“No, my dear.” He kneels before me and gazes into my eyes, making me realize his aren’t blue at all; they’re all the colors of the aurora, dancing to a hidden moon. “There are no demons here.”
“But. . .” Unraveling my arms from around my naked body, I reach for my headache, hoping maybe I’d been hallucinating. Nope. The protrusions are still there.
“Those are most unexpected, little fawn, but rest assured, you are no different than you were before.”
I suppose that should be comforting. I’m still the horny girl crying the shower, now with real horns. “Oh.”
“Oh?” he mimics. His gaze rakes over me, and he chuckles again, then murmurs as though I’m not right here, “I believe our doe isn’t fond of that idea.”
I follow his gaze over my shoulder. The room is much deeper than I’d thought, and too lavish to be Hell unless I’m speaking to the Devil himself. In fact, the four-poster bed with pillars of such pure crystal that they refract light throughout the room suggests this is more likely Heaven. I scrunch my nose. If so, hopefully it’s more fun than the books imply.
“Who are you—oh!” Whipping my head around, I come face-to-face with a massive canine.
Massive is an understatement. There’s no way I’d consider this animal a dog. A deep rumbling purr vibrates the air between us. Its fur is so gray it almost looks blue, and its stormy eyes are so earnest I could’ve sworn—
“Fuck!” I clutch my head as another wave of pain wracks through me, shooting straight to my chest. My fingers tangle around the protrusions, and I curl protectively around my throbbing heart.
Suddenly, the air is so humid I can’t breathe. Like falling through the mirror, but worse, because my heart is trying to punch through my chest and jump onto the wolf’s back. Only the wolf is gone. In its place stands a…man? A big, fuzzy man.
“She’s losing consciousness, pet.” Sexy Wizard mutters.
“I’m fine,” I insist, but my voice is so weak even I don’t believe me.
“Don’t worry,” the newcomer says, his honeyed voice like the caress of morning dew on velvet petals. I long to be a rose, just so he can deflower me. “I’ve got you.”
“Wh-who?”
He’s so close I feel his breath ghost over my cheek like steam, his gaze like a gray sky pelting the window with rain on a cozy day.
My vision blurs, and in the next breath, I let myself fall into the fur blanket that wraps me tight.
Chapter Four
Vulf
“She’s shaking, but she’s breathing,” I state the obvious in an attempt to maintain my composure.
She’s alive. Alive, and here, curled against my side like a frail fawn, buried in my coat like I will keep her safe. It’s only partially true. This woman is nobody’s prey. She doesn’t need my protection, but she has it all the same. Nothing will hurt her now.
“Was it us?” I ask with an edge of panic. “Did you scare her with all the talk of change?”
Azuran snorts. “My love, I’m not the one who hasn’t stopped growling since her arrival.”
My heart leaps to my throat. Sure enough, a possessive purr is bouncing around the crystal room. I swallow it down with a groan. “Fuck me.”
Azuran takes pity on me, rubbing the scruff of my mane opposite where Terra slumbers. “Don’t worry, pet. She’ll come around. She was born to be ours.”
“How do you know?”
Azuran pauses his affections to give me a meaningful look.
“No—you don’t mean it.” I’m helpless to the purr ricocheting up my chest again. “Really?”
“You know the answer.” His eyes run the length of Terra’s antlers. “Between that, and the Vitalin antlers, we now know why my conjuring magic was drawn to her.”
“You already knew, didn’t you?”
Azuran shot me a cocky grin. “I merely suspected.”
