“Thus a blend of magic from the Moonstone and Ruby realms.”
“Whoa.”Ruby was the highest-test magic, and the most mysterious of the fae realms.She looked at the wand with renewed respect.“No wonder it worked on the iron demon so well.I didn’t know you could mix magic between realms.”
Prince Not-So-Charming actually rolled his eyes at her.“I suspect what you don’t know about sorcery could fill buckets.”
“True enough,” she agreed cheerfully.“Too bad I’m fresh out of buckets.Now give me my Moonruby wand.”She reached for it and he snatched it away, tsking at her like some elderly schoolteacher.
“This is a powerful magic artifact,” he told her in important tones.“Not to be waved about willy-nilly.”
“I used that nilly to save your willy,” she reminded him.
“I’m well aware,” he replied gravely.“That kind of service means something to the…me.”
“To the you?”She laughed, guiding Katu around a slow-moving hippo carriage piled high with crates, then turned in her seat to face him more fully.The pink glitter in his indigo hair should have made him look ridiculous, but somehow it came across as more delicious frosting on rich, chocolate (if chocolate was blue) cake.Damn if she didn’t want to lick him up.“And what are the you, pray tell?”
“I can’t tell you,” he answered, then laid a finger over her lips as she snarled a protest.“Can’t,” he said with significance.“Geas, remember?Two things: yes, I have magic, and no, I’m not what you called me.Also, be very careful of what you do call me, Arantxa, in public or in private.”
Serious pussy sparkle there.The word “private” had never sounded so sexy.Cha even quivered a little at the way her broody prince purred her full name, making it sound sensual and wonderful for the first time in her life.Maybe because he wasn’t yelling at her, like most people were when they used her thorny moniker.Also, she could have imagined it—pussy sparkle could do that, leading a woman to all kinds of bad decisions and questionable fantasies—but it seemed like his finger lingered on her lip, tugging the bottom lip down ever so slightly as he withdrew.
“So, whatshouldI call you?”Okay, her voice came out breathy, but hey—if he didn’t want her turned on, he shouldn’t be looking so edible and touching her in sexy ways, right?
“Your Highness,” he answered with a quirk of a teasing smile.“I kind of liked that.”
“You would.I’ll just call you Prince, for short.”
“I’ll take Prince Charming as the ‘handle,’ but it’s a bit much between us.Call me Azul, in private.”He smiled, a hint of real charm in it.
“Azul,” she said, trying it out.Pretty.Would sound mighty fine being shouted in the throes of passion, but… “Sounds a little demonic.”
“I worry about your education.”
“Hey, I might have been a scholarship student at Miss Mulry’s Academy for the Magically Gifted, but the education was top notch.Tell me this,” she continued, before he could retort.“If you can do magic, why couldn’t you keep those fell wolves from carrying you off?”
“Ruby magic,” he replied with distaste.“Higher than mine,” he clarified with a raised brow.“Surely you have some sense of the echelons of magic use.”
“Hey, I’m a simple ley rider.I just know that the higher the color, the faster I can go.”
“I suspect you’re far from a simple ley rider, Arantxa Evermore,” he commented cryptically.
She noticed glossy black trees that lined the road now, along with the decidedly darker cast to the landscape.They’d crossed the invisible border into Gypsum and were getting close to the Obsidian border.Time and Katu had flown fast.“Sharing time is over.I gotta make contact with Dy.”
He nodded—maybe she also imagined some regret in it—and tapped a finger on the globe he’d made over the box.Immediately Dy’s voice came through.
“Bandit, what the hell now!I’ve got heat and not the good kind.Come back.”
“What does that mean?”Azul asked.
“That means to strap in and hang tight.”
“Is there a way to strap in?”He looked around, as if some kind of harness might suddenly appear.
“Nah.Figure of speech.Just don’t fall out.”She grinned as he groaned.“I need to catch up to her quick and what falls out, stays out.”
“Stark, raving mad,” he muttered, but he didn’t sound nearly so annoyed as he used to.In fact…Was that a hint of a dimple from a suppressed smile?
What did you know?Prince Charming was starting to have fun.
~20~
