Total pages in book: 131
Estimated words: 121924 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 610(@200wpm)___ 488(@250wpm)___ 406(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 121924 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 610(@200wpm)___ 488(@250wpm)___ 406(@300wpm)
A small group of officiates materialized. One plopped himself on the bench beside her—his amber eyes marking him a Lykaon. A rather gorgeous one, in fact.
He flashed her a lopsided grin that made a dimple pop out. “There you are.” He planted a quick kiss on her mouth, humming as she fisted his walnut-brown hair. When he pulled back, his attention drifted to me. He squinted. “So you’re the human Sayer.”
“She is,” Khalida unnecessarily confirmed before locking her gaze on me. “This mountain of muscle is Quillen. Alongside him we have our cute Nemean couple, Nakoa and Soule. The beautiful Delphiae on your right is Layna, and beside her is—”
“Jelani,” the blond butted in, his eyes on me. “We’ve met already.”
“Everyone, meet Anara, one of our candidates. I’m planning to take her under my wing,” Khalida announced, surprising me.
Quillen’s grin wavered. “Is that a good idea?” he asked her, piling food on his pewter. “You might be a little too, you know, special to make a good mentor.”
Her brow very slowly inched up. “By special, you mean weird?”
“I mean you’re someone who starts fires when they’re upset.”
I paused in transferring vegetables to my pewter. “You still do that?”
“Not as often as I used to,” she replied before turning back to Quillen. “And as it happens, I have faith in Anara’s ability to get through Xalbia.”
“I’m curious, why would you want to try for a place in the Order?” Layna asked me, the cadence of her voice a little sing-songy.
“I don’t,” I told her, stabbing my fork into a carrot. “The Sovereigns want to see how I perform in the try-outs. Honestly, I’d quit if they hadn’t mentioned something about having other ways they could tease out my strengths and weaknesses.”
Layna pulled a face, tucking a chin-length white-blonde lock behind her ear. “That wouldn’t be anything fun.”
Biting into my carrot, I looked from Quillen to Khalida. “Onto a lighter subject, I’m guessing you two are a couple.”
Khalida pulled a face. “We keep things light. Most in the Order see no point in building solid relationships. We’re not allowed to marry, so there aren’t a lot of true couples in the Order. Which isn’t to say that there’s no exclusivity.” She gestured from herself to Quillen. “We’re exclusive, for instance.”
“Soule and I aren’t,” Nakoa interjected as Soule loaded both her pewter and his own with food. “Casual sex is something of the norm around here.”
His lips quirking, Soule scratched his stubbly jaw. “We’re not exclusive? Is that why you whacked a woman over the head with a tankard yesterday for smiling at me?” he asked in a deliciously rumbly voice.
Batting her waterfall of corkscrew curls over her shoulder, Nakoa shot him an arch look. “It wasn’t because she smiled at you. That was over something else.”
“Which is?” he pushed.
The corners of her brown eyes tightened. “Personal,” she responded. “Respect my privacy.”
Grinning, he cut his gaze to mine. “We’re exclusive,” he said quietly. Or aimed to say quietly—his deep voice easily carried.
Her lips flattening, she glared at him. “Remember how we covered that you can’t whisper for shit?”
Fighting a smile, I looked from Layna to Jelani. “Are you two together?”
“What? Ew,” she blurted out as Jelani barked a, “Hell, no.”
I blinked, startled by the rather vehement replies.
“It would be way too weird,” she added with a shudder as the two exchanged an awkward look. “We’re friends.”
“Just friends,” he insisted.
Hmm, I personally thought they protested a little too much. “Right.” Turning back to Khalida, I cut into my meat. “Are the other Phoenixian godkin who were sent here with you nine years ago still around?”
“They’re at Deimos, but they’re not part of the Order,” she replied. “They didn’t make it through Xalbia.”
“Since you’re taking me under your wing and all, maybe you could tell me what Xalbia is.” I bit into the chicken dangling from my fork.
She flashed me a sympathetic smile. “Nothing you’re going to enjoy, which is why many drop out. But if you get through it, you become one of us.”
A loud laugh made me turn my head without thought. A bunch of officiates were amused at the expense of another, who appeared to have gotten stew all over himself. I idly swept my gaze along the bench of people as I was turning my attention back to the pair opposite me. And my stomach hardened as my eyes clashed with Talon’s striking gaze.
He sat amongst a crowd of people, his body language screaming “power” and “authority.” He looked supremely relaxed yet somehow also coiled to strike.
There was nothing for me to read in that steady stare he pinned on me. He was careful to keep it neutral. But I would imagine he was still trying to figure out how a Sayer could be human.
Good luck with that.
Resettling my focus on Khalida, I asked, “Is it true that Talon never speaks?”