The sound of shuffling tore through the shroud of silence and darkness, and when someone leaned over him, Ryell’s arm snapped forward before his eyes opened. And when they did, Ryell looked up at the woman he’d least expected to see. The same demonologist who’d challenged Archmage Yoreus was sitting beside him with a displeased expression on her face. Her name escaped him, but then, he hadn’t made an effort remembering it.
“Do you mind?” She tried to pull her wrist free from his grip, her voice expressing impatience, not hostility. “It’s just a cold compress.”
He let go and chose his next words carefully. “I didn’t expect… to wake up like this.”
In fact, he hadn’t expected to wake up at all after the thugs cornered him in the alley. With no way to escape and outnumbered, he knew he woul
