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Until I looked down and, suddenly, I was too stunned to take another step.

Because for the first time inyears, bold, shadowy markings were rising upon my skin.

What the hell was going on?

I was so distracted by the ribbons of black lifting from my body that I almost didn’t see the arrow, made of pure Light magic, flying straight toward me.

I twisted aside. It only grazed my thigh, but even the shallow wound sent buzzing energy skipping through my veins. Between it and my emerging markings, I was too dazed to make myself move fast enough.

The Light King, on the other hand, was blazingly fast and focused all of a sudden—a blur of power that slammed into me,knocking me further off balance. His arms wrapped around my waist. He threw me against the nearest tree. My knife slipped from my grasp and my breath left me with a violent gasp.

He pinned my arms at my sides, pressing them into the rough bark.

“Seven years,” he said, his face tilting uncomfortably close to mine. “I’ve sufferedseven yearsin this hell after what you did.”

“After whatIdid? You—”

His hand caught my throat, choking off my reply.

I stopped trying to talk and instead tried to free myself, thrusting my knee upward. He narrowly avoided the strike. The movement shifted his hold, and I nearly slipped free; he caught me by the arm and twisted it painfully, forcing me to go still.

“Seven years,” he repeated in a low, growling voice. “And you aren’t escaping me now.”

“You’ll find I’m very good at escaping,” I snarled back.

He pushed harder against my arm.

The biting pain woke something desperate inside of me. The swirls of darkness on my arm grew bolder. They started to lift and twist and spin around us, and I panicked a bit at the sight, remembering how calling upon these shadows in the past had always left me feeling lightheaded, removed from my own body—not a feeling I wanted to experience while trapped in the king’s deadly embrace.

I didn’t know how I would fare, allowing them to rise after all these years.

And I never found out—because Phantom was upon us in the next instant, bringing a cold wind and a storm of his own shadows with him.

He shifted briefly into an inky, amorphous essence, making himself small enough to slip between Aleksander and me. Then he exploded back into his solid dragon form, talons thrustingoutward toward the king’s chest, forcing Aleksander to stagger backwards to avoid impalement.

The force of Phantom’s re-solidifying body threw me back against the tree, taking my breath once more. But when I caught it and the dizziness subsided, I realized I was free. I stumbled my way from the tree, snatching up my fallen knife as I went.

Aleksander darted furiously around Phantom’s coiling form and dove after me.

I ducked his reach and then swiped upward, catching his wrist with my blade. I danced several feet away before turning back to face him.

Blood poured from his wrist; he didn’t spare it a glance.

“I’mverygood at escaping,” I reiterated with a nasty grin. “Because I’ve hadseven yearsto practice, after your kingdom’s sabotage and lies made a criminal out of me.”

Whatever response he gave, it was swallowed up by Phantom’s hiss as he shot forward.

I watched, applying pressure to the wound on my thigh, as Phantom wrapped his long, powerful body around the king and bent him toward the ground. His bottom jaw unhinged, allowing him to open wider, putting his full, terrifying set of fangs on display.

I wouldn’t be able to question that bastard if his face was ripped off.

I realized this.

But the stinging pain in my thigh and the ache in the arm he’d nearly snapped in half made me less inclined to care.

Before Phantom’s fangs could crush him from existence, however, the ones surrounding us finally rushed out from their hiding places.

Ten soldiers, that I managed to quickly count. All carrying bows. They didn’t try to interfere with my shapeshifting companion. Instead, they all nocked and drew arrows withpracticed, synchronized precision, pointing them at me. With the same disturbingly coordinated sort of movements, they hurried several steps closer, tightening the circle around me and leaving no gaps for escape.