Lord of the Wolfyn - By Jessica Andersen Page 0,26

between them. And for the first time in a long, long while, he didn’t feel alone.

Warm skin beneath his palms. Urgent fingers at his waist, his back, his shoulders, sliding into his hair. Heart pounding. Body tightening. A trickle of magic and moonlight, and—

“Abyss.” He broke the kiss, pressed his forehead to hers. “We can’t do this right now.” Priorities.

She was breathing just as heavily as he, and her fingers dug into his wrists, but she nodded. “Yeah.” And neither of them mentioned the “right now” or the way it left open the option of “later.”

He stepped away, not letting himself reach for her again. “We’ll stop at Candida’s first. She’s got some things I’ll want to bring.” Like the poison she had designed for the sorcerer, and maybe a trick or two that could help him keep Reda safe. Because while she couldn’t be his top priority, she had very definitely become his responsibility.

The thought bumped up against the promises he had made to his father’s spirit, but didn’t unsettle them. He was headed where he needed to be going, with the woman who was to guide him. And when he went to Elden, he’d be going alone.

They set off along the track.

The cold, moonlit night had gone quiet, suggesting that the pack had moved on. Reda kept up easily, though she had to take three strides for every two of his. And although he told himself to think about what he needed from Candida, and the route they should take to reach Meriden Arch safely, without running afoul of the packs whose territory they would be traveling through, his thoughts kept circling back to the woman at his side.

As a younger man in Elden, he had gravitated toward the women of the queen’s Special Guard and assertive, weapon-savvy guardsmen’s daughters, as Twilla had been. And in the wolfyn realm he had spent most of his time with Candida or Keely—both alpha bitches, strong leaders. Not the kind of women who would weep or admit their fears. Reda, on the other hand, wore her emotions out in the open, without subterfuge. Yet, strangely, he hadn’t wanted to move away when she cried, hadn’t been impatient with her tears. Maybe part of that was because he understood what it felt like to be uprooted and lost, and, more, to have failed a loved one. But another part of it was less easily defined—he had wanted to hold her, comfort her, protect her, kiss her. And now that he knew her taste and the sexy sound she made at the back of her throat when they kissed, he wanted to do all that and more.

At the thought, his skin heated and his gums itched where his secondaries burned to be set free.

The response was even more discomfiting this time around, because his blood drinker’s power was threatening to lock on to her, binding him more deeply than he could afford. Or was it just that drinking and sexual arousal had become inextricably linked in his mind? Maybe it was as simple as that.

He willed his secondaries far into hiding and quelled the magic. And he resolved to be on his guard.

After nearly an hour’s hike, they turned up the last narrow track leading to Candida’s cave, where she lived the lone existence she preferred, close enough to the pack to mediate squabbles and provide the healing and auguring that were her specialties, yet far enough away to discourage drop-in visits.

“Hope she’s not out running,” he said as they headed up the last ridge, which crested right before where the high hilltop flattened out in front of Candida’s cave. “She doesn’t go out with the pack every moon time, but will take a run now and then.” Aware of Reda’s nerves—which were understandable given that she’d been raised on the Rutakoppchen version of wolfyn lore—he continued, “She’s an inventor, one of the best at figuring out how to take human tech and make it run off magical power cells they use for energy here. In fact—”

He broke off, blood icing as he scented smoke, thick with the rank odors of searing hair and burning flesh. Worse was the prickle of stale, foul magic.

“No!” he shouted. “Candida!”

He bolted over the last rise with Reda at his heels.

The entrance to the cave was a churned-up mess, with wisps of dark smoke curling around the top edge of the unlit opening. His heart hammered a sick, awful beat as he ducked inside and hit the