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We are eternal.

I feel my heart…give in.

I gasp into his mouth at the sensation.

Immediately, Memnon pulls away, his eyes returning to my former injury. He places a hand back on the skin and presses his power into me.

I grab his wrist. “It’s okay.I’mokay,” I say softly.

My scary, violent sorcerer takes a deep breath. “Little witch, there will always be a part of me that fears your mortality, and right now…I just want to hold you for a little longer.”

So the two of us stay there for another minute, Memnon holding me against him. I lightly grasp Memnon’s forearm and press a wordless healing spell into his skin. Almost immediately, the claw marks begin to seal up. I watch them mend, now knowing the creature that inflicted them.

“How did you get rid of your demon?” I ask.

“I beheaded the first and second. The third one, I stabbed in the heart.”

“You facedthreedemons?” I say, my voice hushed. One was hard enough.

“Leonard was determined to kill me off.”

I stiffen. “What happened to him?”

“Dead. He bled out from a nicked artery.” Memnon’s voice grows cold. “It was too quick and too clean for a monster like him.”

I shiver as I think about those old bloodstains on the floor.

There’s still one Fortuna left, and—shit,Sybil.

I stand too quickly, then sway a little.

“Easy, Empress,” Memnon says, rising up.

“We need to save my friend.”

He groans—groans! “Must you make me act honorably?”

“Memnon!”

There’s a gleam in his eyes. “I tease.” He reaches for my hand. “Let’s go save your friend.”

CHAPTER 51

When we getto the auction floor,pandemonium.

The entire room is one seething, churning mass of aggression.

Lycanthropes swarm the place—many of them in their animal form—along with the guests from the midnight auction. Those individuals still wear glittering gowns and pressed suits. And everywhere my eyes fall, supernaturals are fighting.

The only people who are absent, it appears, are Politia officers. Go figure. I’m sure they’ll show up soon enough, given the carnage.

Blood decorates the walls and floors and even a few of the circular tables that fill the room. Not twenty feet away, I see the body of a man with his throat ripped out, and several more bodies lie slumped over the linen-covered tables or on the ground.

I scan the room, looking for Sybil and any other supernaturals who might’ve been captives, but it’s hard to make sense of the tangle of people. I don’t see anyone who looks like a captive, and I can only hope the lycans have already evacuated those supernaturals from the building.

Memnon strides forward into the mayhem, his hair beginning to rise. His eyes are fixed on a woman to our left. Her hair is now unbound and her dress is ripped, but it’s easy enough to recognize Sophia Fortuna from the haughty set of her chin and the glow of her eyes. A small army of guards encircles her, and she fights from behind them, lobbing spells at the lycans closing in on her. I hear one wolf yelp as a curse lands and its fur catches fire.

This sorceress tried to take you from me, Memnon says, unsheathing his dagger.I cannot let her live.His thoughts are as simple as that, now that his power has consumed him.