Having finished their assessment, they carried their lanterns out again, Gabriel locking the door and pocketing the key.“If I allow the wizards into the workroom on the condition they stay away from the pit, do you think they’ll comply?”
“You’re the mighty Lord Phel,” she said cheerfully.“They’d better obey you.If they don’t, you can send a silver spike through their eye!”
He winced, and she patted his arm.“Too soon?”
“No, I deserved it,” he allowed.
“Quinn described you as deliciously virile,” she told him, watching out of the side of her eye for his reaction.
To her immense satisfaction, he actually blushed.“I could have lived a long time without knowing that.”
Laughing, Nic hooked her arm through the crook of his, hugging herself against his muscled strength.“Apparently everyone was tremendously impressed by your display of power and wizardly rage last night.”
“You are going to tease me about this forever, aren’t you?”
“Oh, yes.At least, until you do something even juicier.”
“Wonderful.”He sounded grumpy, but his lips twitched in a reluctant smile.Then he lifted his head, like a hound scenting something interesting on the wind.“Someone’s arriving,” he told Nic before she could ask.“And—your favorite phrase—you were right.I am getting better at discerning the signatures of the wizards and familiars of our own house from new ones.”His brow wrinkled as they entered the main house and turned toward the front doors.He stopped abruptly, alarm rippling through his magic.“Nic…” Looking at her, he hesitated.
“Just tell me.”
“The wizard feels like Elal magic.”