No pulse.
If it had been a message instead of a mirage, it had already been delivered.
My only hope was that whoever was supposed to receive it had missed the glare.
Each day began to feel like an invisible noose was tightening around us, and nobody could find the knot to untangle it and save us all.
At least today would be joyous.
Evie would become Blood Brotherhood queen and she was happy for it.
The well of power inside of me stirred, lips moving of their own accord, “Winds above and winds below, guard and guide her wherever she’ll go.”
I exhaled the incantation, wrists flaring blue. The wind snatched my billowing breaths away as my chest burned.
I swayed on the ridge. Even after two decades of this existence, I still underestimated the toll protection spells took on me.
But if it would help Evie, even in the smallest way, it was worth it.
With a strange restlessness drumming through me, I turned.
The second I saw him in the tower’s rickety threshold, I startled so hard, my boot slipped on the icy surface.
Ryker lunged forward and grabbed my waist, steadying me before I got a chance to recover–or plummet to the ground.
Adrenaline pushed the air out of my chest as he slowly helped me back to my feet, his hand hot and reassuring on the small of my back. I stared back at him, caught in that strange, tense impasse we’d been dancing in.
It seemed he was caught in that same state, because he didn’t say anything, either. We just stood there, ensnared, lips parting with unspoken words.
Something flickered between us. Too risky to reject, too hard to accept.
Our faces leaned closer the longer we stared at each other, breaths melding.
I knew I should thank him or shove him away. Something.
But, like a coward, my eyes strayed from his, down to his crimson clothes. Gone were the leather uniform and pelts, replaced with an oxenblood ceremonial robe that ended in a cape billowing in the wind.
My lips tightened as I took him in.
Red suited him too well.
Made him look like he’d been born for power, unwavering.
Then my gaze caught on the leather baldric strapped to his chest. No longer empty, it was filled with the daggers he’d hid from me, all with the same purple jewel in the hilt.
My entire body tensed until it hurt to breathe.
I shook my back and his hand off me.
“You scared me,” I mumbled instead of a thank you.
He only nodded, arm falling to his side, as I sidestepped him and marched back to the creaking door.
“You could have scanned the rim from the safety of the tower,” he said, following me inside.
Not if I wanted my incantation to catch, no. “It seems I like living on the edge.”
Easier than admitting I actually cared about this frozen land. I rushed down the steps and put a safe distance between us before I looked back at him. “Did you see anything?”
