“You will walk out of this quad with your heads held high and your shoulders back. You will not look weary and worn for all the rest to judge you as less than ready,” he told them firmly, correcting them as a father would correct his children. “We are warriors!” His shout filled the silent courtyard. “And we will behave as such. You all have done well today. Same time tomorrow,” he nodded as he looked over the large group, “go now and rest.” The male warriors all crossed one arm across their chest in a warrior’s salute and bowed, while the female warriors only bowed their heads. As one they moved in perfect unison.

“What did you think?” Tamsin asked as he made his way over to the front of the makeshift practice field of the courtyard.

“I think there are some that are born warriors and I think there are some that are made warriors,” Trik answered honestly. “You have a mixture of both, but both are equally as good.”

“How long until they’re ready?”

Trik glanced over to where Cassie stood talking to one of the female elves. He knew the warriors could be ready in a matter of days, that wasn’t his concern. He looked back at Tamsin who was watching him closely and had obviously picked up on his thoughts. “I wish I could give her more time,” Trik told him, knowing the light-elf king would understand.

“We will all protect her, Trik. You don’t need to try and draw this out for her benefit.”

Trik nodded. “I know, but that doesn’t stop me from wanting to. I may be the king, Tamsin, but she will always be my Chosen first.” He started towards Cassie but looked over his shoulder at the light-elf king as his jaw tensed, not wanting to say the words but forcing them out all the same. “We will leave in three days.” As he turned back towards Cassie, he muttered under his breath. “And the Forest Lords save us all if anything should happen to her.”

Chapter 9

“I’ve always known something about me was just a little off. It was one of those things I just embraced about myself. But now to find out that what I have been embracing was darkness, that because of my DNA I am actually prone to evil desires, let’s just say that I didn’t handle it real well. Okay, maybe that’s putting it a bit mildly.” ~Elora

“What exactly does that mean?” Elora asked and then added. “And if you give me a vague guy answer I swear I will mess you up.”

“You could hit him with your hammer,” Oakley offered up. Rin choked on a laugh as Cush turned his steely gaze on him. Oakley just shrugged.

Tony let out a deep breath. “Okay, dark elves 101 it is,” he quipped. “Dark elves aren’t called dark elves because they like to dress in black and wear really thick eyeliner.”

“Okay, I should have clarified that a smartass answer will also get you messed up,” Elora said dryly.

“Could you let him finish before you mess him up please?” Cush asked her

“I make no promises.” She smiled as she felt his humor through the strange bond between them. Cush pulled her to him and wrapped an arm around her, securing her in front of him with her back against his chest.

Tony looked from Cush to Elora, obviously waiting on them. “As I was saying,” he started again, “dark elves are drawn to evil. Their very nature is preprogrammed to seek out the wicked things in this world. It’s like they have an addiction before ever having tasted the drug. Even if they are never exposed to evil, or to self-pleasing things, they would still have the innate need to seek it out. Las Vegas,” he motioned out towards the casino floor, “is a dark elf’s mecca. And if a dark elf that had never really given into their darker nature came to Vegas, it would be akin to taking a drug addict and dropping them in a field of opium.”

Tony’s words seemed to resonate down to her soul. She felt them in her very bones, in the cells that made up her body, and knew that he was right. She let her mind think back to the times in her life when she felt this same pull, although not anywhere near this intensity. She had even started a diary that nobody, not even Cassie, knew about because writing about how she felt seemed to help her control the impulses she didn’t understand. How many times had she been at a party and longed to dive into the liquor without thought of consequences? On the few dates she had allowed herself to go on, how hard had she fought desire that she didn’t understand? It wasn’t the same kind of desire she felt for Cush—not anywhere close—but it had been there, and she had been tempted and repulsed at the same time.

She felt Cush tense behind her as he picked up on her thoughts. She didn’t bother trying to hide them from him; she was tired of keeping this part of herself a secret. If she had to share it with someone, she was glad it was him.

“So I’m really evil?” The words just sort of spilled out without conscious effort or thought and then suddenly she was facing Cush and his hands were on her face, forcing her to look up at him. His eyes seemed to pulse with power and his handsome face was tense with the obvious effort to keep himself in check.

“You. Are. Not. Evil,” he said each word carefully, as if doing so would make them sink in. “We all desire things we shouldn’t at times. We all do things we shouldn’t. We all have the capacity for evil but that doesn’t make us evil.”

“You’re forgetting the fact that I have dark-elf DNA swirling around in my cells,” she pointed out unnecessarily.

“Regardless, you have not let it dictate who you are.”