The Sorcery Code (The Sorcery Code #1)(20)

This was the point at which Augusta needed to teleport the soldiers back. Her hands shaking, she reached for the pre-written spell, and the card slipped from her fingers, falling off the chaise. She gasped, frantically trying to catch it, but it was futile. As the card flew to the ground, Augusta was overcome by a panic unlike anything she had ever experienced.

If her spell failed, she would be responsible for the deaths of Barson and his men.





Chapter 12: Blaise


Shocked, Blaise took a step back, staring at Gala. Did she realize what she was doing, kissing him like that?

Despite her startling beauty, he had been trying not to think of her this way. She had just come to this world, and in his eyes, she was as innocent as a child. Her actions, however, belied that idea.

This was getting complicated. Very complicated, very quickly.

Swallowing, Blaise thought about what to say. He could still feel her soft lips pressed against his own, her slim arms embracing him, holding him close. He hadn’t realized that he would react to her so strongly, that it would take all his strength to step away from that kiss.

She took a step toward him. “Um, Blaise?”

“Gala, do you understand what a kiss means?” he asked carefully, trying to control his instinctive reaction to her nearness.

“Of course.” Her blue eyes were large and guileless, looking up at him.

“And what does it mean to you?” Was she just experimenting with him, trying to ‘learn’ about this aspect of life as she tried to learn about everything else?

“The same thing that it means to everyone, I imagine,” she said. “I read about it. There are a lot of stories about men and women kissing if they find each other attractive. And you find me attractive too, right?” There was a questioning look on her delicate face.

Blaise knew he had to tread carefully. Despite his aptitude for sorcery, he was far from an expert when it came to understanding women. The charming creatures had always mystified him, and here was one who was not even human. He might’ve created her, but her mind was as mysterious to him as the depths of the ocean.

“Gala,” he said softly, “I already told you that I find you irresistible—”

She gave him a look that resembled a pout. “But you just resisted me.”

“I had to,” Blaise said patiently. “You’re so new to this world. I’m the first man—the first human—you’ve ever met in person. How can you possibly know how you feel about me?”

“Well, aren’t feelings exactly that? Feelings?” She frowned. “Are you saying that because I haven’t seen the world, my feelings are somehow less real?”

“No, of course not.” Blaise felt like he was digging himself a deeper hole. “I’m not saying that what you’re feeling right now isn’t real. It’s just that it might change in the very near future, as you go out there and see more of the world . . . meet more men.” As he added that last tidbit, he could feel a hot flare of jealousy at the idea, and he squashed it with effort, determined to be noble about this.

Gala’s eyes narrowed. “All right. If that’s your concern, that’s fine. I’ll go out there tomorrow, and I’ll meet other men. And then I’m going to come back and kiss you as much as I want.”

Blaise’s pulse leapt. “Why don’t I take you to the village right now then?” he said, only half-jokingly.

Her eyes lit up, and she practically jumped with eagerness. “Yes, let’s go!”





Chapter 13: Augusta


Below, Augusta could see the peasants launching their attack.

Barson and his soldiers were expecting to be teleported, but when it didn’t happen, they began fighting with ferocious determination. Soon they were surrounded by corpses. Augusta’s lover seemed particularly inhuman in his battle frenzy. Realizing his strategic value, the rebels came at him, one after another, and he dispatched them all with the brutal swings of his sword.

Seeing that the guards were holding their own, Augusta tried to concentrate. She couldn’t fly down to retrieve her spell card—not with a bloody battle raging below—so she had to write a new one.

Getting her thoughts together, she took out a blank card and the remaining parts of the spell. All she had to do now was re-create from memory the complicated bit of sorcery code she’d written earlier. Luckily, Augusta’s memory was excellent, and it took her only a few minutes to recall what she’d done before.

When the spell was finished, she loaded the cards into the Stone and peered below, holding her breath.

A minute later, Barson and his soldiers disappeared from the battleground, leaving behind dozens of dead bodies and baffled rebels.



*



“I am so sorry,” she said when she rendezvoused with Barson and his men back on the hill.

Luckily, no one was hurt; if anything, the fighting seemed to have lifted everyone’s spirits. The soldiers were laughing and slapping each other on the back, like they had just come back from a tournament instead of a bloody battle.

“We held our ground,” Barson told her triumphantly, snatching her up in his strong arms and twirling her around.

Laughing and gasping, Augusta made him put her down. “You’re lucky I was able to replace that card so quickly,” she told him. “If I’d lost some other card, it would’ve taken me more effort to replace it, and you’d have been fighting longer.”