Page 1 of Stone Sentinels (Shadow Guardians #6)

BARON

The Veil

“You were right,” I say with only a hint of sarcasm, and I’m proud of myself for it. Pyre looks up from his desk and sniffs the air. Yeah, I smell bad, but I don’t care. That stinky sludge is doing what it’s supposed to—healing me, and I’m going to let it. Pyre quirks his signature brow as if to agree that he’s always right, so I flip him off and sit backwards in the chair beside him.

“What was I right about?”

“About me not belonging in the other world.”

“I know.”

“When all of this is over, I want to be here in The Veil. But I want to know what being the guardian means, and what exactly we’ll be protecting the spirit realm from.” Folding my arms over the back of the chair, I wait for Pyre’s answer. He scribbles a few more notes in his book, the ink disappearing into the paper. He turns to me and his eyes look... normal? Well, not normal, but more normal than usual. The white is gone, replaced by a rare shade of violet.

But, he still appears blind.

Pyre stares off into the distance for a few more seconds before the white fog returns to his gaze. “I was using a spirit to see. Sorry if I startled you.”

“I’m not going to go blind, am I?”

“No.”

“Then why are you blind?”

“I was blind before I traded my soul. You’ll be fine. And to answer your question, the duties of Guardian of The Veil consist of monitoring all the ancient portals, using the Echoing Spire’s power to keep the territories in their neutral state, eliminating threats, closing rifts, and keeping the peace among the creatures here. When the equilibrium is balanced, you will need to help ease spirits into the afterlife. But for now, I simply make sure those spirits are as comfortable as possible.”

“And the ridiculous amount of knowledge you have?”

Chuckling, Pyre unbraids his long hair. The sides of his head are still shaved. “That came with surviving through the ages, keeping records, and studying the forbidden magics as well as the rest of the arcane arts. Some of my teachings came from the Sentinels.”

“Eilish told me about them.”

“They are very dangerous, but full of knowledge, if you are willing to listen.”

“It can’t be as easy as you make it sound,” I say as I study him with purpose. “What did you struggle with? What do I have to prepare for?”

“What you need to understand is that The Veil is a place where time is obscure, and that means you can walk through dreams, memories, fears, prophecies, and raw power. You can see beyond worlds, because it is this world that bridges them all together. Sorting through it all and channeling the information and energies in ways that are beneficial for The Veil is what is important. Knowledge means everything here; magic is simply the tool we use to acquire it.”

“You said I’ll have to repair rifts. What’s the difference between a rift and a portal?” I stand up to pace the length of the room as we talk.

“Rifts are tears in The Veil; they allow energy and magic to flow between this world and the others. Think of them as holes in your tunic—a few are manageable, but too many can cause it to fall to pieces. Too many rifts would be catastrophic to all. Portals are natural exit and entrance points created by a power rupture of magic.”

“They aren’t dangerous?”

“Only if the wrong sort discovers them. The biggest threat to the spirit world is the living, Baron. Chaos comes swiftly on the wings of the beasts who call The Veil their home,” Pyre says ominously. “So, no. It’s not as simple as I make it seem.”

“Fuck.”

“What?” he asks, appearing genuinely interested.

I sigh. “This is going to be a lot of work.”

“What did you think it would be?” he asked, appearing perplexed.

“I just figured I’d be fucking around with spirits all day.”

It takes him a few seconds to realize I’m joking. Then a smile grips his mouth. “Asshole,” he says.

“So, how do I prepare?” I ask as I fold my arms across my chest and wonder at the turn my life has taken. A year ago, I never would have imagined I’d be in training to become the Guardian of The Veil. A year ago, I was only concerned with jobs that paid.

Pyre hands me a stack of four large books. “This is a good place to start.”

“What are these about?”

“The terrain, species of plants, creatures, types of spirits, demons, and sentries of one territory. This one in particular, The Veil Forest.”

“One of the rooms downstairs is a library, isn’t it?”

Pyre reaches around his neck and tugs on a key. He hands it to me and smiles mockingly. “I’ve written each of the volumes bound in blue leather. The scrolls were written by past necromancers and guardians. The rest I’ve collected over the centuries. There are notes in all of them. You also might want to get into the habit of keeping a journal.”

“A journal? And all this reading? Fuck you, you set me up,” I growl. “Made this gig seem like it was all flashy, with your magic and badass runes. I feel like I’ve been played.”

“Happy reading.”

“Bastard.” Holding onto my oversized reading material, I make my way into the main room. I see Eilish sitting in a large chair, resting after her magical session with Kolvar. Meanwhile, Cambion hovers over Kolvar, holding his palms toward the satyr as if he’s trying to heal Kolvar further. I’m not sure what Cambion thinks he’s doing, because Eilish already healed the fucker. Maybe Cambion’s just trying to take his mind off Theren and the Unseelie.

I tap Eilish’s shoulder, and she looks up at me. I dangle the key in front of her eyes. “Want to get lost in Pyre’s library?”

Her gaze lights up, just like I knew it would. I recall the way she pored over the books in the library outside Variant’s palace. “Do you think there’s something in there on succubae and angels?” she asks eagerly.

“Let’s go find out.” We start for the narrow hallway past the main room like two schoolchildren. I wiggle the key in each lock, searching for the correct door. I find it on the third try. When I open the door, we both inhale in surprise.

Two stories of seemingly endless bookshelves stretch toward the ceiling and fill each wall. We step inside and I close the door behind us. It smells like old paper and older ink. Eilish stares in wonder at the intricate murals and smiles as she runs her hand along the spines of the books.

“Beautiful,” she breathes.

***

DRAGAN

The Veil

Nightfall arrives around the time Cambion finishes with Kolvar. I don’t know just what the elf did to him, that Eilish didn’t already, but I’m also not interested enough to ask. The satyr will need time to rest, like the rest of us. I slip into the bathing room and take my time cleaning up before Revenant takes his turn. And when he does, he’ll take his sweet ass time. Truly, he needs a bath more than I do because the fucker smells like dog shit, owing to whatever crap he applied to his wounds.

The hot water seeps into my sore muscles and I let out a groan.

Noni pops in with a fresh set of clothes. She has bandages on the tips of her fingers again, which means she’s been sewing. “Hello, Mr. Dragan. Noni bring you new soaps, too.”

“Thank you,” I groan.

“Oh! Did Noni tell you she make a new friend?” she asks excitedly. Great. Last thing I need to worry about is more people coming to the cottage.

“Who?” I ask.

“It Mr. Flumph! He finally say he Noni friend and she so happy.”

“Why would you ever want to be that little shit’s friend? Little fucker is rude to everyone.”

“Because Noni know grumpy really means sad or tired or pain or lonely. Grumpy never mean just grumpy. No one angry for no reason.”

“What about Variant?” I ask to test her logic. “Do you think he has a reason?”

Noni appears scared. “Noni can’t tell. Mr. Flumph need to talk to Master. No one else can know, Mr. Dragan. Noni not good at secrets!” She runs from the bathing room in a stream of auburn curls, skirts flapping behind her as the little hole in the door opens for her. I stare after her in confusion, uncertain of what just happened.

When I’m finished bathing and changing into my fresh clothes, I walk to my cot in the corner and settle onto the creaky mattress. The lights turn out and my colleagues bathe one by one before climbing into their own beds. I drift easily off to sleep, having missed the luxuries of a soft pillow beneath my head. Stars twinkle beyond the glass windows as the hours slip by in the strange way that’s unique to The Veil.

I feel the mattress dip and a solid weight settles over my hips. When I open my eyes, I see Eilish straddling me. She lies across my torso.

“Hi,” she whispers.

“Hi,” I answer back.

Her eyes widen and her pupils expand until I can no longer see the whites of her eyes. “Dragan, I…”

“You need to feed,” I say.

She nods. “Revenant,” I start.

“You,” she interrupts.

I’m not sure why but the fact she chooses me over the fucking asshole vampire makes me feel… good.

I wrap my arms around her and pull her closer. She smiles down at me and her lips are on mine an instant later. That glorious naked figure slides across my chest as Eilish’s fingers scramble to find my skin beneath the fabric of my tunic. I bite back a growl and grip her hips until she rocks against me. The wetness between her thighs soaks through my trousers and I reach down to feel the silken heat of her folds. She gasps, tugging at my tunic until I pull it over my head and roll us both over so she’s beneath me.

My hand returns to her dripping core while the other covers her mouth to muffle the moans that spill from her lips. I want to taste her, but there’s no time. Soon, her pheromones will call out to the others. I already hear them growling in their sleep. Eilish pushes my trousers down and grips my throbbing cock, sliding it inside of her body in one motion. She clenches around the girth of my erection and I thrust into her depths.

And she feels like fucking heaven. A heaven I’ve missed and one I’m so fucking glad to have found again.

The force of my hips pushes her further and further up the mattress. Springs squeak and the headboard bashes against the wall as I slam into her, rolling my pelvis as my fingers stroke that bundle of nerves that make her eyes roll into the back of her head. Eilish meets my thrusts as I pound into her with a punishing fury, her legs wrapped around my waist. I release my hold on her long enough to place her knees on my shoulders and bend her in half. Eilish moans out loudly before I can claim her mouth in a kiss that steals the air from her lungs.

I taste the pleasure on her tongue and feel the vibrations against my lips. One last brush of my fingers and she tenses. Her body pulls me deeper, sucking me inside until I reach her limits and can physically go no further. The spasms of her channel milk my cock until I paint her womb with my seed. I bite her shoulder to keep from bellowing my pleasure. That unfurling of power inside me is startling, at first.

But it feels different than before. Instead of leaving me feeling weaker, Eilish’s power floods my veins and my cock twitches within her. I lean back and see a satisfied smile on her beautiful face, but concern chases away my own satisfaction when I see another strand of her hair turns black.

She’s feeding on my darkness and it’s affecting her. It’s turning her darker.

That’s when I realize she needs lightness. Just as she said—she needs to preserve the balance within her. She needs to feed from Cambion. Or else we risk losing her to the darkness. I pause. Never before have I thought of Eilish as belonging to the three of us, but... she does.

And that terrifies me.