Ilyan didn’t wait for whoever had passed us to get very far before pulling me beside him and leading me into the large hall.
I had barely caught my breath before I stopped in place. The main ballroom had been transformed into a night club. I no longer felt out of place with my hair and clothing. Flashing lights flickered and vibrated to the beat of the music, lighting the mosh pit as everyone moved together in some odd semblance of a dance.
I didn’t have time to linger as Ilyan pulled me into the crowd, a hundred other bodies instantly pushing against us. He moved us deep into the writhing mass, enclosing us within it. The lights flashed and pulsed as the crowd danced and moved against everyone around them.
Ilyan pulled me into him, his hands fanning out on the bare skin of my back as he moved me against him in a seductive dance. I fought the urge to shy away from him. I cursed my clothes; he wasn’t the only person who would be acquainting themselves with my body tonight. I felt sick.
“Remember to play the part, Silnỳ. Rich, powerful. And don’t touch him unless you know it’s him. I don’t need Edmund to be able to trace you.” I nodded as he whispered in my ear, his hand moving up to cup my cheek for just a moment. “I’ll be close by.” He looked into my eyes, his finger running the length of my jaw bone.
I looked up and screwed my jaw in defiance, my eyes opening in a seductive powerful way that I hoped fit the look Wyn had given me. I popped my hip and squared my chest, trying desperately to mimic the ridiculous movements I had seen Cynthia McFadden do every day of my life. Ilyan nodded once in approval before turning from me, leaving me alone in the crowd.
I couldn’t let my nerves get to me. I kept my jaw tight, my other facial features soft and wide as I was passed from person to person as I made my way through the throng of tightly packed people. I mimicked the sensual dances as I moved against the bodies that pressed against mine in ways that made me blush. I never wanted to be in a place like this again. I was here for Ryland, and that was enough.
A hundred faces blurred together as they danced, each one with hooded lids and open mouths in some drugged-out ecstasy. I danced through bodies so carefully entangled I could never be sure exactly what they were doing. I skirted around couples who had fallen to the floor in a blissful madness that I never wanted to see again. I moved through them, hoping my alert face and body didn’t give me away.
I had almost reached the edge of the wall of people when someone grabbed me around the waist and pulled me into them. My face fell out of place in fear as I whipped around, expecting some attacker. Instead, I looked into the face of Ryland’s friend, Tyler. He held me tightly to him as he looked down in pompous ignorance. His face looked like all the others: glossed over and void of all normal expression. I moved with him for a minute, trying to plan my escape when he leaned down to nibble on my ear. I jumped back in repulsion, remembering all too well what Ryland had told me about private school boys.
“What?” Tyler yelled over the crowd. “Too dirty for you?” He placed his hands on my hips and moved me back to him. I screwed my face back into position and pulled his shirt to bring him to eye level.
“You have no idea.” I let one eyebrow rise in what I hoped was an alluring way. “Get me a drink?” I asked and wound my arm through his, letting him lead me the rest of the way through the crowd.
I didn’t feel comfortable attaching myself to one person, but if I was lucky, he would lead me right to Ryland. I tried desperately to focus on my character and not let my nerves sneak through to give me away.
I gave him a small smile as he thrust a drink into my hands. I could smell the alcohol before it even made it to my lips. Of course there would be heavy drinking; it made sense given the state that everyone was in. I lowered the glass and set it on the table next to us, I didn’t need any distractions.
The raw magical energy that had been boiling under my skin shifted. I checked to see if the barrier was still firmly in place. Being this close to the energies that controlled me was sure doing weird things to my body.
“You okay, little bunny?” Tyler asked in my ear. My irregular magic had caused my cover to slip. I put the face back on as I leaned into Tyler in a poor imitation of what Ilyan had done to me, but I failed miserably.
“You wanna get out of here?” he asked. I cringed—wrong direction.
“Let’s dance,” I yelled and dragged him back toward the mosh pit. Luckily, Tyler didn’t seem to object to my mixed signals; he must have been beyond drunk.
I led him deeper into the horde of people again, my body dancing to the thumping music. He danced behind me blindly, his free hand trailing over the bare skin on my back as we walked; I fought the urge to cringe against his touch.
We weren’t going the direction I needed to go, but now I was faced with the bigger problem of getting rid of him. My big idea had backfired.
I had only moved a few steps when my magic shifted again, this time taking the constrictive blanket with it. My magic reacted hastily to the unexpected freedom, and it took all my strength to keep it inside. Ovailia was right. I was in trouble. I was running out of time. My magic lurched again, still shifting in the same direction. I took a chance and followed the pull. The music continued to thump through me as I danced with Tyler, moving us through the crowd, grateful he was drunk enough to be led along on my little game.
My magic surged even stronger as we reached the edge of the crowd, this time near the DJ table. Tyler grabbed me and pulled me toward him into a position I was not comfortable with. I pushed him away and began to dance on my own, hoping that the alcohol surging through his system wouldn’t make him too possessive.
It did.
He came up behind me, grabbing me roughly as his hands snaked around my waist, lifting the front of my shirt. I jerked away from him, only to be pulled back against him aggressively. I could feel his fingers like claws against my back. Tyler attempted to get me to dance with him for a minute, but his fingers were starting to hurt me, and I fought him, pushing him away from me.
“Come on, baby!” he yelled, coming up to me again. “Don’t fight the power.” He smiled greasily and grabbed my forearm tightly.
I cried out in pain as I tried to fight him, but his hold on me only increased. “Let me go!”
“No, baby, not until you give me what I came for.”
I gasped as he yanked my arm, pain shooting through my shoulder.
“You’re hurting me!” I pleaded as I looked around me in a panic now, desperately searching for Ilyan or someone willing to help me.
“Come on, I know you like it like that.”
“Not with you. Now, let me go!” I yelled as I caught sight of Ilyan breaking his way through the crowd, his jaw tight in anger.
“What? You here to catch a little rich boy? He’ll just murder you like he did his other little bunny.” His fingers dug into me as he shook me, his words cutting deeply. I looked toward Ilyan; my heart plummeted to see him dancing again, staring dangerously at something behind me.
I turned myself roughly against Tyler’s grip to see what Ilyan was staring daggers at. I guess my plight hadn’t gone completely unnoticed. Ryland was striding toward me, his face screwed up in a more furious anger than I had ever seen.
Even with the anger in his beautiful blue eyes, his look made me feel like I was coming home again. My body grew extraordinarily warm. I felt like I could fly away right then. I kept my energy and my desperate need to be with him under control, but just barely. My heart beat even faster as his blue eyes met mine. I could have run to him, if it hadn’t been for the vice grip around my arm.
“You can have him,” Tyler spat, his free hand punching me aggressively across the face.
I fell to the ground just as Edmund’s restraints flew off me in a torrent. I screamed out against the pain, clutching my head in an attempt to keep the overwhelming power of my magic restrained under my skin. The pain in my cheek, the rumbling headache from the impact with Tyler’s fist, were all but forgotte
n as I screamed out, my voice ricocheting off the smooth floor.
It was too much to focus on, restraining the magic and managing the pain. My chest was heaving with the power of my magic, my fingers flexing against my head. I focused on the floor as I yelled out deafeningly, the power moving deeper into me.
“Breathe deeply and push it into your stomach.” Ryland’s voice was like honey in my ear as he lifted me off the floor to hold me against him, his hands resting on my lower back as he moved me to dance along with him.
I followed his directions, not willing to look up at him quite yet, just in case I lost control again. I pressed my face into his neck, almost losing my focus at the intensity of the memories, the joy that his scent caused me. I refocused and pushed it all back into my stomach, focusing on the space behind my belly button.
“Thanks,” I mumbled as the energy was contained. I looked up at him, focusing with all my might on the surplus power I now kept locked in place.
“I told you not to come.” He looked around nervously, and I knew Ilyan was right. We had walked right into a trap.
I followed Ryland’s line of sight, my stomach clenching as ten Trpaslíks came barreling into the large room. They stopped momentarily before the man in the lead directed them out like a fan. We were trapped. Ryland moved us into the crowd, lifting me off the ground to plunge us into the gyrating mass quickly.
“Ilyan said you wouldn’t leave if it was only him.”
“I wouldn’t. But I can’t leave because you are here, either,” Ryland said.
“I can’t just let Edmund take you away from me,” I stated emphatically.
“Stubborn to the end.” He looked down at me, his bright blue eyes sending a shock through my system. He reached over and placed his hand softly against my face, covering my aching jaw where Tyler had just punched me. I leaned into his touch, needing him to be close to me.
“Are you okay?” he asked softly, his hand growing warm as his magic filled me.
I could only nod as my magic lurched again; I jerked with the energy.
“Focus, Jos,” Ryland whispered, bringing me to rest right against him. “Jeez, how long have you been awake?”
“A week,” I whispered. It was becoming harder to keep the energy restrained.
“Ilyan’s an idiot.” He pulled me against him, his cheek against mine. My heart sputtered and I heard Ryland laugh deeply. I suddenly felt very uncomfortable, not being able to see him properly.
“I need to see your eyes.” I pulled away from him, trying to keep my body moving in the odd dance.
“You don’t have to worry about that, Jos; you’ve already walked right into his trap. You saw all the men that swarmed in here, and there are only about ten times more surrounding us.” He smiled, trying to break the fear that gripped me, but it only grew.
“He’s already so far in that it’s a miracle I can remember you at all. I’ll just let this moment be one last anchor.” He smiled, but it was so sad, so heartbroken.
“You need to come with me,” I begged. “We need to get out of here right now.” I pleaded my case to him, but he said nothing. He only smiled sadly at me and pulled my body to press against his.
I should have fought him, begged him further, but my heart was lost in his touch, his smell. I leaned into him, my soul swelling with joy. He pressed his cheek against mine as we moved. He held me so tightly that it felt as if we simply could not get close enough. I welcomed the contact; it felt so right. I felt so whole in that moment; my magic so close to its other half, my heart beating right next to his. We slow danced among the manically dancing pairs, lost in our own little world.
“I’d sacrifice anything,” he sang softly in my ear, the Frank Sinatra song blending with the loud club music. His voice broke; I could tell he was crying. “Come what might…” I pulled my head away to look at him. The glistening tears streaked down his cheeks. “I will not let anything take away what’s standing right in front of me.”
I reached up, my fingertips softly wiping away the wet tears from his face. As my fingers traced the lines of his cheek, the bruises and cuts swam into view. I gasped as I saw him up close; his face, his agony, making everything that much more real. My hand flew to my mouth, my own tears falling down my cheeks.
“Don’t cry,” he whispered. “Please, don’t cry.”
“But, Ryland,” I spoke through my tears, “what has he done to you?” The tears came fast and hard as I placed my hand against his face, the ridges of his swollen jawline hard against my skin.
“It’s okay. You’re here now. Don’t cry.” His voice was soft. He held me tightly and I felt the warmth of his magic surge into my back. As he had for almost every day of my life, he comforted me, even though he could barely move. Even through his pain, his agony, he helped me.
I let the magic in, pulling it into me. It filled me in a way it had never done before, as his warm tendrils blended and moved with my own, intermingling in a familiar way that I never wanted to lose. The energy inside me continued to build uncontrollably, my skin prickling as the surges fought their way out. I knew he felt it, too; his smile was so triumphant, so happy.
“Now, I can never leave you. No matter what happens, no matter where I go. You will always be mine.”
“Forever,” I whispered through the tears.
Ryland leaned toward me, his eyes boring into mine, searching me. In that moment, I didn’t care about the hordes of people surrounding us. I didn’t care about Ilyan frantically yelling at us to stop. I needed him like I needed oxygen. I closed the gap between us and pressed my lips firmly to his.
That’s all it took for my magic to explode.
Fifty-Two
Joclyn
I had been waiting for this kiss for months, dreaming of the way it would feel to have his lips against mine, our bodies pressed together. My fantasies weren’t even close to the reality I was now experiencing.
A warm tingling began in my toes and spread rapidly at his silky touch. His hand trailed up my spine to get lost in my hair. My magic expanded; his, still intertwined with mine. Our magic bubbled together like a pot overflowing. The two separate powers became so infused that I couldn’t tell where mine ended and his began.
He pressed me to him roughly, a deep groan issuing from the back of his throat. I sighed at the sound, the touch, the pressure. My hands wrapped around him, clutching at his hips and elbows in a desperate effort to be closer to him. He answered my call. I gasped as our magic became a white hot heat that rocked inside our bodies with a violent force. The white heat grew, his touch tingled, the kiss deepened. My body became limp in his arms as the magic within me reached a point I could no longer control.
Our combined energies exploded out of us in a blinding, white light. It was the same light as when Ryland had touched my kiss for the first time, but now, it had more force and energy. It whooshed out of us as the ground shook violently in an explosion of energy, fire and wind. Flimsy human bodies were flung away from us as a result of the blast, slamming them into tables and walls with such force that I couldn’t imagine many of them surviving.
Ryland held on to me tightly as screams filled the room. Teenagers ran for the exits in a wall of people that clogged the doorways, which resulted in yelling and fighting as the drunken crowd attempted to escape. I didn’t dare move from Ryland’s embrace; he held me in place, his arms shielding me protectively.
“You couldn’t wait to seal her to you until we had gotten you out of here?” Ilyan yelled as he ran through the crowd, his hair long and blonde again, his skin glowing with energy.
“You knew you weren’t getting me out of here in the first place, Ilyan!” Ryland yelled back.
“Ha!” Ilyan laughed without any humor. “You always did underestimate everyone, Ryland.”
“You walked right into his trap and you accuse me of underestimating! You...” He stopped abruptly, his body twitching violently.
“No!” I yelled, clinging to him; he twitched again,
his arm flying away from me.
“He’s close.” I heard Ilyan mumble from somewhere behind me.
The Trpaslíks who had walked into the room before had begun disentangling themselves from the wreckage around us. I looked around in a panic as more of them began to appear; from beneath the rubble on the main floor, on the balcony that surrounded the large room, in front of every doorway. Tace, Zilla and the other guards appeared out of nowhere to encompass the three of us in a wide circle, each of them with their hands palm side up, prepared for an attack.
The Trpaslíks began to approach us, their steps slow and measured. They kept looking from one to the other, gloating as if they were overjoyed with the prospect of battle.
Ryland twitched again, the violent motion sending him flying to the ground. I sank down with him, my hands hovering uselessly above him; it was like the first dream all over again.
“Fight it, Ryland,” I pleaded.
“Get him out of here, Joclyn,” Ilyan said as sparks flew from his fingertips.
I grabbed Ryland and hung on to him, a gust of wind swirling around us as I prepared to take flight. My wind vanished in fear as an explosion rocked the room. The main doors flew off their hinges, the large slabs of wood flying right toward us. Ilyan raised his hand and stopped them in mid-air before shoving them in another direction, both doors now flying toward the Trpaslíks who were approaching us. The screams of the teenagers who were still in the large hall increased as they watched what was going on.
“Well, well, well.” I jerked away from Ryland at hearing that detestable voice, my eyes searching for him in the mass of people standing in the doorway. Edmund stood in the middle of them, his tall frame and shortly-cropped hair giving him an almost militant look. Next to him stood Timothy and Cail, both of whom looked pleased, anticipating the events about to take place.
Imdalind Ruby Collection One: Kiss of Fire | Eyes of Ember | Scorched Treachery Page 36