Page 18 of Rage of Her Ravens
The mages were fanned out in a V formation. The one in front had long chestnut, hair, warm skin, swirling tattoos over a bare, broad chest, and dark, piercing eyes that rendered me momentarily speechless and turned my legs to jelly. I had a feeling he was the alpha of the pack judging by the raw power that pulsed off him. The pull I sensed coming from him was too strong to be natural. Was he my fated mate, or had he cast a spell over me?
“Why have you come?” I asked him, the power behind my voice rustling the hair off his shoulders.
“To kill Flora and Derrick,” he answered with a grunt, the words forcefully dragged from his lips.
“Why?”
He nodded toward the other two mages behind him. “They killed our parents, and they’re plotting to kill our queen.”
Their parents? I scanned the mages’ faces. They did look related, all with the same large, dark eyes and warm complexions. I was painfully aware of my nieces shaking like leaves in a windstorm as they trembled beside me. I gently rubbed their backs. “Who were your parents?”
The mage gave me a look that would’ve made a lesser witch cower. “Lord and Lady Tobias and Chara Inferni.”
I angled toward my father, a blade piercing my chest at the sparks of rage shining in his eyes. “Father, answer me truthfully.” I swallowed back my fear when his nostrils flared and he growled like a wounded animal. If he and my mother didn’t despise me before, they certainly did so now. “Did you and Mother kill their parents?”
He snarled, flashing sharp incisors. “No.”
“Who killed their parents?” I pressed.
He worked a tic in his jaw, glaring. “Malvolia.”
“You lie!” the alpha mage boomed.
The girls buried their faces in my skirts.
I patted their heads as I gave the alpha mage a hard stare. “He can’t lie,” I answered, doing my best to infuse a note of calm into my voice.
I glared at my growling and grunting father. “I heard you and Mother talking about Thorin in the shed,” I said to him, accusation lacing my words. “I heard everything.”
His jaw dropped. “How, when we were mind-speaking?”
I refused to answer. “Why did you lie about Tari?” My throat constricted at the sound of my sister’s name on my lips.
He struggled against his invisible restraints. “To keep her safe.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
He stopped struggling long enough to shoot eye daggers at me. “Because you would’ve fought us.”
My fear of my father was replaced with resentment. As his blade of betrayal pierced deep into my spine, a rage I’d never known flooded my veins, and I had to clutch the girls to ground my anger. “So you let me think my twin was dead!”
“Yes.” He grunted, struggling to stand. “Let me up, Shiri. There could be more mages.”
“Are there more of you?” I asked the alpha.
“No.” The fire in his eyes had cooled, replaced with two inky, hard pools of stone. A chill snaked up my spine when our gazes locked, and I feared my fated mate would stop at nothing to kill my parents.
I swallowed back bile, forcing myself to be brave, not just for my sake, but for the children. I dug my fingers into their shoulders, then released them when Aurora cried out. “Sorry, baby,” I mouthed to her. My gaze shot to the alpha mage. “What kind of spell are you casting on me?”
“We’re not.” His words came out like searing arrows, burning the air between us.
“You are!” I insisted.
He shook his head. “It might be the mating bond.”
I looked from him to the other two mages. “Are you saying you’re my mates?”
I swore when the three of them nodded.