Warrior's Dawn (Fire and Tears) by Isabo Kelly

Author:Isabo Kelly [Kelly, Isabo]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
Published: 2014-07-28T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter Fourteen

Althir stalked through the upper levels of the bakery and chocolatier the entire time Mina was away. Once cleaned and changed into clothes that were as close a fit as he could find, he’d searched the entire building. He wasn’t sure what he was looking for, but he knew this place was different to her—not just another hiding spot. He suspected it was her family home, but she’d led him to another chocolatier before. He wanted to be sure.

She’d been gone for more than an hour when he discovered the pictograph painting of her when she was younger, at a stage when she was just starting to show the woman she’d grow into. She stood smiling with an older couple and young man nearly a head taller than her. The young man’s eyes looked just like Mina’s. He had an arm over her shoulder and a crooked smile that also reminded Althir of Mina.

The artwork wasn’t done by a great master, but the brushstrokes were sufficient to bring the small family to life. And to show a depth of love and companionship he couldn’t quite comprehend. He and Ulric had never been that close. When their parents died during the first goblin war, their relationship had grown even more distant.

Elves rarely had two children as close together as Althir was with Ulric. Usually elven siblings grew up as part of completely different generations. Althir always wished his parents had been smart enough to stick to that pattern. Growing up in Ulric’s perfect shadow had been…a lifelong annoyance.

Althir stared at the picture, knowing he was looking at Mina’s parents and brother. As he’d guessed, this had been her home before the war. Her earlier tears made sense. Returning home, seeing the remains and knowing what had been lost in the intervening years was never easy.

He returned the picture where he’d found it and continued to stalk through the building, too uneasy to rest. Being forced to wait, not being able to watch out for her, went against the grain. He wasn’t sure when it had become so important to him that she remain safe, when he’d started to think it necessary to keep her alive. But he did.

Seeing all the cuts and injuries she’d taken in their fight to get to the List had only intensified that instinct. Letting her leave without him had been one of the hardest things he’d ever done. If not for her reminder that the List itself did need to be guarded, he would have followed her, despite her insistence he stay behind.

He’d lost several hundred years off his long life watching the Sorcerer’s knife bite into her throat. Luckily the knife hadn’t cut deep. He’d barely been able to keep up his casual façade, though, and for the first time in his life, he wasn’t sure his charm—and his ability to lie—would hold out against the raging of emotion he had to contain and hide.

His emotional state hadn’t been helped by the sight of all the cuts and bruises decorating her lush body.

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