Ravage by Lacey Andersen (ebook reader online txt) 📕

Instantly, I’m gasping in air. He sheaths his sword at his back and sweeps me into his arms.

I hate that I wrap my arms around his neck and cling to him tightly. I’m a dark fae. A powerful dark fae, with the lines of two of the strongest fae houses running through my veins. In all my life, I haven’t faced a true enemy. Anyone who tried to harm me could be killed in an instant. But now, in front of a man I’d never want to see me weak, I was suddenly needing rescue. It pained my prideful soul.

“It’s okay,” he whispers, shushing me as he carries me far from the demon.

My teeth chatter as I say, “I’m fine,” trying to sound brave and failing.

He looks down at me, and there’s nothing of the grinning, golden boy that I’m used to. Instead, he looks overwhelmed with concern. His gaze sweeping over my face like there’s nothing more important in this world than me.

“No one faces an iron demon and doesn’t feel scared,” he tells me in that soft voice of his that seems to rumble through me. “But if you want, we can pretend you weren’t.”

Instead of answering him, I press my cheek against his chest, listening to the rapid beating of his heart. After all this time, how does he still know me so well? I remember when I had just turned thirteen. My parents had a big celebration, and I’d reluctantly joined the festivities. I’d even danced with some of the boys. And then, one of them surprised me by kissing me.

I’d felt panicked. I’d rushed from the room, running for my monsters, but Lucian had caught up to me. His arms had been around me in an instant, and I’d felt like such a fool. Who ran when a boy kissed them? I faced demons, monsters, ghosts, all without flinching, and yet my own kind always seemed to scare me.

He’d stroked my hair that night and whispered softly, “I wouldn’t want that jackass kissing me either.”

And I’d smiled. And I’d felt better. Because Lucian always seemed to know what I needed to hear.

I guess as many things had changed between us, that hadn’t. Maybe I’d done something years ago that pushed them away from me, but the connection between all of us was still there, even if they didn’t care about it anymore.

My eyes close, my energy drained from the contact with the damned iron demon. With anyone else I might have fought against the suffocating exhaustion, but something inside of me seemed to accept that I didn’t have to fight it, not with this man. Not with this man, who wore a locket with the picture of his grandmother. Not this man, who could sing like an angel, but rarely let anyone hear him. I didn’t even know where Lucian was taking me when I heard a door open and close, and then another door open and close.

“You’re covered in demon blood,” he says, his voice barely louder than a whisper.

I don’t open my eyes, but that rumbling voice of his makes me shiver. “Get it off me.”

His hands tighten around me, but we don’t move for a long minute. “I could put you…in the shower.”

“Yes,” I tell him, even the one word costing me.

A minute later, a light flashes on. He shifts me in his arms and turns on a shower. Then he sits, and my heavy lids open enough to see that we’re seated at the edge of a tub. He holds me there for a long time, before the shower begins to steam.

“It’s ready” he says, hesitation in his voice.

I force myself to sit up, then strip my tank top off, wincing at the black blood coating it. “Help me with my boots and pants,” I murmur.

He clumsily helps remove my boots, but then his hand pauses at the button to my jeans.

“Lucian, please,” I say, confused by his reluctance.

I feel him take a deep breath, and then he undoes my jeans and pulls them from my legs.

In my black bra and underwear, he lowers me into the shower.

I stare down at the water, watching it turn black from the demon’s blood. The sticky substance seems to ooze off my chest and arms. My skin underneath is red and painful-looking, but not nearly as bad as it could’ve been.

If he hadn’t shown up to save me.

Why had he been out there? Why had he faced an iron demon for me? Any fae would’ve run. They wouldn’t have risked their potentially immortal life for their friend’s little sister. For a woman they hadn’t bothered to call, text, or even email in four years.

My mind goes back to the last texts I sent this man. I still had them. I still tortured myself with reading them, every once in a while, when the sun shone too bright and the world outside looked foreign and unwelcoming.

The visit was fun.

No response.

Is it nice to be back at the academy? Will you be home the next break?

No response.

Did I do something?

No response.

And I hadn’t contacted him again. Yes, I was lonely. Yes, they were my only fae friends in the world. But no, I was a Bloodmore, I wouldn’t grovel for their friendship. If it’d finally occurred to them that they could never be friends with a dark fae, then I’d let them go. I didn’t need anyone.

Lucian leans forward and uses his thumb to rub the specks of blood from my face, and I lean closer so that he can run his hands through my hair and wash everything out of the long strands. His touch is gentle as he moves his calloused palms over me, something I appreciate when my body feels so sensitive.

My eyes close again, and I remember so much in that moment. So much of the Lucian who used to play with my brother.