The Viin


    The stars in the night sky were beaming down at him when he opened his eyes, as was one Alexander Kingsley, who seemed to havee back to himself far toote to save either Trystan or Sage from injury.


    Sage!


    He bent his torso up, ignoring the ck spots over his vision as he stood on the balcony, stumbling toward the branch she’d been trapped atop.


    Gone. It was gone.


    “No!” Trystan yelled. “Sage!”


    “Down here!” The panicked voiceing from just below the balcony’s edge felt like a sharp syringe that injected immediate relief straight into his pounding heart.


    “Gods!” He ran for the railing and marveled at how quickly that relief fled for the hills. There she was, holding tight to a vine hanging out of a crack in the stone, her arms and legs wrapped tightly as it swayed back and forth in the breeze. “What happened?”


    She hesitated before speaking, the furrow in her brow absurdly making him want to smile. “Getting over my fear of heights as intensely as possible, apparently.”


    He propped his chin up on his palm, resting against the railing in a show of casualness. “How is it going?”


    “Oh, well, you know my theory. Can’t be scared if you’re dead.” She shrugged, pretending to let go for a moment.


    “Stop it!” He dropped to his stomach, leaning through the balcony’s railing, grabbing at the top of the vine. “All right, you proved your point, little tornado. I’m pulling you up.”


    He started tugging, his biceps straining with each pull, but knowing Sage was on the end of it, he pulled harder.


    “Oh, this is like a little full-circle moment, isn’t it?” she said as he huffed and tugged and strained.


    “How”—he panted—“do you figure”—almost there—“that.”


    “You’re usually pushing people off edges, and now you’re pulling someone up one.”


    Not someone, he thought.


    You.


    His power stirred beneath his skin as she came closer, and through the meshting at her back, he could see a spark of rainbow color from her scar. Her grip loosened for a second, one hand letting gopletely. “Agh!” she cried out, and Trystan felt a sliver of his soul leave his body, likely to never return.


    He wondered if, on his deathbed, whatever dark figure came to escort him into the afterlife would be kind enough to ry precisely how many years Evie Sage had knocked from his lifespan. By his mark, he was pushing five.


    “I’m okay! My dagger burned my thigh,” she said. Good. This was the one time he’d allow himself a clear mental image of her thighs, the thought of her shapely, smooth skin beneath his hands calming his every nerve ending until pulling her up became second nature. Her hand reached for his, and then he had her over the railing and in his arms, the force of it causing both of them to topple to the ground.


    His hands on her cheeks, he scanned every inch of her for injury. “Is anything hurt? Broken?”


    “Besides my sense of safety and security?” She leaned one of her cheeks against his chest, breathing heavily. “I’m fine. Just let me catch my breath.”


    It was no longer eptable for his thoughts to be on his apprentice’s thighs, but considering they were draped over either side of his waist, the task was significantly more difficult now.


    The warmth of her made everything in him go rigid. And he did mean everything.


    Mortifyingly.


    “I hate this stupid tree house,” she moaned into his silk shirt, the warmth of her cheek permeating the thin fabric and sinking deep until it hit somewhere in the vicinity of his heart.


    “Good. I n to turn it to ash before the next sunrise.”


    “Just be sure Lord Fowler is inside,” she grumbled, and the vibration against his skin sent an unpleasant sensation from the top of his head to the tips of his fingers. Her honest cruelty was startlingly arousing, proving once and for all that Trystan was truly a sinister son of a bitch.


    “What happened to ying his game and enjoying ourselves?” he asked with arched condescension.


    She raised her head, and his chest felt chilled from the absence of warmth. It was merely a matter of body temperature; it had little to do with emotion. Save for the annoying one telling him to pull her back against him.


    “I’d enjoy myself quite thoroughly if Lord Fowler was on fire,” she said quietly, a subtle smirk on her lips.


    “Terrible thing to be on your bad side, Sage,” he said tly, sucking all feeling from his voice as she scooted off him. Out of necessity. She had been inches away from brushing against an appendage that would give a great deal of him away.


    She leaned back in,ying a hand on his shoulder to help her stay steady, and he flinched away instinctively. She masked the hurt with a smile, and he hated himself for being yet another person in her life who gave her cause to do so. “You would know, wouldn’t you, sir?”


    “Ha! I got ’im! I got the frog!” A booming voice had them both knocking into each other as they scrambled to stand.


    A crowd had formed in the balcony doorway, light spilling out from the library beyond. And standing before them was a man Trystan hated so intensely, his vision burned in bright, angry color.


    Granted, he’d never met the man before that moment, but he didn’t need to know much beyond Kingsley gripped in his fist and the hungry, disgusting eyes roving over Sage like she was a morsel up for grabbing.


    “I won a night with The Wicked Woman!” he called, licking his lips as his buddies mmed hands against his back, and Sage stiffened beside him, reaching out to grab Trystan’s arm.


    “Oh gods.” Sage’s face took on a grayish hue, like all the blood in her body had escaped to parts unknown. “Lord Fowler?” Sage didn’t go to Trystan for aid, and that fucking stung.


    He’d been a right bastard to her for the past few weeks, but surely she considered him a safer option for assistance than a rtive stranger who had drugged them before forcing them into a hostage dinner party.


    He had just saved her from falling to her death, hadn’t he?


    Just as Trystan had suspected, Fowler acted in the sameckadaisical manner he always did, taking the fake crown off his head and cing it atop the man holding Kingsley in hisrge fists.


    Trystan imagined those hands pawing at Sage in the dark, and his magic pooled at his feet. He made no attempt to call it back. He wasn’t in the habit of fighting losing battles.


    “I’m afraid our friend The Destroyer here won your game fair and square, Ms. Sage.” Fowler clicked his tongue sympathetically, shoving “The Destroyer” toward them.


    “Your name is…The Destroyer?” Sage pursed her lips, looking up at Trystan with a bewildered expression. “That doesn’t bode well for me, does it?”


    Trystan resisted the urge to retch.


    The Destroyer walked toward them, hisrge boots nging against the ground until he was a mere foot away from Sage. Close enough.


    Trystan mmed his fist into The Destroyer’s stomach before grabbing the hand that held Kingsley and twisting it behind the reprobate’s back until he cried out and released Kingsley right into Trystan’s waiting palm.


    “You rutting bastard!” The man iled in his arms, but Trystan managed to restrain him with one hand with surprising ease for a man of his size. “I won that bitch fair and square.”


    Trystan sighed, cing Kingsley into Sage’s palm. “Hold him.” And before another word was spoken, Trystan had gripped The Destroyer by the cor and flung him over the balcony’s edge.


    Brushing his hands against his pants, he listened closely as the man screamed the whole way down.


    Sage stared at Trystan with a ckened jaw, as did Kingsley, who pulled up a sign that read: Destroyed.


    Fowler pped,ughing jovially as he patted Trystan on the back. “Well done, old friend. He’s broken three of my favorite chairs, and I couldn’t think of a proper punishment.”


    Trystan red, and Fowler had the sense to take his hand away, but not before pushing Trystan toward Sage until they were toe to toe. “And now you im your prize!”


    What?


    “Kindly escort The Viin and his lovely apprentice to the lovers’ suite.”


    FUCK. FUCK. FUCK. FUCK.


    No. This isn’t happening.


    “The Viin has won a night with The Wicked Woman!”


    Yes. It is.