Sworn To Defiance Read Online Free PDF Page B

apparently being a prince didn’t negate jealousy. Still if the responsibility of Sebastian’s station wasn’t enough to force him to act like a mature adult, men in Algardis reached majority at fifteen and a half. They could marry, own land, start businesses, and even join the imperial army at that age.  So he wasn’t really a boy. He was a young man and should act accordingly. Which meant that Sebastian had no excuse in her mind for being petty and sulking .
    He hadn’t been this angry when they were facing Jason alone, she thought with a sigh. Nice to know what gets him riled up.
    She angrily tossed her hair behind her. Refusing to bring her hand up to shade her eyes from the glare of the rising sun behind Thanar. The daemoni was giving her a crick in her neck from just floating there. From the smirk on his face, he knew it too.
    Of course he does , she thought ruefully as she took in the new white tunic that had appeared before her eyes like magic but apparently had always been present in Sebastian’s. She wondered what that meant. Wondered if Thanar knew she could see through his illusion spell and see the dark sigils they hid on his skin. She wondered if he cared. From the smirk that graced his face, she decided he didn’t. Now the shirt opened on his stomach—pale, scarred, and yet still beautiful. When she looked back up at his eyes they took on the appearance of dark carnelians that sparkled in his face in a way she’d never seen before. As if flecks of gold were spread throughout the dark brown of his irises. His hair, ebony like a raven’s wings, floated around his shoulders. She noted with surprise that it had grown out.
    That was fast , she thought. Ciardis knew that a group of men from Sebastian’s troops had hacked away the daemoni prince’s hair as well as beat him in retribution for what he had done on the battlefields of the north. Then they had put him in a cage. To be fair, the cage part had been justified. It was the actions that immediately proceeded it and the filthiness of the confines that had tugged at Ciardis’s heart. Mainly, the men’s retribution had come about because Thanar had refused to die even after they had executed him for murdering the Sanctuary kith . Or rather they tried to kill him. With an arrow that went straight through his heart.
    Now his black hair floated about his face in waves. It was pretty enough that she wished she could run her fingers through it.
    Then warmth spread through her chest. She suddenly had the overwhelming desire to run to Thanar. Again. For the second time in less than ten minutes, she wanted to reach up and slide her hands from the edge of his sculpted shoulders, up the breadth of his neck, and through his falling hair.
    When those feelings overtook her that was when Ciardis examined her motions with shock. This wasn’t like her...at all.
    She felt anger and horror flow like molten lava through her veins. Because she had never felt like this before and she knew it wasn’t a natural occurrence for her. Not with Thanar. Besides she didn’t entertain the foolish whims of a woman in love...or lust. She never had.
    A shocked intake of breath later, Ciardis knew what he had done.

Chapter 5
    C iardis realized it wasn’t her desire to hold the daemoni prince in her hands. It was his twisted desire to see her in his arms that was flowing through her. She could feel his emotions like an undercurrent in her head. Like a small stream of thought it flowed deep in her mind, just below the raging river of thoughts and emotions she could feel constantly emanating from Sebastian. Sebastian had yet to turn off their connection. If he ever intended to at all. With her focus on the overflow of thoughts and feelings from him, she had missed the smaller influx that had craftily flowed through her mind like a spider working on a web before the trap was set. Even now she wasn’t overtly conscious of Thanar’s mind unless she focused on him.
    What is going on?