Page 112 of Contested Crown

“We do it together.”

I relaxed, sitting. And then we were both drawing in the magic, drinking it back into ourselves. Slowly, the flames went out, the smell of char and ash thick in the room.

When I opened my eyes, we were back in an empty room, magic etched on the walls, everything blackened from the flames. Cade slumped forward, and I stood, managing to catch his weight on my shoulders.

My legs trembled from the magic I had just performed, my body jumping and twitching, but I held myself steady for Cade, needing to be strong for him.

After a moment, Cade straightened, standing up. He raised his hand to his face and frowned. “We didn’t burn.”

Cade looked down at me, shaking his head, both eyebrows going up. “Whatareyou, Miles?”

I whined, leaning back against his leg. He nodded down at me.

“Yes, we should go.” He walked across the room and picked up my discarded clothing. “When you’re human again, we’re going to have some very serious conversations about doing dangerous things. If you want to be my consort, you need to bealive.”

He stopped again, blinking at me. “Alive, you understand, Miles?”

I let my mouth fall open, my tongue hanging out from between my lips, and Cade looked at me, shaking his head.

Then I heard the noise of footsteps pounding down the stairs. Whoever was monitoring the beeping light in the keypad had finally arrived. Growling, I placed myself in front of Cade. As the men burst into the room, I was suddenly aware of how much larger I was than normal. Cade’s magic had augmented my size and strength. I didn’t just need his magic to find my wolf; I needed it because it let me be strong enough to help him, strong enough to protect him.

“Prince Bartlett?” one of the men asked, but his hesitation was just long enough for me to leap. I landed on him hard, and he fell backward, the magic he had been holding going off into the ceiling. Rock and masonry rained down on us, and I tore claws across his chest.

The man to the side of him raised his hands, but Cade moved forward. He brushed his fingers along my back, pushing the fur in the wrong direction, drawing the magic off me, but it didn’t matter because then he was throwing up his hands, an enormous net dropping on top of the other mage. The mage fell, his leg cracking as it twisted in the wrong direction, trapped under the weight of Cade’s spell.

The man screamed, and then Cade sprinted toward the stairs. I followed, making it halfway up the stairs before one of my legs gave, and I could feel it happening in reverse, my shift disappearing, my leg turning human.

Whatever noise I made caused Cade to turn, his eyes wide as he caught sight of me struggling. He slapped his hand back onto me, and magic surged through me.

My leg shifted back, wolf again, and I was up, bounding in front of him, because I heard what he hadn’t yet.

Ahead, in the narrow staircase, were more mages. I slammed through the door, sending two of them flying backward. The other one was ready for me. She raised her hands, but I lifted my head and bit hard on her wrist. My teeth tore through her skin, the bones cracking under the strength of my bite.

She screamed, and I let her go, turning in the narrow hallway to find the next threat. Cade pounded up the stairs behind me, his breath coming too fast, and I heard his heart racing in his chest. It was a shot of adrenaline. My mate was scared, terrified—I had to protect him.

I used my full weight to slam one of the mages into the wall, and then I felt something slither between my shoulder blades.

As I pressed the man hard into the concrete, Basil hissed in my ear, but it was beyond me to understand what he was saying. An explosion threw us apart, the man’s head snapping back and slamming into the concrete. I managed to right myself, growling at the woman, who was still screaming and holding her bleeding arm.

Cade was already ahead of me, and I followed behind him up more stairs, then into the lobby and through the doors. On the street, we made an even stranger pair: a fully shifted werewolf, blood coating his muzzle and paws, and a mage, sweating and exhausted, streaks of soot on his face.

For a few blocks, we continued to run, until Cade stumbled, managing to catch himself before falling but wincing when he tried to take his next step.

“I can’t.” Cade panted. “I can’t go any further. We need to find somewhere safe.”

I knew that. It was like a beacon in my mind, the need to find somewhere to settle down, somewhere to curl around him and lick our wounds until we could meet whatever danger we were facing.

“Is there anywhere we can be safe?” Cade looked at me, helpless. I had to be strong for him.

I could be strong for him because he was the only person I trusted myself to be weak in front of.

I turned in a circle, my familiar city now filled entirely with danger. Still, there was one place where I knew no one would bother us.

Trotting down the street, I turned and looked over my shoulder until I was sure that Cade was behind me, his stumbling steps growing more sure as I led us through a series of increasingly narrow streets. We were in an area packed close with town houses, each one with windows that looked straight into its neighbors’. There was no privacy here, neighbors so close that if they leaned against the wall, they could hear whispered arguments at night.

Except for one house that had been warded and protected.

I walked up to the back gate, looking at Cade expectantly until he opened the latch. We entered the backyard, and I trotted over to the back door.