Page 11 of Shadow Kissed
“His bark is worse than his bite,” he assures me.
I laugh in disbelief. “Is it? Does he ever smile?”
Jasiel chuckles, spinning me around and catching me at my waist. “He does. He can even crack a joke or two.”
“I’ll take your word for it.” It’s hard to believe he does anything but frown.
“Seriously though. He’s right. You would have died out there tonight. Whoever left you out there would have been responsible for your death. That isn’t a prank, miss.”
“Please, call me Reya,” I insist. Who am I dancing and on first-name terms with a Shadow Borne? A soldier runs over to Raegal and whispers something in his ear, snagging my attention. As he listens, his eyes lift straight up to find mine. He stands up and stalks off alongside the soldier back the way he came from.
“Had you ever seen a mutt before tonight?” Jasiel asks me, as we dance around the fire once more. I’m out of breath with the reverie of the dancing.
“Not that close. I’ve seen them from the wall of our village. Their eyes glowing from the forest line around Terleigh. We lost a shoe smith to a pack of them two years ago.”
Jasiel grimaces and says, “They’re ferocious beasts that lack a master to control them.” Our conversation is cut short when the commander comes up behind Jasiel and places a hand on his shoulder.
“Come with me and bring the Asen.” He turns and stalks off without a backward glance. I begrudgingly follow Jasiel to the large tent.
The cheek of him calling me the Asen! I have a name!
We enter his tent. A pile of furs makes up a bed over at the back of the tent. I notice his armour and his glistening blacksword sitting on a small wooden table. Surprisingly, though, that’s as grand as it gets in here.
Raegal takes off his leather waistcoat and discards it on a wooden stool, leaving him clad in only a thin white shirt. “The mutts have followed her scent to our camp.”
Jasiel frowns. “They followed her here, despite our presence?” He walks over to a table and picks up a jug, pouring himself a drink. He offers me one, but I decline, the news of the mutts making me no longer in the mood to drink and dance.
“There are over fifty of them circling the camp,” Raegal says, looking disturbed by this latest development. “Its odd behaviour.”
I chortle, and they both look at me in surprise. “I doubt they are here just for me. You have a camp full of Asen.”
He shakes his head. “Even if we’re travelling with Asen, they don’t normally come near us. They stay away from fear of us. They’ve followed you here.”
“What do we do?” Jasiel asks, becoming a mask of order.
“We put out extra patrols. She’ll have to stay in here tonight,” he says with a reluctant sigh. He gestures briefly at me before returning his attention to his friend.
“But where will you stay?” I ask, and this brings a smirk from him. I’ve never seen him smirk before, and it disarms me a little. You can say what you like about this man, but he is handsome.
“I’ll be sleeping in here too, little Asen,” he tells me, smirking when I gasp in horror.
“No!”
“No?” he says, almost doing a double take when I defy him.
“No. I’m not sleeping in here with you,” I insist, folding my arms across my chest and raising my chin in defiance. He might be in charge of his soldiers, but he sure as hell isn’t in charge of me. “I’d rather be back out there with the mutts than sleep beside one of your kind!”
“Miss, with all due respect. In here with Raegal will be the safest place for you,” Jasiel chips in. I turn my frosty glare on him, and he takes a hasty step back.
“If I cover her scent with my shadows, they shouldn’t try to infiltrate the camp. With any luck, they’ll think they have lost her and move on,” he tells Jasiel, once again talking about me like I’m not there.
“What do you mean by cover my scent with your shadows?” I ask him, not liking the sound of that one bit. “I’d rather your creepy shadows stayed the hell away from me.” The thought of his shadows touching me fills me with disgust. I shudder at the very thought.
Raegal mutters something under his breath, clearly exasperated with me. “I’ll sleep beside you and wrap us in my shadows. This will mask your scent. All they will smell is my shadow magic.”
“There must be another way,” I say. Sleeping next to a man, especially one as attractive and divine as him, is a first for me.
“Put extra guards outside my tent as well. Just to be sure. The sooner dawn arrives, the better.” He disappears behind a curtain and comes back carrying an item of clothing in his hand. “Change into this. It has my scent on it.” He tosses a white shirt to me and gestures to the curtain. I want to protest, but Jasiel looks at me as if to say, please just do as we ask.