“This is old magic,” he said softly and his deep voice seemed to bounce off the walls of the quiet room. “Ancient magic.” His eyes caught on a sentence and he flipped back to the page that had drawn his attention. He pulled the book closer and began to read.

“The Forest Lords set forth three portals that did not require a reflection in order to be traveled through. These are known as the master portals and control every portal between the elfin realm and the human realm. When one of these portals is closed, then they all close.”

“Not to point out the obvious,” Oakley spoke up from his perch on the end of the desk, “but we sort of figured that part out. Is there anything that tells how to open them?”

Cush’s lips tightened as he glanced over at Oakley. “Patience.”

“Not my thing,” Oakley retorted.

Elora stepped forward and pushed her brother off the edge of the desk and away from the glowering elf. “That’s enough,” she told them both. “Oakley, quit trying to irritate Cush. And Cush, quit looking at my brother like you’re going to sew his lips shut.”

“Not a bad idea,” Cush told her with a nonchalant shrug.

Elora honed in on him with her purple gaze. “Neither is world peace, but it ain’t happening so don’t get your hopes up.” She pointed back at the book as if to say get on with it.

Cush fought back the smile that wanted to spread across his face at her surly banter because he didn’t want to find her attractive, or cute, or sexy, and yet as she glared at him in all her dark glory, that’s exactly what he felt. He looked back down at the pages before him, shaking off the thoughts of what he didn’t want, but did want, but didn’t know what to do about, and focused on the words before him.

He read in silence, flipping page after page, feeling the magic intensify at times only to then abate. Every now and then he would see someone shift out of the corner of his eye but no one ever interrupted him as he read. His eyes moved quickly and his mind translated the language as he searched for anything that would help them with any part of their dilemma. Then he found something.

“Bingo,” he muttered.

“Bingo? What’s Bingo?” Elora perked up at the sound of Cush’s voice after what felt like hours of silence. She looked at him expectantly.

He cleared his throat before he began to read aloud again.

“If a master portal is closed, the only way for the portals to be opened again is by a blood offering from the one who closed them.”

Elora scoffed. “Of course they can only be opened by some psycho elf in another realm, because why on earth would we want this to be doable. Where would the fun in that be?”

Cush ignored her mini-rant and continued to scan the page. “Loophole.” He grinned up at her but quickly looked away when he saw the way her lips parted and her eyes widened at his grin. “It says the portals can also be opened by the willing sacrifice of a servant.”

“You mean one of the dark elves would have to sacrifice themselves?” Elora asked.

“It just says a willing sacrifice. It doesn’t say it has to be their life,” Cush points out.

“Well that’s a little more doable,” she said as she pulled her long, dark hair up into a ponytail securing it with a rubber band from her wrist. She lowered her arms and propped her hands on her waist and chewed on her bottom lip as she thought. “Now we just need to find a sacrificial lamb amongst the dark elves in the human realm.” She looked at her mom and then to Cush and smiled. “You know what this means?”

“Uh, what?” Oakley asked blankly.

“Vegas baby!” she whooped.

“What’s in Las Vegas?”

“From what Cassie told me, it’s the dark-elf capital of the world.”

“And do you really believe you can get a dark elf to willingly give a sacrifice to open the portals?” he countered.

Elora shrugged. “Everyone has a price.”

Elora tapped her chin with her finger as she stared into her closet. She had already packed all the mundane items needed for traveling but she knew she needed something with a little swagger; they were going to Sin City after all. Her mind drifted to Cassie and she felt a twist of regret in her gut that her best friend wouldn’t be with her to see the bright lights of Vegas in all their blaring glory.

“What’s your price, Little Raven?” A deep voice rumbled from her doorway startling her from her thoughts.

She turned slowly, giving herself time to compose herself, to see Cush standing in all his Elfin warrior glory. His hair was pulled back and in its long braid down his back, and the band that he wore around his head should have looked feminine, but instead it made him appear regal without diminishing any of his masculinity. His green vest molded to his chest. Brown pants outlined powerful legs and the boots were like icing on the cake—dude was hot. She would love to say that her breath didn’t catch, or that her heart didn’t do some ridiculous girly flip, or that the damn butterflies weren’t doing the tango in her stomach again, but the fact of the matter was that she was over the freaking moon for the guy. And there he was, standing there, staring at her with those eyes and that mouth and, get a grip, she growled to herself.

“What do you mean?” she asked cautiously.

He took a step inside and let his eyes wander over the room. She knew that her room didn’t exactly resemble that of a typical teenage girl. It was dark and edgy, just like her. Where some girls might have One Direction, gag me, she thought, hanging on their walls, she had Bram Stoker’s Dracula. And where some girls might have cozy flannel sheets, she had black satin.