““He picked up the scrape of boots on stone before his companions did, his Fae ears catching the sound, and threw out an arm in front of Aelin and Nesryn, who froze with expert silence. He sniffed the air, but the stranger was downwind. So he listened. Just one person, judging from the near-silent footfalls that pierced through the wall of fog. Moving with a predator’s ease that made Aedion’s instincts rise to the forefront. Aedion palmed his fighting knives as the male’s scent hit him—unwashed, but with a hint of pine and snow. And then he smelled Aelin on the stranger, the scent complex and layered, woven into the male himself.””
