Autumn Moon Read Online Free Page B

face him from my own environment.”
    Like sun on wet earth, Dylan’s frustration rolled off his shoulders in waves. “Elen—”
    â€œNo,” she repeated, shaking her head with conviction. On this matter, she wouldn’t bend. “You treat me as if I need protection.” She flicked her hand toward Cormack.“Assigning me guards without my consent.” She could rip the very life force from any living thing, plant or creature, if she so chose. “As if I’m weak—”
    â€œYour compassion is your weakness,” Dylan asserted with annoying insight. “Correspondence is one thing, but this is a different situation. If you are harmed . . . if you are taken . . . if I, as a leader, allow that to happen without retaliation—what will the consequences be?” His voice rose, unbending in its authority. “Answer me, Elen!”
    She closed her eyes, knowing the answer, and hating that he was right. “The war will begin in earnest.” Because neither of her brothers, Dylan nor Luc, would submit to Guardian rule, since it would only bring more deaths to the weaker members of their race. Or enslavement. Worse, she couldn’t bear the thought of another battle because of her. Not when it was her family who suffered most.
    â€œElen needs her cottage,” Cormack said. He spoke low, but his calm intrusion gained both Elen and Dylan’s full attention—hers for more personal reasons. “You would encase her in a fortress of cemented rock,” he explained, waving his hand around the office with its whitewashed stone walls, “when her greatest weapon is her garden and the forest that surrounds her home. Nature is her sword. How would you react if asked to face an enemy without yours?”
    Elen leaned into the polished wood of the desk to steady her balance. His understanding rendered her speechless. He
knew
her. Of course he knew her, but now he had a voice that gave him the ability to articulate that knowledge. And he’d done it in a way her brother would appreciate.
    And he wasn’t quite finished. “Avon put her at the same disadvantage.” Cormack lifted his arms in demonstration of his fairly new form. “The battle before, the one that took place in these very woods . . .” His voice trailed off.
Theone,
he might have said were he less considerate,
where she’d ripped the power from a Guardian and given it to him.
He said instead, “You see before you what she can do in her own environment.”
    Seeking confirmation, Dylan pinned her with an assessing glare. “If this is your reason for wanting to stay, I would hear it from you.” He thought like a warrior, and all this talk of weapons and defenses swayed his decision more than any of her former arguments.
    If she weren’t so grateful, she may have been put out. Either way, she didn’t deny its accuracy. “He’s right.”
    Dylan pushed back from his desk and shoved open his office window. A crisp breeze ruffled the drapes and carried the scent of pine and earth. Ivy grew along the outer wall and spilled over the sill, a blanket of green edged by red as autumn’s cool nights painted its glossy leaves.
    Knowing her brother needed reassurances, Elen crossed the few paces to stand beside him. She reached out to stroke the twisted stems with her right hand and gently placed her left over his. This ivy was strong and old, and so was its power as it rose to greet her. Touch was a direct conduit for her gift, and she allowed just a taste of what she held to flow along her arm and into his skin.
    As always, she felt the transfer. It began as a tingle, like the awakening of blood-deprived limbs, but soon burned like red embers against tender flesh. The energy of his beast recoiled at her invasion. Pure in soul and savvy in spirit, it knew when to run.
    Where most men would have shrunk from her grasp, Dylan only