the back of his neck and over the wide expanse of his muscled chest.
Weeping fuck. The motion revealed her still-healing fang marks over his heart, and a spike of heat flushed and gathered in her core.
And that smile. The crinkled lines in the corners of his eyes. The press of his shortened fangs into his bottom lip. She’d swear it was all for her. A secret, just between the two of them.
A crowd of similarly filthy warriors followed in his wake, piling in as they roughhoused. She was torn between staying locked on Brand forever and scanning the other Demons for any sign of his younger brother.
Sisters forgive her, but self-preservation won out.
She spotted Hedda and Faldir, grinning like loons. Thad playfully darting a swinging fist. Magnus, laugh booming as he threw his head back. Others she’d healed, some she’d never laid eyes on.
No Araxis, thank the stars.
She did her best not to melt into a puddle all over the marble floor. It didn’t mean Araxis wasn’t here, but it gave her a chance to get hold of the situation.
Brand closed the distance and reached out to grab her chin, tilting her face up. His eyes danced between hers. “Good morning, little moon.”
The sound Nyri made was somewhere between a gasp and a squeak.
Brand raised a brow in her direction, lips tilted in a half smile. “Goodbye, Nyriadne.”
“Nicknames and twinkly glances, and you want me to leave? Did the trip addle your head? I need details.” She turned to Lunara and pointed at her. “You had all morning to tell me whatever this is. I knew something was up whenhecalled you Luna.Magnus? Meaningless. Does it all the time.ButBrand? And little moon, are you kidding me! Oh… my… sunstar…” Her mouth fell open and she clapped both hands to her cheeks. “Are youmates?!”
Her shriek echoed through the bustling hall, the word ‘mates’bouncing from window to window, and Lunara couldn’t stifle her groan as all eyes turned in their direction.
Brand drew in a deep, slow breath. Out, and in again, standing so still.
With an explosivethump,her heart flipped over and into a racing gallop that pumped tense pain right up into the base of her skull. Forced her eyes out of focus, her ears to ring. She couldn’t feel her lips or limbs.
Two realizations slammed into her.
First, it wasn’t her. She had her fair share ofmoments,but not this same struggle to breathe. This feeling that a carefully curated control had been wrenched from her grasp, forcing her into a spiraling unknown. And yet, she related so viscerally that it threatened to send her to her knees right then and there.
Second, she could help.
Lunara leaned into the overload, sifting through the dampened senses that didn’t belong to her in order to find her own. She wasn’t particularly thrilled with Nyri at the moment, but she could be calm. For him, she could.
She reached inside with both hands and tossed away the trepidation and the fear. The worry. The unbelievable dressing-down she’d planned to throw at him for being an imperious arse. They were no good at the moment.
Let him feel her awe, instead. The bliss she felt in his arms. Shy hope and quiet wonder. Even the drop of brazen impudence she’d carried with her through everything, just to give him a little fight.
The bond pulled tighter and—for the barest, fleeting instant—she was…him, focused wholly on the flecks of silver and sage scattered throughout her own azure eyes, the iridescent freckles across her nose and cheeks. On the thought that salvation lay before him, in lines and patterns and colors that mimicked the beloved sea and sky.
Tighter…
