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The three of us look at each other.

What in the—?

All at once, we’re moving, my chair toppling behind me in my haste to figure out what’s going on. Malaki, Des, and I rush from the room—dinner, missing men, and enslaver kingdoms forgotten.

Out in the halls, fairies are dashing around, trying to find shelter. One of the palace officers runs to us, bowing hastily to Des.

“There’s been a security breach,” he explains, his voice breathless. “One of the portals is down—something’s crossed over and collapsed it.”

“Gather a hundred of my best soldiers and have them meet us in the air.”

As soon as Des gives the order, the officer is off, running back the way he came.

We move again. Rather than head down to the main floor of the palace, I follow Des and Malaki to one of the castle balconies.

My eyes scour the horizon, looking for something, anything to explain that violent wave of magic. It had felt so familiar…

Des tears his gaze from the horizon to look at me. His lips part, and I’m pretty sure this is where he tells me to get back inside.

Instead, he closes his mouth and squares his jaw. After striding over to me, he clasps the back of my neck. “Do you wish to join me?” he asks.

“Always.” It’s less thought than it is instinct. Where my mate goes, I go.

“Desmond—” Malaki protests.

“This will be dangerous,” Des warns me, ignoring his friend. “Either of us could die. Are you still sure?”

My heart thumps like mad. Had I ever thought Des’s love would be stifling? That it would coddle me like a security blanket? Because this isn’t stifling or coddling. It’s dangerous and all-consuming, and right now it leaves a taste in my mouth like blood and smoke.

“I’m sure.”

Behind us, Malaki throws up his hands.

Des nods to me, his face foreboding. “Follow my lead and keep yourself safe. That’s an order.”

His wings unfurl behind him, blossoming like some twisted thorny flower. In response, my own wings stretch wide.

With a burst of magic, he leaps into the night air, his wings propelling him up. My own takeoff isn’t nearly so graceful, but several seconds later, I too am airborne, trailing after the King of the Night, Malaki at my back.

I don’t see what caused the commotion until well after Malaki, Des, and I have joined with Des’s soldiers.

Far below the floating island of Somnia, on the main landmass that makes up the Otherworld, a massive fireball is unfolding, thick inky plumes of smoke already rising from it.

Flakes of smoldering ash drift around us the closer we get. I squint down at the flames as the smoke burns my eyes.

My brows furrow.

Right in the center of the inferno, right where I’d assumed the heat would be the hottest and the fire would burn the brightest, there’s a blackened pathway the flames don’t dare touch.

One of the guards points to something along the singed trail, and I follow his finger. There, amid the charred earth, are what appear to be two figures.

It’s not until we’re about a hundred feet away from the ground that I recognize one of them.

Well, fuck me good.

Temperance “Temper” Darling, my best friend and colleague, is striding amid the blaze like she controls it, dragging a very frightened-looking fairy along with her. Her dark eyes glow like coals, bolts of electricity snapping from her.

Uh-oh.