Songs of Vice (The Siren's Call Book 1) by Nicole Bailey

Author:Nicole Bailey [Bailey, Nicole]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-03-15T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER NINETEEN

SAI

Lira studied her reflection in the cabin’s window, her booted feet dipping into a puddle in the grass as she scowled and ran her fingers through her tangled hair. The entire world was rain drenched. Limbs heavy with water bowed towards the earth and dripped into pools that whirled above the grass. I didn’t know what Lira frowned at. She looked even more beautiful than the moment I’d met her, if that was possible—her cheeks flushed with color, her hair mussed as it framed her face, her lips slightly swollen.

Heat coursed through me.

Last night was like standing at the helm of a ship as it went down and refusing to abandon it. It felt like drowning. It felt glorious.

Most of all, though, it terrified me.

Despite that, I couldn’t help but revel in it. Even thinking about Lira bare in the firelight, her eyes filled with reflections of the flames as our bodies tangled together, had me wanting again.

Was it something about her magic that made me feel this way? I couldn’t think of another explanation why I felt drawn to her. It made me wary. Lira is distracting you and distractions cause problems, I could hear Neia saying.

Lira sighed and walked over. “Sorry. I’m a mess.”

A mess? She looked like a deity, but I kept my voice light. “Like a typhoon?”

She cocked her head and looked up at me, her lips parted and glistening and—Goddess kill me I needed to find some way to focus around this woman. “I can’t decide if you continuing to compare me to a storm is a compliment or a slight.”

I nodded towards the path, and we started walking. “It’s a compliment.” Or maybe both. Typhoons were necessary, as I’d told her before. They provided much needed rain, replenished water supply, and removed pollutants. But they could devastate as well.

Lira shrugged, color warming her complexion again. “I’m the least typhoon-like person. You just don’t know me well yet.”

“Or maybe you don’t know yourself well yet.”

She lifted her face again and her crystal eyes—clear like the palest blue of a morning sky—glittered. “Maybe so.”

I wanted to kiss her again, wrap my hands around her waist, push her against a tree, run my fingers along her smooth flesh, watch as she dropped her head back and groaned, move my hands lower and— Damn it, Sai. Focus.

A glitter of magic burst in the air, gold and hazel that fluttered like dust motes. Lira gasped and wrapped her arms around me which did not help my concentration. I settled an arm over her shoulders as I reached my free hand out for the thrush. The glistening form of the bird landed on my palm and dropped a scroll. The creature disappeared again as I unfolded the page.

“What was that?” Lira asked.

I stopped reading even though concern pulsed through me. “You don’t know about the thrushes?”

“It’s a bird?”

“Not exactly. It’s magic. Fae communicate with them.”

She frowned, and my thoughts went to war again.

She’s acting. How could any fae not know about thrushes?

No, she grew up human.

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