Royal House of Shadows: Part 3 of 12 by Gena Showalter

Author:Gena Showalter
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2016-06-14T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 18

They dressed quickly, quietly, and Jane packed a little bag of necessities. Such as the book—Nicolai had been overjoyed to see it—a few robes, snacks and a canteen of water. Laila had not brought any weapons for Odette to use, a fact that disappointed Jane but didn’t surprise her.

“How are you going to invade her dreams?” she asked Nicolai.

“I’ll tell you all about it.” He moved in front of her and gripped her shoulders. Once again he wore the slave’s mask. “When I’m done.”

She knew what that meant—he would be in danger—and her answer was hell, no. “I’m going with you.”

He sighed as if he’d expected such a response and had already resigned himself to it. “I do want to take you into the dream with me, and I will try to do so. Having never done something like that before, I don’t know if it will work. Meanwhile, I want you to stay here.”

“Why?”

He flicked his tongue over an incisor. “If I can’t force her to harm herself, I’ll have to absorb her powers. All of her powers and all the spells she has cast upon herself.”

Jane’s eyes widened. “You can do that?”

A stiff nod. “Most likely I will have to go that route. I tried to invade her dreams while you were sleeping and encountered an unexpected resistance. If the resistance is still there, while I’m in close proximity to her, I’ll have to do something to lower her guard to steal her magic. Something...nonviolent.”

She began to understand, and wanted to throw up. Or maybe throw a punch. “Like...kissing her?” Or more?

Another nod, this one barely discernable.

“You can’t just stab her?” she asked hopefully.

“Not without dying myself. She’s cast a spell that causes any injury I attempt to inflict on her to be directed at myself.”

“Okay, so that’s out.” Jane nibbled on her bottom lip, felt the cuts already there and realized she had been doing a lot of nervous chewing lately. “That explains the power I felt wafting from her, I guess.”

“You felt it?”

“Yep.” She squared her shoulders. “And okay, fine. If you have to kiss her, you have to kiss her. And believe me, I do not envy you. That’s taking one for the team a little far. I mean, I think I’d rather endure the stabbing if I had to kiss her.”

He nearly choked on a laugh. “This is not funny, Jane.”

“I know.” But she’d much rather he laugh than worry over her reaction. “As long as you survive, I’m good with the plan. Please tell me you’ll be able to hurt her once you absorb her powers.”

“Yes.” Absolute determination radiated from him. “I will.”

“Then I guess sticking your tongue down the devil’s throat has a nice enough payoff.” She punched him in the arm. “Good luck, tiger.”

He laughed again, this time far less strained. “Thank you. Now. Will you please stay here?”

“Nope, sorry. I may not possess any magic of my own, but Laila still assumes I’m Odette. You might need me.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.