Shaedes of Gray: A Shaede Assassin Novel

self. I’d been unfeeling for so long, the walls I’d put up began to crumble, and I thought I would start screaming and never stop.

My gaze absorbed the cold, unwelcome studio. Everything about it spoke of detachment. The white furnishings and cold brick walls. The polished concrete countertops, sparsely covered and shining with an antiseptic quality that made me shudder. It was more than I could take. To see what I had become, what I had reduced myself to . . .

I turned, and Ty beamed at me. It was one of his huge, unguarded smiles that usually made me want to slap his face and then strip off all his clothes. The joy of that expression seeped into my pores, and all I wanted was to be taken away from my cold, unfeeling nature for a little while, at least.

I rushed to him, twining my fingers through the thick locks of his hair, and kissed him. My mouth pressed hard against his, and I ran my tongue along the cool skin of his parted lips. His arms hung limp at his sides, and I guided them around the small of my back so I could press my body closer. Slowly, I traced my hands up his arms and shoulders, and my mouth tasted the flesh at his neck. His scent, the delicious smell that had no comparison, intoxicated me, and I inhaled deeply at his throat before biting at the skin there. He sucked in his breath between his teeth, and I felt his hands leave my back to wrap around my arms just above my elbow. He gently pushed me away.

“No, Darian,” he said.

I lunged toward him, determined to have my way. “What do you mean no? You’ve been after me for months, and now no?”

“You’re angry and hurt, and I don’t want to be some kind of revenge screw so you can feel better about something.”

“Why are you saying this?” I demanded. “Revenge screw? You’re acting like I’m using you to get back at a boyfriend or something.”

“Isn’t that what you’re doing?”

His calm answer pushed me closer to the edge. Couldn’t he just shut up and act like a selfish, sex-starved man for an hour or so? “You think I’m doing this because of Xander? You think I’m trying to make him jealous or something?”

“No,” he said, too calm. “I think you’re doing this because of Azriel.”

“Get out!” I yelled at the top of my lungs.

I didn’t even have to wish to make him leave. He turned, gone before I could beg him to come back.

Chapter 14

Raif didn’t say anything to me about my outburst at Xander’s. We trained like we usually did, but Raif decided to quit early, which was out of character for his never-say-die attitude. He looked uneasy. Great. Apparently, he was going to bring up my outburst.

“War is serious business, Darian,” he said. “And we are at war.”

“I’m not at war,” I insisted. “I’m hired help. I have only one job to do.”

Raif laughed, and it always sounded strange coming out of his hard-lined mouth. “You are a very stubborn woman. Do you know that?”

I shrugged. “I’ve been called worse.”

“I want you to know I was never in favor of information being withheld from you. It was my king’s decision. I must abide by his ruling.”

Touching. Raif was reaching out, albeit a little stiffly. “I appreciate that,” I said. “But I don’t like being played with. I’m not just going to sit here and pretend that it’s all water under the bridge, because it isn’t. I’ve been lied to long enough, and I don’t want to be lied to again.”

“I’ll level with you,” Raif said, “because I believe a soldier must know what he is fighting for if he is to commit to battle. Azriel is Alexander’s son. He’s been in exile for almost a hundred years. That was the last time he tried to rise against his father. Obviously, he didn’t succeed, and his punishment was banishment. He was kept comfortable, as was his due—under guard, of course.”

Sure, of course. Why the hell not?

“A few months ago, he managed to evade the detachment Xander had assigned to watch over him. He came straight to Seattle, so naturally we followed. Curious as to what might have drawn his interest, we came to only one conclusion: He came for you.”

If he’d kicked me to the curb all those years ago, leaving me convinced he’d been killed, I couldn’t imagine he was looking for a lover’s reunion. “Maybe he just missed the city? He always loved it here. Besides, it’s not like he came out of hiding to take me out to dinner or anything, Raif.”

Raif shrugged as if he weren’t interested in my opinion. “Either way, he must be dealt with.”

“So why kill him now?” I asked. I couldn’t imagine a father signing his son’s death warrant, but Xander had done it easily enough. “Why not lock him up, keep him under house arrest like you did before?”

“How do you suppose we do that?” Raif asked. “He managed to escape once. He’d do it again.”

“What about the rope you used on me?” I suggested. “I couldn’t move or transform. We could tie him up with it.”

“Lyhtan hair,” Raif said. “That’s what the rope was made of. He’s become much too dangerous to be simply restrained or imprisoned. No. He’s crafty. Deadly. The best student I ever trained. And you’ll have to be better than him if you want to beat him at his own game.”

I got deadly. In fact, I considered myself a tad deadly. But dangerous is never good. “Dangerous how?” I asked, banishing the image of being bound with Lyhtan hair from my mind.

“Three of my best men were ambushed just before dawn yesterday,” Raif said. “They were torn limb from limb.”

“By Lyhtans?”

Raif nodded. “I assume so. We’re tracking them now, but they’re not so easy to find. Elusive creatures”—he almost spat the word—“and violent to an extreme.”

“And you’re sure Azriel commands them?”

“Yes. He sent an envoy a month ago.”

“What was the message?”

“ ‘Surrender the throne,’ ” Raif said.

“Nothing else?”

“Nothing.”

I had to admit, it sounded like Azriel. He didn’t mince words. “What does he want with Xander’s throne?”

“What does any usurper want?” Raif asked. “Power. Think, Darian: Kingdoms are not often inherited in our world—not when the king might live for millennia. Azriel would be nothing more than Xander’s son for what might as well be an eternity. A crown prince, of course, but an impotent figurehead. Azriel craves that which he might never have: a king’s crown upon his head and the power to command those under his rule. And who better to help him in his endeavors than an army of Lyhtans? Vicious killers”—Raif paused and massaged his temples between his thumb and fingers—“and easy to control.”

“But why would he want me?” I asked. Did he, perhaps, hope to kill me before I could kill him? I wondered what death would be like for a Shaede. Would I wander like a spirit, confined to shadows for all eternity, insubstantial and unrecognized?

“You are his weakness,” Raif said, taking me by surprise. “His Achilles’ heel.”

“What makes you say that?” I said.

“I would have killed you decades ago,” Raif answered with a frankness that told me he wasn’t kidding, even a little.

“Who are the three who made others?” I needed to know, in some perverse way. Who were these Shaedes that had taken human lives and transformed them into something else altogether?

Raif contemplated his answer. I think he wrestled with whether he wanted to tell me or not, but he finally spoke. “Anya, who made Dimitri, her mate. Azriel, who made you.” Raif paused and looked at the floor. “And