by J. L. Weil
“We’re about to find ourselves surrounded by Ryker’s private militia,” Kai said before I could speak.
I shot him a frown.
“Do I even want to know how you obtained this information? Or was it you who told Ryker she is here?” Devyn hurled at Kai.
Quiet wrath simmered under Kai’s cool exterior. He pretended to be aloof, but I could see through the mask. “As much as I love the spotlight, the credit is not mine.”
Devyn stared at his stepbrother like he was about to cut him in half. “I’ll kill you for this.”
I stepped in between them and into the treacherous crossfire. We had bigger problems to deal with than their family feud. “Kill each other later,” I said. “I bought us a few minutes to devise a plan, not fight.”
Devyn’s hands were clenched into fists at his sides, and he turned his hostile glower to me. His features softened, but the edge to his voice remained. “What are you talking about?”
Kai’s grin was razor-sharp. “Your Kitten has been very busy.”
A low snarl ripped from Devyn, but it was cut off. The knock echoed from down the hall. Kai and I swapped a look.
Kai’s mouth formed a straight line. “That would be him.”
“Tell me you’re not going to answer the door this time,” I groaned at the shadow master.
Devyn wasn’t pleased by what he saw between Kai and me. “I don’t know what game you’re playing at, but if anything happens to her, I’ll end you.”
Kai wasn’t the least intimidated by Devyn’s promise. “How many times have I heard you say that? Just tell me what the plan is, and then we can go back to despising each other after we wipe out those who dare threaten our land.”
Rap. Rap. Rap. A fist pounded on wood.
“We give them the fight they’re looking for, and we spare no one.”
“I was really hoping you’d say that.” The gleam in Kai’s eyes sent a shiver through me.
“What about Holly?” I asked as the image of her lying under a pile of ash became clear in my mind. Was this the vision Belle had tried to warn me of? Was Ryker planning on burning the house to the ground?
Devyn’s eyes were bright green as he declared, “You’ll stay here with her.”
My very bones balked at the order. “No. We can’t be in the house.”
“Karina,” he rumbled as he strapped Wrath and Fury across his back in one fluid motion. “For once in your life, don’t argue with me.”
This was an instance where I wouldn’t be pushed aside. I latched onto his arm and met his eyes, letting him see how important this decision was. Life or death. I didn’t know for a fact if this was the moment in the vision, but I was taking no chances. “I don’t have time to explain, but you have to trust me. It isn’t safe for Holly or me to be in the house.”
He looked deep into my eyes, and what he saw changed his mind. “Kai will watch after Holly,” he said with a deadly calm. Devyn and Kai locked eyes, and then Kai was gone, vanishing into the darkness. Devyn moved to a wooden chest nestled against the wall and opened it, pulling out two more daggers, which he secured to his thighs. Weapon after weapon, he loaded himself up until he was a living armory. “If you get cornered, shift and—”
“Stay close,” I finished for him. “I know the drill.”
He shook his head at me before wrapping a cloak as dark as the night around my shoulders, tugging the hood far over my head to conceal my face. “I won’t let him take you. Do you understand? Not now. Not ever.”
What did I do to earn such devoted loyalty? To put your life on the line time and time again for someone had to come from more than just a fae bond, didn’t it? “I need to leave. I can’t put your family at risk any longer.” Ryker wouldn’t stop hunting me, or Talin.
He threw on a cloak of his own, identical in color and fabric as the one I wore. “Let’s go.” The set of his jaw told me enough to know not to push the subject. Not now.
But later, when this was over . . .
We moved into the hall. Kai and Holly joined us as we descended a set of stairs into a dark cellar. My boots crunched over loose dirt and pebbles. No one said a word, but outside, my fae hearing picked up the sound of voices and the rustling of anxious foot soldiers. The knocking had stopped, replaced by what sounded like a shoulder slamming into the wood. The asshole was actually going to break in.
At the rear of the cellar was a rusty door covered in cobwebs and dust. It was clear the exit didn’t get much use. Light spilled from under the crack, and the metal hinges groaned when Devyn pushed at the door, using his shoulder to put a bit of weight behind it.
Beyond the door, soft aqua skies were painted with strokes of orange light from the sinking sun. A field stretched between the house and the woods with not a fae in sight, which struck me as odd. Why wouldn’t he have covered all exit points of the house, especially since it was obvious no one was answering the door?
My gut told me this was wrong, and the look on Devyn’s face said he was just as suspicious. The Shaman took in the distance to the woods, judging with his warrior skills if it was worth the risk of the open field to escape to the dense coverage of the trees.
Kai didn’t share Devyn’s conflicted expression, but it said something to me about how everyone in his family looked to Devyn for answers. They might hate each other, but Kai trusted Devyn. “What’s it going to be? Run or fight?”
“Fight,” Holly said, her face set in grim determination. I noticed then the curved short sword at her hip. This family was an army in and of itself.
“I’m with the squirt,” Kai agreed. “They brought this fight to us. Why not show them why you’re called the Sin Eater?”
They were all crazy. Four faes against at least fifty?
“There is no reason for all of us to fight. It’s me they’re after,” I hissed, trying to talk sense into a group of insanity.
“She’s right,” Kai agreed, and no one was more shocked than me. “Let Holly and I distract them while you get Karina out of here. Get her somewhere safe.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“I owe you,” Devyn said with a nod at Kai. “And you know how much I hate being indebted to anyone, especially you.”
Kai grinned. “Why do you think I volunteered?”
He was such a liar. Deep down, under all that rudeness and I-don’t-give-a-shit attitude was a decent guy. You just had to look really, really deep inside him to find it.
I opened my mouth to argue, but Devyn slid his hand under my arm and dragged me toward the shadow of a tree as he gave the signal to Kai and Holly.
Conversation over.
I poked my head around the trunk in time to see Kai cloak Holly and himself in shadows and disappear. My sweaty palms flattened against the bark. This was so wrong, letting Kai and Holly put themselves in direct danger for me. Queen or no queen, I hated the risks others took on my behalf. I would never be able to live with myself if either one of them was hurt because of me. The guilt alone was enough to make me want to give myself up, turn myself over to my uncle, and call an end to this ordeal.
Devyn’s face was bleak. “That’s our signal. Move your ass, Kitten. We need to make this moment count.”
With a nod, I shifted. There would be a day I would make both of my uncles pay for everyone that had suffered by their hands. They wouldn’t get away with treachery forever. My time would come. And when it did, they would be weighed in the balance and found wanting.
Together, Devyn and I ran straight for the woods, just like all those times we had when training.
Chapter Fourteen
I ran, faster than I ever had in my life, lurching for the mushroom-topped trees. Behind me, the clash of metal on metal reached my fae ears, and I stumbled once, but forced my legs to keep going, even though a part of me screamed to turn around and help. Leaving Kai and Holly as a distraction nipped at my conscience, but it was hard enough thinking around the panic shrilling in my head, let alone trying to keep from imag
ining the worst.
We only had minutes to get inside the woods and lose ourselves among the trees. Devyn was beside me, his presence the only thing keeping me from falling apart. I drew upon his strength instead of giving up. I owed it to him, to Holly, and to everyone else to keep fighting.
Devyn had never disappointed me. I wasn’t about to let him down.
The sky, wildflowers, and tall grass rushed past us as we ran until the dim, cool forest shaded us. I slowed down, needing to see if Holly and Kai were okay. Had we been spotted? Was there an army racing toward the woods? Had our escape been for nothing?
Devyn had matched his pace with mine and halted when I did. Looking back toward the house, my eyes scanned the scene for any sign of Holly or Kai through the chaos the two of them had created. The madness of battle reached my ears: the singing of blades through the air, the beating of flesh, and orders being thrown around, but through it all, I didn’t see one glimpse of Kai or Holly.
“We need to keep going,” Devyn said after a quick sweep of the field. No one had given chase, and I couldn’t help but think that our escape had been too effortless. My uncle didn’t strike me as someone who didn’t calculate every possible angle. He would have anticipated Devyn would try something and would do whatever it took to protect me. Ryker knew the depth of a Shaman’s bond.
So why had our escape gone so flawlessly? Was it because I had reset the time line? Did that have anything to do with our ability to get away undetected?
Sweat beaded over Devyn’s brow. I could smell it on him along with the adrenaline pumping in his blood. He was itching for a fight, to throw himself into the middle of battle. I wasn’t the only one who was having a difficult time accepting the choice we’d made.
It was hard turning my back on Kai and Holly, running away yet again without knowing whether I was dooming them both. But a picture of my dead body flashed before my eyes. If I was dead, all of this would have been for nothing, and I couldn’t accept that.
A heavy sigh heaved from my chest just as something thumped on the ground behind us. As if our bodies were one, Devyn and I whirled around in sync. Wrath and Fury were in his hands, and I bared my teeth in a low snarl.
Shit.
So much for thinking we’d gotten a clean getaway.
A dozen or more soldiers stood in front of us, having jumped from the trees where they’d been waiting. We were surrounded in seconds.
Sons of bitches.
Wrath and Fury glinted in a patch of sunlight, their eyes bright with hunger as they twined around Devyn’s arms, fusing fae with steel. They hissed at the faes who encircled us.
Devyn chuckled, surveying the men surrounding us. “You’re kidding, right? This is it? You do know who I am.”
My eyes sliced upward to Devyn like he’d lost his freaking mind. What the hell was he doing? He was insane.
The fae guards didn’t so much as flinch at Devyn’s goading but stood erect with their weapons drawn and pointed at us. But Devyn continued spewing a string of cockiness that had no end. “How do you want to do this? One at a time, or should we see how many of you I can kill at once?”
Before Devyn could succumb to the bloodlust he craved, a man emerged from behind a cluster of trees and the ranks of fae. My blood ran cold as my fae senses picked up his scent. Even if I hadn’t seen him only minutes ago when I’d screwed with the time line, I would have recognized this fae for who he was.
My enemy.
Ryker’s glowing amber eyes burned with smugness as they landed on Devyn. “Well, if it isn’t the Sin Eater himself.”
Devyn smiled, taking a slight bow and putting himself in front of me, a tactic he was fond of doing. “The one and only.”
“I’m a bit disappointed you fell so easily into my trap. So predictable.” Ryker, the lord of Orangeoland, sneered at the mock letdown. “That little trick you pulled earlier was cunning, I’ll give you that,” he added, his eyes shifting to me as he rubbed a hand under his chin. “I’m intrigued to see how this plays out.”
I let my canines flash. Was this all a sick, twisted game to him? People’s lives were on the line, and he wanted to pat himself on the back for being a devious asshole.
Devyn cracked his neck, flipping Wrath once in the air. The fae blade whistled with precision, and Wrath let a hiss of eager anticipation vibrate through the suddenly silent woods. “Give me ten minutes to even out the odds.”
Ryker wasn’t intimidated, and I didn’t know what that said about him. He either was extremely stupid or he had something up his sleeve. Neither gave me much comfort. “Right, the infamous Shaman. I’d hoped we could be civil, but your reputation for bloodshed says otherwise.”
I wanted to sink my teeth into his carotid artery, the sudden urge to kill overwhelming in my fox form. An animal instinct that had only been a whisper was now a blaring command in my veins. It was ridiculous how he talked of bloodshed when he was the one with an army.
“You should have thought about that before you sent those assassins after her,” Devyn replied.
Ryker made a careless gesture with his hand. “Lapse in judgment, I assure you. I’ve had time to think, time to consider other possibilities that don’t involve killing my niece.”
That was it? That was all he had to say about the numerous attacks Talin and he had orchestrated to kill me? A momentary lapse in judgment? Good thing I was in fox form or I would have screeched in outrage.
“I don’t give two shits,” Devyn said, literally spitting at Ryker’s feet.
He was going to get us killed, but besides his methods for dealing with Ryker, I sensed Devyn was about to unleash himself on the army. So I called forth the magic I was born to wield, preparing to discharge a flame of storms.
Wrath and Fury blazed bright green in the gloomy forest, the same color as Devyn’s eyes, which burned with the anticipation of battle. “I’m done talking.” Darkness swirled around him in a phantom wind as he slammed the twin blades into the ground, causing a tremor to ripple through the earth.
Ryker’s face turned to stone as he gave the order for his men to charge.
Withdrawing two daggers, Devyn looked over his shoulder at me with a wicked grin. “Stay low,” he said. Then the fae who was fury and wrath made flesh attacked.
He spun away from the tree, and before he took another step, both daggers were sailing through the air. I heard the thud of two bodies hit the ground. Devyn had two more blades ready in his grasp. By the time Devyn hurled them, the men surrounding us were shouting, weapons raised. His mark was true each and every time. In seconds, he had dispatched four fae.
I was in awe of the Shaman, of what he could do in a blink of an eye. Devyn reached behind himself, pulling Wrath and Fury out of the ground as three guards engaged him in battle. The Shaman raised one of the blades and metal on metal rang through the air. He blocked not one, not two, but three swings in succession.
His eyes shone with green fire.
I turned to the handful of guards attacking our backs and set the woods aflame. Molten fire rushed out of me, pouring into every crevice of my veins and releasing into the world. Fire licked over the ground, burning everything in its path, including those fae who hadn’t had time to seek cover. Their screams rang out, a horrific sound that pierced my heightened hearing.
In this world, my fox knew what the hell she was doing. She commanded, wielded, and unfurled our powers in a way that was seamless. The fox was me, and I was her, but I’d always sort of separated the two. Human form. Fox form. But in the Second Moon, we converged as one mind, one body regardless of what skin I wore.
Through the thick smoke and dying embers, I searched for Ryker, not wanting to lose sight of the man who had made my life a living hell. He stood with his chin high and the blade strapped to his side clean, allowing his men to do all the dirty work.
Did royalty not get their hands bloody in the Second Moon?
Kill him. Kill him. Kill him, a voice purred in my head.
Ash
and smoke coated my mouth as I pivoted to face Ryker—my murderous uncle.
Bodies littered the ground between us, some bloodied, some charred. It looked like hell on earth as if a grenade had gone off in this little section of the woods, incinerating everything in its path.
Yet it didn’t matter how hard we fought or how many we took down, more of Ryker’s militia kept pouring into the woods. Some of them looked at their fallen comrades with leery expressions, others looked at Devyn, shifting nervously on their feet, but they pressed forward, and it felt as if this fight would never end.
I had to do something.
A glint of steel caught my eye, and before I could second-guess what I was about to do, I let the cool shadows and mist gather around me, cloaking myself in darkness as the fox became woman. I sprinted a few steps, stooping down to pluck out one of Devyn’s daggers from the chest of a fallen fae. Then I hurled that knife at Ryker, a throw that was perfectly aimed for his heart—a fatal throw. All it had to do was hit its mark.
Ryker caught the dagger in midair, a mere breath away from his face. A smile tipped his lips as those glittering amber eyes clashed with mine.
Disappointment cascaded over me.
This had to end. The killing. The fighting. The destruction.
My hope of escaping here was quickly slipping away. How long could we continue to fight an army?
A whiz of magic spiraled toward me, and I ducked, my ear just missing being blasted, but another followed. And another. From the shadows, a figure appeared, and I sighed in relief as Kai winked at me. He swung his blade in a precise arc that cut through everything in its path, including the spheres of magic being hurled at me.
Devyn stalked forward, and the closest of Ryker’s soldiers wisely backed up a step. Devyn’s harsh face glowed in the golden light of the sun streaming through the branches. “About time you decided to show up,” he grumbled to Kai.