"Not long. A couple of hours." He shrugged. "I doubt anyone has even realized you’re gone yet."
Azriel would have. He’d have felt it, even if—thanks to the magic barrier—he’d been incapable of doing anything about it.
As his name ran through my mind, I felt the heat of his presence surge across the foul-smelling darkness. Lucian stopped abruptly. "I think your reaper just arrived."
"I think you might be right." I paused beside him. "Azriel?"
He stepped out of the shadows, Valdis held by his left side, her blade flickering with blue fire. The flames spun through the darkness like brief flashes of lightning.
His stormy gaze ran from me to Lucian then back again, but all he said was, "Are you all right?"
"No, actually, I feel like shit and I smell like it, too. Right now I just want to get somewhere safe and take a bath."
"I can take—"
"No," Lucian said forcibly. "I will take her to my apartment. She’ll be safe—"
"I think it highly unlikely she would be safe with the likes of you," Azriel commented, his tone even but his grip on Valdis seeming to tighten. The fire along her blade flared.
"And yet it was me who rescued her, not you, reaper."
"Oh for God’s sake, enough with this macho bullshit!" I all but exploded. "I’ll fucking take care of myself, thank you very much."
Lucian swung around. "I did not mean that you couldn’t—"
I placed a hand on his arm, stopping him. "I know, and thank you for both the concern and the rescue, but right now I need to be away from people I care about."
"I, like you, am more than able to take care of myself," he retorted. "And not just with a gun—"