Read Online Nightshade by Shea Godfrey - Free Book Online Page B

seizing at his hard look of recognition, his expression filled with warning. And then they were past her, Jessa retreating until she bumped into the wall behind her, Darrius’s infectious laughter floating in their wake.
     
    *
     
    Radha stood at the balcony arch in the curve of the north wall and watched Jessa sit in the moonlight. Jessa’s eyes were closed and her face was raised to the light. How much Jessa resembled her mother, the beautiful lines of her face and the elegant curve of her neck. Even her body was reminiscent of her, voluptuous and graceful in its form yet never too obvious in any feature.
    “What troubles you, child?”
    “If the Veil of Shadows is cast properly, is it still possible to be seen?”
    Radha narrowed her eyes. “Were you seen?”
    Jessa did not answer.
    “At times.” Radha moved back into their spacious chambers. “If the desire to be seen is strong enough, the charm may transform. This happens only when you’re careless.”
    “I wasn’t careless.”
    “If you were seen then you were careless.”
    Jessa searched the night sky, gauging the direction of the constellations and finding the stars of the warrior Attia. The Princess Darrius was not what she had expected, not in any way.
    She thought of Darrius sitting alone on the railing of the walkway, her hair catching the moonlight. Her expression had been so sad in that brief instant before she lowered her face, left in the wake of her brother’s attack. Jessa also remembered the words Darrius used to challenge him. She had met his malice with a memory that sounded so lovely Jessa had felt a fierce stirring of envy.
    Jessa smiled, remembering the laughter into the wine at the banquet and the grin that Darrius had tried to stop as she wiped her face. Laughter stirred within Jessa once again, only this time she released it.
And what do those eyes look like, I wonder, when your full humor is upon you
?
Such colors filled with laughter and not sadness, I would very much like to see that. Before you’re cast into the Blood Fires of the Vhaelin for being a cad
. She smiled more freely and the heat of a blush rose along her neck.

Chapter Five
     
    Darry ran, her bare feet sure within the thick grass despite the morning dew. She rushed through the hedgerows of the gardens at a rapid pace. The air burning her lungs felt good. Darry tasted the sharpness of the hedges with each breath. Their scent filled the back of her head and flooded her with the flavor of new things.
    She bolted down a separate path near the heart of the main gardens, never stopping, pushing herself faster. She laughed, breathless as she ducked her head and broke through the corner of a hedge in a sharp turn, leaves flying in her wake. She could smell the water.
    Jessa walked along the edge of the clearing in the early morning sun. She trailed her hand through the ivy and verdant leaves of the hedge. The small white flowers of hamesroot were in full bloom and tangled within the branches, teasing her fingers and stirring her sense of touch.
    The bluish-green water of a pond was set within the small glade, the land it occupied low within the center of a natural depression and fed by a spring near the eastern edge.
    It was a place of serenity and undeniable beauty, the colors rich and fulfilling, and as Jessa moved along the southern hedges, she wondered how deep the water might be at the center. When summer was high in Lyoness and the heat at times unbearable in its arid oppression, the mosaic tiles on the bottom of the reflecting pool in the western courtyard of the Jade Palace showed, bereft of water. The comparison appalled her.
    The Princess Darrius burst into the clearing in a rage of movement and Jessa stumbled into the solid presence of the hedge. She spoke the runes of her spell upon sheer instinct, the Veil of Shadows rising like a surge of heat erupting from the earth.
    Darrius tossed her tunic into the air behind her and slowed her pace only long enough to