Free Shadowborn by Jocelyn Adams Page A

been.”
    “Don’t do this. I love you. She means nothing to me.”
    “Then that makes me sad, considering you’ll be married to her for the rest of your life. Will the ancestors mate her to you, too?”
    He gave a frantic shake of his head, but his eyes reflected a glint of fear. “I won’t allow it.”
    Hurting everywhere, I faced the dark woods. “It’s none of my business. I’m done talking about this. Don’t come to Dun Bray anymore unless there’s official fae business.” I can’t bear it.
    I swallowed my emotion like a barbed pill and glanced over my shoulder. A tear crawled down his face, sparkling in the moonlight. My heart shattered into a million shards of agony. The whirlwind of pain in my chest became unbearable. I brought my hand to my constricted throat as I walked toward the others waiting at the edge of the forest.
    Each step punctuated my isolation, my loneliness—a growing rift standing between me and all I’d ever wanted. Liam.
    Sudden silence halted me. Chafed against my raw nerves. I listened and wiped a stray tear from my cheek, concentrating on the landscape. Not a sound came from the surrounding trees as if every living thing for miles had fled.
    Goddess, lend me your sight.
    Flashes of trees and fields filled my mind, all silent and still. Moonlight cast an eerie silver glow over everything. I looked down from above as if I’d hijacked the eyes of some winged creature flying overhead.
    A tiny movement drew me back to the edge of a forest, shadow moving within shadow.
    I drew in a breath. “Bring your Light!” I screamed. “Now!” Mine flared to life, driving back the darkness in a twenty-foot radius. Guttural protests rose in a ruckus around me.
    The others approached from the far side of the field, and Liam’s footsteps came from behind me, their combined Light turning night to midday brightness.
    In the distance, a low, hoarse voice said, “Are you afraid of the dark, Lila Gray?”
    “A little cliché, don’t you think? I’m made of Light, shithead. So that would be a big, fat no.”
    Hissing laughter faded away. “Your soul is marked, faerie queen.”
    Nix and Liam reached me together, followed shortly after by a huffing Gallagher and Donovan.
    “What is it?” Nix asked, his brow drawn down.
    “I know who the Shadowborn were hired to kill.”
    Liam wiped a hand down his face. “Let me guess. Us?”
    “More specifically, me. I guess I’m pissing everybody off today.” I should have been afraid, but I wasn’t. My rage needed somewhere to go, a purpose to draw it away from the ones I cared about. The shadow freaks would fit the bill just fine.
    “Wait.” Gallagher shook a finger at nothing in particular. “How do you know this?”
    “I sort of saw one.” I pranced in place, expelling some energy.
    Four faces paled. Donovan shut his eyes, muttering, “No. No, no, no.”
    When Gallagher gathered his chin off the ground, he invaded my space, staring nose to nose with me. “That is not possible. If you speak the truth, then you should be lost to us.”
    I poked a finger into his sternum and forced him back a step. “I used my Sight when I noticed the silence and saw shadows moving along the ground. Then one of them spoke in a hoarse language, sort of like the Sluagh, and said my soul had been marked.”
    “Oh, dear, merciful Goddess.” Gallagher faced the heavens.
    “What now?” Nix asked.
    “We go meet the elves, that’s what.” I poured more energy into my skin, lighting the path in front of me as I sped toward the woods. When nobody followed, I turned to them. “What?”
    Gallagher set his glower on me. “I don’t think you’ve grasped the seriousness of what just occurred, Lila. Nobody sees or speaks to the Shadowborn and walks away with his soul. They live for the hunt. For you to survive their attack, they will now view you as the ultimate prey. They are impossible to track and incessant when it comes to something they want. Once their target has