Ravaged: An Eternal Guardians Novella (1001 Dark Nights) by Elisabeth Naughton Read Free Book Online

the blackout episodes he did. Normal people didn’t have random flashes of the horrible things they’d done while in the midst of one of those episodes.
    Needed a woman? No way. Sure, he had desires just like the next guy, and he had no problem fulfilling those desires when he was out on his scouting trips. There were always willing females if you knew where to look. But the last thing he needed was one infiltrating his personal space.
    More frustrated than before, he snapped the top of his pack, pulled on a jacket, then slung the straps over his shoulders. Screw Silas and his opinions. Ari didn’t need anything but himself. He’d been getting along just fine alone for dozens of years.
    He headed for the door and the frozen wilderness beyond. And hoped he ran into another pack of daemons. A good bloodletting would take his mind off that nymph. But something told him it wouldn’t be enough to make him forget that she now had a name.
     
    * * *
     
    Daphne hadn’t slept well. Her dreams were a mixture of Ari and the Sirens and her long-destroyed village.
    She climbed out of bed and yawned as she dressed in the sweats and T-shirt Silas had given her after dinner. The clothing was huge. She had to roll the pants down at the waist several times just so they stayed up, and the light-blue T-shirt wasn’t much better—hanging like a dress almost all the way to her knees. After tucking it in as best she could, she fluffed her hair and told herself she could still make this work. She’d aced her strategy training. She simply had to think outside the box where Aristokles was concerned.
    She turned out of her room and moved barefoot through the hall. When she reached the kitchen on the lower level, she found Silas filling a backpack on the table with supplies—water, bandages, gloves.
    She approached slowly, not sure what he was doing. “I hope you’re not running away.”
    Silas glanced up and smiled, his hair damp around the collar from a shower, his light-blue eyes sparkling, making her almost forget about the scars on his face. “Good morning. Sleep well?”
    “Fine,” Daphne lied as she pulled a chair out at the table and sat. “Are you going somewhere?”
    Silas shoved a bag of granola into his pack. “Supply run. We’re low on several things.”
    Panic clawed at her chest. “How long will you be gone?”
    “Three, maybe four days. I’m supposed to take you with me.”
    Shit. She couldn’t let that happen. “Um—”
    “I don’t think you’re well enough to leave, though.”
    Daphne’s gaze shot to his. The male’s blue eyes sharpened when he added, “And call me selfish, but I think you can do some good here while you finish healing.”
    She didn’t know what he meant but as he pushed his pack to the end of the table, pulled out a chair, and sat across from her, she found herself hanging on his every word. “Ari left on a scouting trip. He’ll be back later tonight. He’ll likely be ticked you’re still here, but he can just deal with it. He needs to deal with it.”
    “Why?”
    “Ari thinks it’s better for everyone if he isolates himself.”
    “Why does he believe that?” she asked, playing dumb.
    “Because he’s bullheaded,” Silas answered. “But I fear this self-imposed isolation of his is slowly catching up with him.”
    “You care about him.” The realization hit before she could stop the words from spilling from her lips.
    “Of course I do.” Sighing, Silas shook his head and leaned back in his chair. “It’s more than the fact he saved my life. I’d heard rumors about the crazed Argonaut just as you, but I quickly realized he’s not what everyone says he is.”
    “And what is he?”
    Silas didn’t immediately answer, and in the silence, Daphne thought back over everything she knew of Aristokles. The stories she’d heard from Zeus and Athena contradicted with what Silas had told her last night. And after spending a few minutes with Ari in the library, she didn’t know