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I could hardly believe Derek when he told me what he and Ibrahim had discovered on their short trip to one of the hunters’ ships Although we didn’t want to worry any of our people unnecessarily, we also didn’t want to keep them in the dark, so we leaked the story about what Derek and Ibrahim had witnessed, and news soon spread to everyone

Ibrahiured out how to tweak the spell so that the hunters could no longer sense our h she had lost e froons when they found out that the hunters atching us so closely It seemed that some of them had not even been aware of the ships stationed around the island to begin with Clearly they were very territorial creatures and Jeriad was io scorch the ships

Of course, they could have done that, but that was not what Derek wanted, and that was not what I wanted either We didn’t want to cause more bloodshed or make enemies out of the hunters So far at least, they had not harh we all knehat their intentions were Still, we had no desire to spark a war between The Shade and the human world We were on their side, even if they refused to believe it

I was teue with the hunters, try to reassure them that we meant no hare, he didn’t think that they would even give us a chance to talk He suspected that they ree to meet with us but only as a trap and as soon as ithin range, ould be shot And so that idea was pushed aside

Derek forbade anyone to go outside of the boundary except with our express per the beach every evening, to check if the ships were still there Each time, they were Weeks passed, and they still re… for what exactly, we still weren’t sure

Although Derek was firm in his decision to let them be and not launch an attack, I could see the effect that the hunters’ presence was having on hiically I knew my husband, every part of him--often better than he knew hi else, I could sense it playing at the back of his mind, and I couldn’tour walk, to ray ships htened around Derek’s

His brows furrowed as he stared out toward the new vessels

I was proud of him for how he’d handled the situation so far--it was quite unlike Derek Usually he was not the first to suggest a peaceful course of action Noorried that if any et all notions of peace and just start planning to blast theood for anyone in the long term And we had both witnessed too much bloodshed already

But as I stood there with hi the dark outlines of the five ships above the waters, I wasn’t sure what to say to hi to resort to violence So I just kept quiet and waited for him to reveal his mind to me

But he didn’t He stayed just as silent as me After tenout here longer So we had five ships watching us now instead of three It hat it was

Turning to face him fully, I reached my arms up and draped them around his neck I pulled his head down so that he was looking at o to bed You’ve had such a long day Worry about it , if you have to"