Free Seared by Desire by Jennifer T. Alli Page A

permission to leave
the village again.”
    “ Abi, the fire that will destroy your enemies will kill me.
Seraphina already leaves me exhausted as is. The hotter and more
powerful she burns, the more drained I feel. She’s already killing
me, every time she makes an appearance I feel weaker.”
    “ What are you talking about Sara? They aren’t ‘my enemies’,
they’re your enemies as well.”
    “ These people have never done anything to me and I’m not going
to do anything to them.”
    She needed to find her vampire; her time was up. She wouldn’t
find sanctuary in this city now that Abi had found her. More fire
elementals would be called if she wasn’t returned and the longer
she stayed out of their grasps, the more that would be called until
the city was overflowing with them. Summoning the flame within her,
Sara created a wall of fire around the hunting party, sealing them
within its fiery walls. There was no time to wrestle with Seraphina
to make the fire do more than simply burn until it was out of fuel
but there was also no time to regret her lack of care. Throwing
herself into Lance’s saddle, she reached for David and pulled him
onto the horse before spurring the horse into a wild
gallop.
    “ Where are we going David?” she demanded, running blind.
People jumped out of the way, terrified of Lance’s powerful hooves
and the scenery blurred as she ran past it.
    “ What’s going on?”
    “ I asked you a question David, where are we going?”
    Realising that he wasn’t going to get answers to his
questions and wanting to get out of whatever dangerous situation
Sara had dragged him into, David directed her to the nearby tavern.
They dismounted quickly, Sara pulling David by his cold hand into
the building. The inside was well lit, with boisterous men
proceeding to become increasingly inebriated as they threw back
pint after pint of rich ale.
    Feast. Hungry. Ten minutes.
    What? She cursed. You told me that I had at least two hours! What
happened?
    Want more fire. More flames. Burn everything.
    Sara groaned, cursing her rash actions. The fire she had
started to give her time to escape had backfired, slashing away at
the time she had left to search. With only ten minutes until
another episode was upon her, she would have to find Lucian and
hope he could fly her out of the city. She knew older vampires had
the ability to fly and quickly reasoned that as the leader Lucian
had to be the oldest of them all. No more
fire then. “Do you see him?” she demanded,
her heart racing.
    “ Yes, over there.” David raised a hand, pointing to a tall
figure in the distance, surrounded by many others.
    Abandoning her guide, she walked towards him realising with
every step that she took that there was something familiar about
the man. He turned to look at one of the people that surrounded him
and his face became visible. Her heart stopped as she gasped. She
had come looking for the leader of the vampires to help her find
the one that was destined to help her. She had never for even a
second realised that they were one and the same. The doors flew
open and Abigail’s hunting party poured inside, Sara’s flaming red
hair giving away her location instantly. Her eyes flickered between
her friend and her saviour. This could get
tricky, she sighed dejectedly.

Chapter Six – The Problems a Bride
Brings
     
    Lucian had known the instant his bride had stepped into the
tavern. The blood coursing through her veins sang out to him,
urging him to sink his teeth into her neck with each beat of her
heart. It was a struggle to keep his mind on the words that were
floating around him, his fangs practically salivating at the
prospect of the taste of her exotic blood on his tongue. He
couldn’t afford for anyone here to know who she truly was to him.
He suspected that the tavern was a meeting ground for Malachites
and a bride was a weakness they would exploit to the fullest. The
conversation around him faded as she approached him, the