Page 48

Everly

C rimson coated the walls in arcs and streaks like a violent painting. The furniture was shattered just like it was downstairs. The chandelier hung lopsided, half its crystals already on the floor.

And Yorrick, Wynnie’s husband, lay in the center, throat torn open, dead eyes staring up at me as a Tharnok crouched over him, feasting.

I choked back a scream, tears blurring my vision.

No.

I couldn’t be too late. I hadn’t risked everything to get here too late.

A soft whimper came from the corner, followed by my name whispered in quiet desperation. My gaze snapped toward the closet.

If I listened closely enough, I could hear the sound of her hitching breaths in between the snarls and crunching of bone.

She was in there.

Alive.

Barricaded inside by chairs, and ottomans, and whatever the hells else Yorrick had been able to shove into place to keep her safe.

Relief crashed over me so potent my knees threatened to buckle.

Alive.

My sister is alive.

Then I looked back at the male on the floor. The one who had never shown my sister a real ounce of love but had used his last breath to protect her.

And had died for it.

The Tharnok turned slowly, head tilting, black tongue flicking across its bloodied maw.

It hadn’t noticed me for the first few heartbeats I’d been standing here, but it did now. And it was staring. Studying me with ravenous hunger flashing in its sunken amber eyes. It shifted then, arching its body toward me, its lips pulled back in a snarl.

Terror gripped my throat, and every breath scraped like broken glass.

My hands trembled as I adjusted my grip on the blood-soaked hilt of my dagger until my knuckles were white from the strain.

I focused on my anger, letting it wash away the panic, letting it flood my veins like an icy river of rage. It rose to the surface, locking itself in place like armor.

I couldn’t run, even if the thing hadn’t been faster. The barrier around my sister wouldn’t hold once the Tharnok switched its focus to her. And it would. Even I could hear her past the flimsy wood, so I knew the predator smelled her from here.

I needed this monster to die.

The wind inside the keep howled louder. Snow and ice burst through the room before escaping through the broken balcony doors. Had Yorrick locked them in here, searching for safety, when this Tharnok came in through the balcony doors?

The monster took a lumbering step forward.

Then another.

And then… it smiled.

I dodged to the left as it lunged for me, claws slamming into the floor where I had just been standing. I rolled and got to my feet just before it tried again. Each attack coming faster than the last. I barely ducked beneath a sweeping claw, stumbling back into the shattered dresser.

I raised my dagger, taking in another wheezing breath.

I needed to lead it to the balcony. I had no idea if Tharnoks could survive a fall this high, but I wasn’t capable of fighting it directly if I wanted to survive, so it was a theory I was more than willing to test.

The monster circled me like it was savoring the chase.

I took a careful step backward, closer to the glass-paned doors, ducking or feinting when I needed to corral the Tharnok a little closer or further away.

A crash sounded behind its towering form, followed by the sound of splintering wood.

Dread rooted itself deep in my gut, like poisonous mournbriar vines.

I wasn’t Draven. I couldn’t take on more than one monster.

Another crash rang out, but again, the Tharnok didn’t flinch. Its gaze remained fixed solidly on me.

I took another step back, and then I heard a voice.

“Leave my sister alone, you disgusting, blood-drunk shitbeast!”

The monster whirled around just as Wynnie used her mana to hurl the furniture across the room, pelting the Tharnok again and again as she raced forward and slammed a broken chair over its face.

It roared as she scrambled backward to grab another, screaming curses at it with each breath.

“Shards damn it, Wynnie, I had it under control!”

With its attention on her now, there was no more time to hold back. I leapt onto the monster’s back, trying to avoid the sharpened spines that stuck out of its skin like obsidian blades, before driving my dagger into the Tharnok.

“Yes, I’m sure you had a flawless solution that didn’t involve getting eaten,” my sister quipped as she hurled more furniture through the air.

The monster roared again, flailing. One of its spines sliced across my side, but there wasn’t time to register the pain, or the warmth pooling down my dress. I screamed and yanked the blade free and stabbed again. And again.

It bucked, shrieking loud enough to split the air. The chandelier came crashing down. And the glass doors and windows shattered.

“Balcony!” I screamed.

Wynnie was already moving. She shoved the doors the rest of the way open. The wind and snow from the storm within the manor colliding with the one outside.

The Tharnok howled. Slashing out with its claws, but it was slower now.

Wynnie didn’t hesitate. She rammed into it with everything she had. It tumbled backward, limbs flailing, and went over the railing with a horrible scream.

Then… silence.

My muscles twitched involuntarily. I could feel the shock beginning to settle in. Could see it in my sister’s face now that the immediate danger was gone.

We didn’t speak. Just threw ourselves into each other’s bloody arms.

“Draven,” I rasped out his name. “We have to get to him.”

My sister’s eyes widened, and she gave a slow, unsteady nod of her head.

Footsteps thundered in the hallway, ones that were heavy and with claws that scraped against wood.

Wynnie grabbed my hand. “This way.”

She pulled me toward a panel in her wall. We ducked into the narrow stone hall of the servant’s passage just as another Tharnok rounded the corner into her bedroom. It slid across the floors, screeching in fury before its glowing amber eyes locked onto us.

Wynnie slammed the hidden wall closed, sealing the door just as the monster crashed into it from the other side.

We stumbled back as a frenzy of claws angrily scraping against stone echoed through the passage. It was so loud, too loud, and I didn’t know how long her seal would hold.

My sister snapped her fingers, and four orbs of fae light appeared above our heads.

“They will lead us out,” she shouted over the snarling and scraping, pointing to the dancing lights.

I nodded and followed her lead as we raced through the passageways, putting as much distance between ourselves and the Tharnok as possible.

My ring went cold. Ice bit into my skin as sharp as a blade, and it refused to let up.

The truth sank in like a dagger between my ribs as I finally understood what it had been trying to tell me all this time. The ice flared again, like a warning bell.

Danger.

Draven was in danger.

My steps were fueled with even more urgency than before as we raced around corners and down stairs until we found ourselves at the dining hall. Impatience buzzed along my skin like a hoard of angry ice-wasps as Wynnie and I listened at the door, waiting until it was safe to ease it open.

But the door wouldn’t budge. I pushed against it, harder this time, going low to dislodge whatever weight was blocking it. When it eventually gave way, I stumbled to the ground and a dark shadow slid on top of me. It wasn’t the pressure of a monster, and it wasn’t moving to attack.

Bile swam over my tongue as something slopped down onto my head, and down my neck. It was wet, and cold, and wrong .

So very wrong.

Wynnie gasped as she climbed over me, her hands reaching out in quiet, trembling movements. When I could finally sit up, it was to see my sister pulling a member of her staff off of me. Or what was left of them, at least.

Her expression was stoic as she gently placed them against the wall, her hands were trembling more violently once she let them go.

I grabbed her by her shoulders, forcing her upright, just as she had done for me so many times.

“Breathe,” I whispered, trying to pull her from her panic, while being mindful of whatever could hear us.

She did, and I tried to follow suit.

Then the wind exploded. It blasted through the dining hall, so forceful it ripped the doors from their hinges. My ring burned with cold again, just as I looked up to find Draven in the kitchen surrounded by five Tharnoks. Bodies littered the floor around him like broken toys.

I screamed his name like a prayer. His head snapped toward me. A mix of relief, fury, and fear danced across his features.

A Tharnok’s jaws snapped down on his arm.

He stumbled, and I ran forward.

Wynnie grabbed my arm, wrenching me back. “There’s nothing you can do, Ev. There are too many of them.”

Her voice was hoarse, broken even, as her crystal blue eyes searched mine.

I shook my head, resisting her tugging.

It didn’t make sense. Not when I had come here to save her, not when I knew he was stronger than us both. But another shriek rent the air, and I knew with a certainty that there was no part of me that could walk away and leave my husband to these monsters.

I tore free just as another wave of mana blasted through the room.

My husband’s face was twisted in sheer, unrelenting fury. The monsters were flung back. One of them hit the wall so hard it crumbled. The others scrambled to regroup, but he was already moving.

A haze of frost. A blur of ice, sharpened like a blade.

He flitted between them, ice ripping through limbs, mana lashing out. One monster shattered into a thousand shards of ice and blood. Another was frozen mid-lunge, then ripped apart by sheer force of will.

He was rage and storm and salvation all at once. And then, he was here.

Bleeding. Limping. Breathing hard.

The final Tharnok hadn’t even hit the ground when Draven crossed the space between us and pressed his bloodied forehead to mine.

It should have felt strange, but it was instinctual. I leaned into him, needing to feel that we were both still here. Both still alive.

I closed my eyes and took my first real breath, pulling him into my lungs and clinging to the scent of frost and juniper that somehow still clung to him after everything. Slowly, something close to relief settled in.

Even though I knew this still wasn’t over.