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Swift, efficient cooperation … Or so it would have been, if I’d remembered to watch the ground as well.

The attack came out of nowhere, a snarl and a flash of movement. Something hit me with the force of a sledgehammer, knocking the breath out of me, and then I was flying – flying – flying – an eternity in which I hung suspended in the air, the world reduced to incoherent screams and the penetrating smell of dog and rotting blood …

I slammed like a ragdoll against the earth.

Pain exploded through me a moment later, even my nerves slow to catch up on what in hell was happening. I whimpered and tried to roll over, the world around me staggering back into existence. Moist earth beneath my palms. The sword onmy back, cross-guard prodding my neck at every movement. Howling …

Howling.

Abruptly, my muscles regained their senses.

I hauled myself onto my back in a burst of instinct, blinking to turn smudges of colour back into the reality I knew. The dead fae lay sprawled between the cabbages a few feet away from me, blood still gushing from his cut throat. Behind him, seven feet tall, fur knotted with blood and mud and gods knew what else …

A hound.

Snarling at Creon.

My breath caught again.

Inches away from those dripping jaws, Creon slowly sauntered back, away from me. Holding the creature’s red-glowing gaze with a look no less dangerous – eyes shining with a murderous fire, sharp lines of his face shifted into the ferocity of a circling hawk. The hound followed, growling but holding back. Sentient enough, it seemed, to recognise danger when staring it right in the face – sentient enough to wait for weakness, rather than charge without a second thought.

Monster to monster. Predator to predator. A delicate dance between fae and beast …

But Creon’s magic was still bound.

So when the hound lashed out, would he even be able to defend himself? The fact that the creature was still alive, that he was distracting it rather than having killed it the moment it attacked, suggested he at least doubted it himself.

I staggered to my feet, pain shooting up my left ankle as I put my weight on it. The hound didn’t seem to notice me as it yawned, revealing half of a bloodied hand still stuck between its fangs.

Creon didn’t even flinch.

I drew from my black shirt without thinking, aiming the full force of my red magic at the vulnerable spot beneath the hound’s jaw.

The creature whipped back around, howling in pain … and only then did I realise the mistake I’d made. Because the bleeding gash in the monster’s neck didn’t slow its movements in the slightest – the opposite if anything – and now that furious bulk of muscle and teeth was charging at me once again, the stench of rotting meat washing over me …

A loud screech behind me.

The whizz of small wings past my ear.

The hound roared as Alyra buried her talons deep into the scurvy skin of its snout. She let go as fast as she’d made contact, spun around in mid-air, and managed to hit an eye on her second attempt, claws sinking mercilessly into that red-glowing darkness.

I pulled myself together enough to send a flare of red after her, hitting the spot just above the other eye. With a howl of agony, the hound reared, claws coming off the ground as it coiled for attack …

That one moment was all Creon needed.

A slam of wings, a flicker of steel, and his dagger dug deep into the monster’s exposed chest, staying behind as he jumped back with catlike grace and speed. Whining, the hound staggered a last step forward, then collapsed, landing with a thump I felt vibrating through the earth beneath my feet.

A last wet growl, and it went silent.

Alyra let out a triumphant squeal and fluttered down to perch on the dead creature’s snout.

Only then did I hear my own ragged breathing; it came shrieking from my throat as I stared at that mountain of hair and claws and fangs, covered in raw wounds and festering scabs. Sharp pain lanced through my ankle as I staggered back. Thesounds of the battlefield finally made their way to my conscious mind again, a never-ending cacophony of screams and sizzles and clattering metal.

‘Are you alright?’ Only the hint of roughness in Creon’s voice suggested his staring match with a creature ten times his size may not have left him entirely unaffected. His movements were tightly coiled and perfectly controlled as always as he retrieved his knife from the hound’s chest and wiped it on a patch of more or less clean fur, then turned to me, gaze shooting down to my ankle. ‘Sprained?’

I grimaced. ‘Think so.’

He muttered a curse, sliding his knife back into his boot. ‘We can’t linger here. We’re lucky no one else seems to have noticed us.’