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The battle was won.

But I knew the war was far from over. As we may have been victorious this time, but I still hadn’t been able to crush their leader between my jaws like I had intended to. That was because the coward had kept himself back, leading his armies from afar, and not as a true leader would at the head of the fight. But that was because he knew he couldn’t beat me.

The fucking coward!

The battle hadn’t been without its losses, as Koro’s army had suffered. But no more so than Garmr’s side, as once more it seemed as if the fighting had only just got underway before he was ordering his HellHounds to retreat. Something we didn’t allow for long, as we chased them further away from the town, keeping the people at the camp safe.

The ones closest to us had tried to run but were easily killed, despite us having no choice but to let the ones furthest out of reach go. My beast and I were eager to get back to Ella.

Koro had spoken of a cave in the mountains he was taking her to, and not for the first time in my life, I wished for wings.

“Well hopefully that fuck will think twice about challenging us in battle,” Orth said, after shaking himself free of his beast. Mine, I had managed to take control of, now there was no threat to Ella.

“Yes, but did you notice how Garmr ordered the retreat a little too soon?” Marcus said, for once not being vocally cocky about the victory, which instantly put me on edge.

“He’s a coward, that’s what they do,” Orth replied with a shrug as we made our way back to the camp, Tyr and Orson both doing the same.

“He could see he was going to lose and wanted to cut his losses,” I agreed, but Marcus shook his head.

“But so soon?”

“What you getting at, Marc?” I asked with a frown, giving him a sideways glance.

“How did they even know we were here? How did they get here so quickly?” Marcus replied as obviously, this was playing on his mind now the threat was over…for now.

“You think it was planned in advance?” my brother asked, as he too was allowing doubt to worm its way in.

“Well for that, they would have had to have known we were here as soon as we arrived, or…” Marcus stopped his flow of words, as something must have come to him and from the looks of things, nothing good.

“Or what?” I pushed, wishing the cagey bugger would come out with it already.

“They had managed to track us somehow,” Marcus replied, making me snap,

“And you’re telling me this now?!”

“Hey, I only just thought about it, but now after the way they retreated so soon, it was almost like…fuck.”

“What… what, Marcus?!” I snapped, stopping to grab hold of him, as his eyes were wide with panic. Not ever a good fucking sign from the smug bastard.

“What if it was only ever meant to be a distraction?”

At this my eyes widened, and one name slipped from my lips.

“Ella!”

Immediately, we all took off running the second I said her name, even Tyr and Orson, who, it fucking pained me to say, had both been instrumental in winning the battle. Telling me the God had literally been born to fight and Orson’s demonic bear had enjoyed the freedom of his rampage.

What I didn’t expect to see was the sight of Asher, Lerna, Koro, and Sorina making their way back to us. My eyes quickly searched for Ella and I found myself fucking roaring when I didn’t see her! In fact, the only reason I didn’t burst into my HellBeast that very second was because of my need to know what had happened. To know if she had been hurt or if my biggest fears had come true…

She had been taken.

“WHERE THE FUCK IS SHE!?” I roared when they were close enough. The sight of Lerna crying was my first indication that something had gone wrong and whatever it was, it was bad.

“Her blood… her blood…” Lerna sobbed, making me grit my teeth so hard I thought they would shatter. This making me unable to lash out verbally.

“She cut her hand, her blood fell to the floor…” Koro told us, now holding Lerna to his chest, consoling her.

“The spell, it led them straight to her,” Sorina said.