Free Dark Prince's Desire by Jessa Slade Page B

silly.”
    “Never.”
    And since she was touching him, she knew he told the truth. So she kissed him again.
    The pterodactyl made a disapproving noise and took to the air, flying in a tight circle at the end of its chain.
    “Cover yourselves,” EveStar said. “I will push you off.”
    Yelena grabbed a corner of the velvet throw and tugged it over Raze. “I just don’t see how the—”
    The phae flattened her eerie hands against the stern and shoved. Sand screamed under the hull as the boat drifted impossibly forward. The pterodactyl echoed the sound then dove.
    The prow wrenched down. Yelena threw her arm over Raze, trying to anchor him as the boat tilted. Sparkling black sand poured over the bulwark like a wave of night.
    Raze pulled the velvet over their heads just as the sand engulfed them.
    * * *
    At the quiet sound of lapping water, Yelena carefully nudged back the velvet. Sand sloughed away, drifting into streamers of glittering smoke. How...? Where...?
    The space around them was as dark as the sand had been and almost as sparkly.
    She recognized the veins of phosphorescent light across the ceiling of Raze’s cavern and let out a relieved sigh. But just as quickly, she sucked in the same breath and flicked the cover back from Raze.
    Eyes closed. So still. She settled her fingertips against his neck, feeling... She let out the breath one last time and flattened her palm over his chest, letting the steady rise and fall comfort her for a moment.
    She glanced around warily. The boat floated on a dark lake, though she glimpsed veins of the same crystals illuminating the depths beneath them. She’d smelled this wet, mineral scent when Raze had first brought her to his cavern, and she’d suspected there was a spring somewhere nearby. But this...
    She trailed her hand over the edge and let out a soft sound of surprise. Though the air was cool, the water was warm, almost hot. She cast a wry glance at her unconscious passenger. She wouldn’t have thought him the hot-tubbing type.
    The pterodactyl floated quietly in front of the boat, its neck twisted to stare at its ghostly white reflection. The raw scales where the iron collar chafed it looked smoother, mostly healed; if the water had soothed that squawking beast, she hoped it would do Raze some good too.
    She ladled a handful over his brow, and his eyes opened, the usually stormy gray lightened to silver with the crystalline light above them.
    She realized she was grinning like a fool. “Rise and shine, handsome.”
    “You are confused,” he said, his voice rough.
    “True. I suppose it’s always night down here.”
    “Not with you.” He caught her hand and pressed a kiss to her knuckles.
    This time the courtly gesture made her blush, though she knew she should concentrate on more important things. “How badly are you hurt?”
    He shifted, grimacing, and she helped him sit up. “Could have been worse,” he said, with more stoicism than she thought was necessary. “We could have been stripped to our elemental components and rewoven into the illusions of the court.”
    With him sitting, she was able to examine his back. His damaged trousers clung precariously around his hips. “You were mostly stripped.”
    He winced as he craned his neck to follow the light touch of her fingers to his scalded shoulders. “The real damage is to the wards that locked the portals. Without the geasa powered directly through me, through my skin and blood, the wards will fail.”
    She paused in her examination, a flicker of uneasy excitement zinging through her. If the locks on the portals failed, she could leave the phaedrealii whenever she wished. She had already reached the verita luna once and been close twice more; obviously her misconnection with the change was correcting itself.
    His gaze was locked on her, as if he was trying to read her mind, so she kept her focus on carefully pouring water over his skin to wash away the rose-petal dust, or whatever a busted illusion