Page 53 of Reaper’s Ruin (Reaper’s Ruin Trilogy #1)

Two days of riding with barely a pause had taken its toll.

My mortal body ached in ways I’d long forgotten—muscles protesting with each stride of the Stormsteed, hands blistered from gripping the rope I’d fashioned as reins.

Exhaustion settled in my bones like a weight, dull and constant.

A weakness I hadn’t experienced in centuries.

I cursed this fragile form. In the Shadowveil, I needed no rest, felt no hunger or thirst. Death didn’t tire. Death didn’t feel the burning in his lungs or the stiffness in his back.

But now, in this mortal vessel, I felt everything.

Soraya hadn’t complained once, though I knew she must be suffering far worse than I was.

I’d ridden into battle countless times in my mortal life, but she had never spent more than a few hours on horseback, if the stories of her world were any indication.

Yet she remained straight-backed and watchful, her eyes constantly scanning the horizon behind us.

“We should stop soon,” I said, studying the darkening sky. The Storm Court’s mountains loomed behind us in the distance, their peaks still visible against the dying light.

“I’m fine,” she said, her voice clipped. “We should keep going.”

She’d been like this since Thunderspire—quiet, distant, not looking at me unless she had to.

And gods, it gutted me more than any blade ever could. I told myself it was for the best. I had to believe that. Whatever madness overtook us in Lord Cassius’s chambers—that storm of hands and mouths and desperation—could never happen again.

It was a mistake.

A beautiful, soul-shattering mistake.

No matter how much holding her in my arms all day shredded my sanity and unraveled my resolve, I fought every second to bury the memories.

The feel of her skin beneath mine.

Her ragged breath in my ear.

Her body meeting mine thrust for thrust, as if we’d been made to break each other open.

It was enough to drive me mad all over again. But I held the line. Bit down on every need. Because I couldn’t give in again.

Not when every second I touched her, I fell deeper.

Not when I knew I’d lose her.

I had to keep her at arm’s length—no matter how it destroyed me. Because if I let go again... if I tasted her again, held her again, kissed her again—

I wouldn’t survive the moment she left.

And she would leave.

Her door would come. Her peace. Her afterlife.

And I’d be left behind, standing in the wreckage of what we were. Of what we could never be.

So I rebuilt the armor around my heart, reinforced the iron bars, and tried to deflect the blows of those eyes, those lips, that woman.

My woman.

But the truth was cruel and inescapable.

She wasn’t mine.

She was never meant to be mine. And I didn’t know how to stop wanting her anyway .

“Moonshadow is exhausted,” I said, my tone leaving no room for argument. “And so are you.”

She didn’t answer, just stared straight ahead at the narrowing path that wound between ancient trees. The forest had grown denser as we’d traveled, the undergrowth thicker, slowing our progress. We were still at least a day’s ride from the Flame Court border.

We needed rest, but I also had the constant nagging thought that Storm Warriors were expert trackers. Moonshadow, magnificent as he was, left tracks that even a novice could follow. And we’d made no effort to conceal our trail in our desperate flight from the castle.

They would be behind us. The only question was how close.

As if in answer to my unspoken fear, a sound reached my ears—a distant thunder, too rhythmic to be natural. I felt Soraya stiffen against me.

Hoofbeats.

“They’re coming,” I whispered.

“The Storm Warriors?” Her voice was tight with fear.

I listened, counting the beats. “A dozen, at least.”

“What do we do?” She twisted to look back at me, her eyes wide, and for a moment, I forgot everything but the need to keep her safe.

I scanned our surroundings, searching for any advantage.

The forest grew denser to our right, the trees closer together, the undergrowth thicker.

The terrain was rougher there, with steep slopes and rocky outcroppings—difficult riding for Stormsteeds.

To our left, the ground sloped downward toward a narrow stream, the path easier but more exposed.

The hoofbeats grew louder. Minutes, not hours, separated us from our pursuers .

“Get off,” I decided, and she slipped to the ground quickly. I leapt off after her, grabbing the halter and sliding it from Moonshadow’s head.

I pressed a hand to his neck, my forehead to his. “Thank you for your help, Moonshadow. Now you need to run back to your herd. Find your friends. Lead them away from us.”

He seemed to sense my need, and when I stepped back and waved my hand at him, he took off galloping. I looked at the ground, noting the deep tracks he left in his wake.

“How are we going to catch him?” Soraya asked watching Moonshadow disappear through the trees.

“We’re not. He’ll lead them away with any luck and then you and I can hide. We’ll finish the journey on foot.”

“Will he be okay?” she asked, and I found it endearing how much she cared for everyone and everything.

“Yes. He’s a herd animal. He’ll smell the other Stormsteeds and join up with them. He’ll be home safe in his stall in a few days.”

Her face softened with relief.

“They’re getting closer,” Soraya said, her voice surprisingly steady. “We can’t outrun them.”

She was right. Storm Warriors were elite soldiers, their bodies enhanced by their trial-won powers. Against a dozen Storm Warriors, with no weapons but my sword and her dagger, if they found us, we stood no chance.

I hadn’t been able to summon my wings at will in this form.

They had manifested only in moments of extreme danger or high emotion—when the Voltmauler had attacked, when I’d let myself lose control in her body, when we’d escaped the castle.

Born of desperation and need, they’d appeared and vanished without my control.

But if I could summon them now.. .

I called on them, begging my wings to ripple from my skin, grant me the power to take them on. But instead of springing forth, nothing happened.

I cursed under my breath.

But even if they had obeyed, I wasn’t sure if I could overtake a dozen Storm Warriors at one time without significant risk to Soraya. She could withstand one of their powerful jolts, but not if several hit her at once.

A battle was too risky.

I could hear them now, too close, the sound of Stormsteeds pushing through the undergrowth, the low voices of their riders. The Storm Court’s elite, coming to eliminate the murderers who’d dared to slaughter the new King’s uncles.

If only they knew why.

I looked around, desperate for a place to hide, hoping they would see Moonshadow’s tracks and blow right past us.

“This way.” I pulled her deeper into the shadows of the trees, searching for a place to hide but finding nowhere secretive enough to conceal us from trained hunters.

But when I heard them reach the place we’d just been, I had no choice but to take cover and hope they followed Moonshadow’s tracks right past us.

I grabbed Soraya’s hand and quietly pulled her behind a bush, kneeling down and using it for cover.

“The tracks stop here before it looks like they galloped off that way,” a deep voice said, no doubt examining where we’d just been.

“Let’s get them,” another voice growled.

I heard them start moving, anxious hooves dancing on the dirt. My breath trapped in my lungs waiting for them to gallop off after Moonshadow... away from us.

“Wait!” a voice said. “Footprints. Do you see that? I think they got off here.”

Fuck .

More voices joined the discussion. Some wondering if we’d gotten off to make camp and got back on and galloped away. Another though, damned her clever mind, wondering if we’d climbed off here and sent our Stormsteed away to mislead them.

“We need to search here for more tracks before we move on,” she said. “Make sure they didn’t get off and hide.”

Soraya looked up at me, eyes wide with fear.

We were barely concealed. It would be too noisy to climb into the brush, and even then, if they were halfway decent trackers, they would find us anyway.

“Rhyker,” she whispered, her fingers tightening around mine. “They’re coming. What do we do?”

I would die before I let them touch her.

The thought struck with such fierce certainty that it took my breath away. Eight hundred years I’d existed without feeling, without caring. And now, in the span of mere days, this woman had become everything to me.

I closed my eyes, reaching deep within myself, searching for that power that had served me for centuries. The shadows that had been my constant companions, my only solace. The wings that had carried me between worlds.

Nothing.

“Please,” I whispered, not knowing who or what I was begging. The Veil? The universe? Whatever Gods may have existed? Whatever cruel power had brought us together only to tear us apart?

I felt Soraya press against me, her body warm and real and terrified. Her hand squeezed mine, a silent plea.

And then I felt it—a stirring beneath my skin, a cold, familiar power awakening. I reached for it desperately, begging it to respond .

And then, they broke free. My Veilwings, our dark and shadowy saviors.

I rose, ready to go to war to save her, slice through them with lethal precision. But as I saw them through the breaks in the leaves, I also realized there were more than a dozen. Twenty at least.

Could I take them? Likely.

Could she be hurt or killed as I did? Also likely.

And with no idea what would happen to her if she died in this body, I knew I needed another way to keep her safe.

The Shadowveil.

The thought slammed into my mind with blinding clarity. If I could pull us into the Shadowveil, no hunter, no matter how trained, how clever, could find us.

Is it even possible?