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“My poor mate,” she whispered. “What have they done to you?”

She stood there for long moments, her thumb swiveling over his beard, which had grown long. It was the only way he could tell time had passed. Time had lost all meaning, and he no longerknew dreams from reality. But he guessed he must have been trapped in the X for weeks or months.

In all that time, he hadn’t been allowed to sleep more than a few nonconsecutive hours—and only when sleep overtook him after hours of torture.

He blinked slowly down at Arabella.

There had been too many times where he’d been filled with relief at the sight of her. But the moment he let his guard down, she’d plunged the syphen into his chest or ripped him open with magic.

“We don’t have much time,” she said, her voice low. “We must hurry before they return.”

For a moment, he tried to speak, to tell her to get out of here before Magnus appeared, but he barely managed to part his lips before the effort became too much.

The demon inside him raged, demanding to be fed.

The idea of feeding on Magnus no longer filled him with dread. In fact, he couldn’t bring himself to feel anything at all. A strange sort of numbness had settled over his mind and heart.

But when the tent flap opened, revealing Flynn, something stirred in Elias’ chest.

“Run,” he rasped.

But it was too late.

Flynn jumped between shadows until he appeared at Arabella’s side. His hand wrapped around her neck, and she tried to fight him off. Elias watched as his mate grew pliant in Flynn’s grip. In his other hand, he held a syphen.

She made a little whimpering sound that had a burning rage awakening in him.

How dare anyone touch his mate?

As Flynn leaned in, his lips nearly pressing to Arabella’s as he summoned her essence, Elias managed to get his feetunderneath him, pushing himself up while his ankles were shackled. He grunted as agony shot through his chest.

“The syphen,” he rasped. He didn’t know if Flynn had been created with the syphen in his hand or with the one Breckett had stolen, but it was her only chance of escaping. “Use the… syphen.”

The effort to speak nearly had him blacking out, and his words slurred together.

Slowly, Arabella turned her head toward him, brows drawn together. “I love you, Elias.”

Flynn gripped her face tightly, forcing her to look back at him as he pulled her essence from her. Glowing blue floated from her lips, which the erox sucked into his mouth. He watched as clouds of it moved from her body, watched as the life faded from her eyes.

He’d never heard his mate say those words, and he didn’t want his only memory of her telling her feelings to be the moments before she died—drank dry by one of Magnus’ inner circle.

“No.” Elias pulled against his restraints. “Please… don’t… hurt her.”

But Flynn didn’t look up, didn’t even acknowledge that Elias had spoken as he drained Arabella dry. When the life faded from her eyes, Flynn released his grip on her neck and allowed her body to drop to the floor.

A fissure that had formed in Elias’ chest cracked open further as a scream tore from somewhere in the depths of his soul.

“No!” he cried, pulling against his restraints with all his might.

Gone.

Arabella was gone.

His heart fractured into shards—his soul mere fragments of who he once was. How could he possibly exist in the ageswithout her? He’d wanted to share his world with her, to worship the ground she walked on and feel her love for him in her lingering touches and the way her gaze fell upon him in stolen moments.

But they’d never have the time.

Tears streamed down his face, and his strength was sapped from him all at once. His knees gave out first before his body dropped in the X. Once more, he dangled from the cuffs at his wrists. He let his head drop forward.