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And at their center stood a single individual.

The water before the Fae had frozen solid, stretching all the way to what Arianna finally realized was their prisoner.This place…Her hand flew up to cover her mouth.

This was where the High Lords and Ladies of Móirín performed their executions.

No, not just executions. This was a place where the worst of the worst came to be punished. Where they suffered slowly, their bodies freezing one cell at a time. She’d thought the practice banished long ago.

Arianna studied the figure at their center. The wind blew away from her, carrying their scent with it. Ice had already crawled halfway up their bodies, but whoever it was hadn’t started screaming yet. She knew the way cold burned, and wondered if anyone could deserve such a brutal fate.

The crippling pain in her chest pulled again and before Arianna realized it, she was at the base of those stairs.

Their chanting filled her ears, an ancient, hollow sound that made her skin prickle as she continued to circle, her mind desperate beyond reason to see who stood at the center of this dreadful magic. It echoed in her bones, screaming at her tohurry, hurry, hurry.

She could hear the prisoner’s ragged breaths now. Male. Definitely male. The ice had solidified up to his chest, and he’d clenched his fists as if holding in the pain, refusing to give in to its demands.

Arianna took another step, but no one in the circle seemed to notice her.

She caught a glimpse of auburn hair beneath the hood. Another step and she saw his angular face, his lips tinted blue from the cold. Another step and the wind shifted, carrying her scent toward her father’s prisoner.

Arianna’s heart clenched as emerald eyes slid to meet hers and that cord, that bond she’d been denying sprang to life.

It braided itself together, weaving between her and the male until it was so strong, Arianna was certain no blade could ever sever it.

All doubt, reason, and grief left her, replaced by a rage she’d never experienced. It burned like wildfire, pulsing, humming as if alive.

And Arianna roared.

Those nearest to her leapt back, their spell broken, and Arianna plunged straight into the freezing water. Steam rose up around her body as she fought her way through the ice, breaking it down chunks at a time. She snapped her teeth and tugged at her magic, using the water from that cursed pool to throw the Fae away from him.

Waist deep, she wrapped her arms around Rion’s torso, desperate to bring warmth back to his frozen body.

He didn’t move.

“What’s the meaning of this?” Her father was the only one left in the water. All others had fled to the stone bank, watching and waiting as they observed their Lady’s feral rage.

Her father. He hadn’t insisted she come to the meeting because this is what he’d been planning. He wanted Rion gone. Dead.

She turned to him, growling so low and deep she didn’t recognize her own voice. And her father, her strong, courageous father, the male who’d declared her too weak to lead, yielded a step.

Rion’s body shivered, but she didn’t remove her arms. Her magic flowed through him, both water and healing. She thawed his blood, warmed the muscles in his legs that had been completely frozen, then set to healing the tissue.

So much damage and she wasn’t sure she could repair it all. Wasn’t sure he’d be able to walk again.

Another growl reverberated from deep in her chest as her father regained his composure and stepped toward them.

He didn’t stop and every fiber in Arianna’s body screamed at her to protect the male in her arms.

To protect her mate.

The water to her front solidified and shattered into a thousand shards. She tugged on those spears of glass, surrounding herself and Rion in their protective embrace before launching half at her father. Avalon pulled at the particles in the air and shielded himself from her blast. He growled in warning at his eldest daughter, but Arianna wasn’t finished. No, she’d make them all realize, make sure they knew that no one, absolutely no one, was going to take her mate from her.

The water around her body reacted, solidifying all the way to the bank and she yanked the liquid from her father’s grasp, leaving him standing on bare stone. The ice towered and circled her and Rion like a giant serpent, cracking and refreezing as she shaped it to her liking.

Her father froze, mouth gaping, but she could feel his magic prodding, searching for any scrap of moisture to fight with.

She didn’t give him a drop and once again, her father took a retreating step back. Vulnerable. That’s what she’d just made the High Lord of Móirín.

Rion’s body shivered, and Arianna poured more heat into him, praying and praying that he wouldn’t collapse right there. His skin was still ice cold, but his body was healing, slowly, it was healing.