Chapter 40
CHAPTER FORTY
SILVANUS
It was quicker to return to the palace and find Medusa than fly across the world to save him. There were vampires on my trail, refusing to obey my commands to leave me alone.
I felt their relief as I returned to Hurlock Island.
Briefly.
I found my friend in my chambers, standing at the balcony in humanoid form.
She turned as I hurried over. “You’re back?”
“He’s in the Werewolf Domain,” I told her. “I can sense him. I don’t know why, but I can.”
“What—”
“Please. I have to get to him. Action now, questions later.” I fell to my knees, the Heart of All anguished as much as I saw she was. “I’m begging you, Medusa.”
My friend. My loyal friend tangled in the shared memories of me and my people. She deserved to be free of me, of everything I’d inflicted upon her.
One day. Soon.
Her lips trembled. “Do you have an exact location?”
I did, the brightness a pinpoint on a mental map. In a cave within the Lost Valley.
She took action instantly, summoning a portal. “Come on.”
“Thank you,” I said as we ran through.
We arrived to find a pack of wolves closing in on the elf. The wolves were naked and in humanoid form, their eyes golden.
By Selene! Aidan again!
Paris was on a bed of furs, sliding away from them. I grabbed him, hefting him into my arms.
Paris yelped at the move, those wonderful eyes wide and terrified.
Bastards. How dare they terrify my elf?
“Touch him and I’ll rip your spines out,” I snarled.
They growled at me, the one at the head of the pack smiling maliciously.
Possibly the alpha. I didn’t care. All that mattered was the precious one, this incredible man in my arms.
He is the one glimmer of goodness in this world, the antidote to this constant spiral of lamenting.
He shouldn’t be, but he was, my yearning as painful as my sorrow.
I want you, Paris Raine.
“This elf needs to die,” the alpha declared. “Then you can follow him, king.”
“In another life,” I retorted, and dashed through the portal.
Back in my chambers, I thought that to be the end of it. But the potential alpha wolf followed us through at the last moment, launching into an attack.
I tossed Paris onto the bed, shooting him an apology as I threw myself at the wolf. I overpowered him quickly, on the edge of breaking his neck.
“No!” Paris cried, halting my move.
I froze.
“Don’t kill him,” he begged, jogging over. “I can’t handle anymore…anymore…” He collapsed, sobbing his beautiful elven heart out.
Before the alpha caused any damage, I knocked him out, ordered him taken to the dungeons. Vampires and thralls entered my chambers, taking him away through a portal Medusa made.
I lowered myself to Paris’s level, my own tears running free. “I’m here,” I said, as if that meant something to him.
My yearning didn’t mean he felt the same.
But I’d like it to.
He sniffled, covering his face, his sobbing agony to my ears.
“Paris…”
“S-sorry,” he replied. “You’re…you’ve just experienced a terrible…oh, fuck.” He lifted his head, then blanched. “Your face. Are you bleeding?” He reached for me.
“Crying,” I answered.
“Oh, yeah. You cry blood.” He shuffled forward, taking my face in his hands.
So soft, so warm, as wonderful as a miracle.
He is a miracle…
He stared into my soul, his cornflower-blue gaze magnificently disarming.
“Paris…”
He crushed his lips to mine, carrying me away on the happy clouds of his kiss.
Goodness. His kisses truly were an escape, a way out of this pain.
I could kiss you forever…
I had to tell him.
I had to confess these new feelings, the compulsion suddenly overwhelming. Honestly, I knew I should wait to understand my feelings better, to sit with them in case they were misplaced.
Sometimes lust and love skirted closely to each other, confusing the mind and the heart.
Yet I broke the kiss and counted to three.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, his hands dropping to his sides.
My right hand found the back of his head, fingers curling in his lovely silver hair. This was it. This is where everything changed.
Forever.
Hesitantly, my nerves butterflies trapped in a jar, I set the words free.
“I think I’ve fallen in love with you.”