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“If we can ride them,” he says evenly, “we’ll cover more ground.”

It sounds tactical, like he’s not half-watching Luna when he says it, like he didn’t just follow her into the clearing without a second thought. Like he didn’t offer the idea only after she’d made the first move.

It’s laughable.

Elias snorts beside me, voice low and sharp. “Sure. Let’s all ride the murder horses. What’s the worst that could happen?”

He glances at Luna, waiting for her reaction.

She doesn’t look at him.

Which, naturally, only makes him worse.

“I mean, unless you want to share mine,” he adds, casual as sin, flashing her a crooked smile. “I’m very good with… mounts.”

The unicorn closest to her—the largest, its horn longer than her forearm, its coat almost silver beneath the light—shifts when she approaches. It watches her carefully, deliberately, like it’s already made its choice.

And maybe it has.

The moment hangs sharp, stretched tight as a blade.

Then Elias breathes out, low and careful, and I feel the shift before I even register it. The air slows around us, like the world’s breath catches for half a second. The light warps softer, movement thickening just enough that everything feels a fraction delayed. It’s not enough to stop time, but enough to buy us a moment.

Elias can’t compel like Lucien, but he’s always known how to skew the odds. A subtle slant to the universe, like the entire world humors him because he asked nicely.

The unicorns freeze.

Just long enough.

Luna tenses beside me. She doesn’t want to do this. She’s walked into the clearing, but she hasn’t moved closer. There’s something rigid in her spine, her gaze locked on the creatures like she already knows how this ends and wants nothing to do with it.

I don’t give her a chance to second-guess.

Before any of the others can move—before Silas can fling himself onto one like a fool, before Elias can charm her intotrusting him—I step forward, catch her by the waist, and lift her clean off the ground.

Her breath punches out of her in a sharp, startled sound, fingers curling reflexively against my shoulder. “Ambrose—”

I don’t let her finish.

I swing her up onto the back of the unicorn in front of me, smooth and efficient, like it’s already been decided. She lands lightly, legs straddling the creature’s back, her fingers scrambling instinctively for purchase in the glimmering white mane.

Before she can say anything else, I move, vaulting up behind her in one fluid motion. I settle behind her, one arm looping around her waist, careful but firm, anchoring her without giving her room to bolt. She’s warm against me, stiff but steady, the curve of her spine pressed to my chest.

“Didn’t want you getting left behind,” I murmur near her ear.

The second she settles against me, the others lose whatever restraint they had left.

Silas is the first to move, of course. His eyes locked on the unicorns like he’s been handed a godsdamned miracle. Before I can blink, he’s lunging forward, hands out like he’s afraid they’ll disappear if he hesitates.

“Okay, okay—nobody panic, I call dibs on the one with the murder eyes!” he shouts, practically skipping toward the creature that looks most likely to impale him.

The unicorn he chooses watches him approach, its gaze flat and depthless, like it’s already decided it’s too good for him. He throws himself up onto its back in one fluid, graceless motion, nearly sliding off the other side before he steadies himself. “Holy shit—this is happening. I am majestic!”

Elias follows behind, slower, more deliberate—but not by much. His smirk is sharp enough to cut, eyes glinting as hecircles one of the smaller unicorns, sleek and silver with a horn curved like a blade.

“If I die,” he says casually, glancing toward Luna without subtlety, “tell everyone it was because I was too handsome to live.”

Luna doesn’t bother answering, but I see the flicker at the corner of her mouth—the part of her that still softens for him, despite everything.