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R age still shook me as Emon’s mind spun me into the next memory and I narrowed my eyes on the heavy iron door. Stepping back from the tortuous sounds behind it. The sounds of an unwanted rhythmic slapping of flesh. The pleasurable grunting of male satisfaction upon the unwilling.

I could taste the bile in my mouth and the beginning of panic clawing at my insides, but a thunderous roar shook me to my core and I spun at the familiar sound.

“No.” I whispered, staring at Emon running naked with uncontrolled fury raging in his eyes straight for that forsaken door. The iron chains hung around him, his beautiful bronze skin still covered in slashes and burns I had witnessed in the last memory. Deirdre had found a way past her vow.

I jumped back out of instinct as he came crashing towards me and then flinched when his large solid body slammed into the door, the iron searing his flesh. I stared when the sizzling sound of his skin didn’t even phase him, let alone the pain it must have caused.

Snarling and with muscles bulging, he gripped the door, and with a ferocious roar, his hands burning on the cursed metal, he ripped it clear off its hinges, tossing it behind him with such a force that I ducked out of the way quickly. It hit the far wall an thunderous boom that shook the walls.

“Impossible.” I whispered, following his memory towards the open room, a room I never wanted to return to.

I paused at the doorway and closed my eyes.

If I passed through this door, then I had to accept two things.

One. Emon was much more powerful than anyone could ever imagine. The irons had only stopped him from shifting…but it never weakened his shifter strength, his power had ensured his survival.

And Two. I had to accept what had been done to me. I would have to witness it, acknowledge it, and then let it go. There was no room for me to continue to carry this hurt any longer, not with Emon in my life, and I wanted him…in my life. We both needed to move past this moment in time.

Trembling, I opened my eyes and stepped through the door with a confident stride despite my shaking.

I stared at the drugged version of me in this memory, chained with irons to a sterile cold table—so helpless. Helpless against the human that was forcing himself between my thighs, so caught up in taking his pleasure from my body he hadn’t even noticed the roaring shifter until it was too late.

Emon ripped the pathetic human off of me with one arm and sent him careening into the opposite wall, his skull exploding on impact. Showering everyone in the room with blood.

Growling low, Emon licked at the bright red blood from his lips and stalked towards the dead human. Bending with menacing intent, he ripped the flaccid penis off the body with his bare hands.

Then ever so slowly, he turned towards the two other humans in the room frozen in terror with their eyes bulging and their pathetic bodies trembling with fear. Still holding the small bleeding dick in his hand, Emon prowled towards them, his gold eyes swirling with white hot fury.

“You.” He pointed the severed cock at one of them. “Take off your shirt.”

Shaking violently, the human fumbled clumsily with the buttons of his shirt under the murderous gaze of the king of shifters towering over their meager height.

Emon snatched the shirt from the human the instant it was off, the movement causing his commrade’s eyes to roll before he crumbled to the floor, passed out from sheer fear, a wet stain spreading over the front of his khaki pants.

Emon didn’t even spare the unconscious human a glance. “Hold this for me, human.” He snarled and extended the bloody dick flesh to the still conscious man.

The shocked human paled and promptly bent over, throwing up all over the blood sprayed tile.

Emon hissed and side stepped the projectile vomit, his iron chains dragging across the floor noisily while his flesh sizzled. Yanking on the hand of the still vomiting human, Emon slapped the cock into it.

“If you drop this, I will kill you.” He snarled.

The human paused from his retching to look down at the bloody flesh before his entire body heaved to vomit again, intelligently keeping the dick still in his hand.

Disgusted, Emon turned away, walking over to my unconscious body with the blood splattered shirt.

The violent rage on his face softened to one of compassion and sadness when he looked down upon me to tenderly drape the shirt over my naked body, pulling it over my shoulders and brushing away the greasy hair that clung to my feverish face.

His hand stilled then, his eyes widening with shock. Time seemed to stop in our awe of each other, the only sound was that our ragged breaths over my unconscious body, and then time started again.

Slowly, Emon turned back to the human, his face shuttered with violent rage and his eyes glowed white with deadly malice—they were going to die.

The conscious human perceived this instantly. “Bbb—but you said you wouldn’t kill me if I didn’t drop—” He glanced down at his outstretched hand.

Emon cocked his head to the side. His voice was so cold that if I had a body I would have had goosebumps. “I said I’d kill you if you did, I never said I wouldn’t kill anyway.”

Recognizing that he was about to die, the human attempted to escape, except Emon was already in front of him before he could take another step. The shifter's hand shot out around the human's throat, the iron chains clanking loudly by the abrupt movement.

Dark satisfaction rose within me when the human released a terrified cry.

“Did you rape her?” Emon growled

“It was an ooorrd…oorrrder.” The human’s mouth gaped when Emon’s hand slowly squeezed his throat harder.

In a blink, the shifter king grabbed the severed dick in the human’s hand and shoved it down his gaping throat. He screamed and choked around the bloody appendage, but Emon’s hand covering his mouth prevented him from spitting it out as he thrashed to get away.

Emon watched the human struggle with a feral grin for a few more seconds before snapping his neck with a sharp twist and dropping him to the floor.

The bloody dick tumbled out of the man’s dead gaping mouth as Emon stepped over him unaffectedly towards the last living human still unconscious on the floor.

With a furious roar, Emon slammed his bare heel down on the man's crotch. The fracturing of his pelvis forced the man to wake up with a blood curdling scream before promptly passing out again.

Swiftly, Emon punched downwards, sending the iron chains flying before his fist punched a hole straight into the human’s chest—crushing the man’s heart with one blow.

Brutal. Monstrous. Emon was an avenging animal but this was mercy from a fae. I would have done much worse.

Blood dripped from every inch of Emon’s exquisitely marred and naked body as he spun and was back at my side with unnatural speed. I stepped closer to watch his memory and the way his trembling hand rose to lovingly cup the side of my face, the blood on them smearing on my pale skin like war paint.

“Forgive me.” Tears pooled in his eyes and fell, splattering with loud plops on the metal table. “Forgive me, my little umbra. I did not know, I would have come sooner had I known. I would have come sooner.”

The keening cry that left him sent my heart crashing into my stomach and I watched, unable to soothe him, as his body bowed over my unconscious form, shaking with strangled sobs.

“My soulmate, my soulmate.” He cried into my unconscious chest, smearing more blood on the white shirt he had covered my body in.

“Soulmate.” I whispered, my why was before me.

Then I felt it, the bond clicking into place between us and I took in a deep clear breath as if I had been holding it my entire life, just waiting for the air that only Emon could give me.

Emon rose, wiping the tears from his eyes and stared at the iron cuffs that restrained me on the table. Roaring, he raised his fist and it slammed down hard on the thick iron casing.

His knuckles split wide open.

Another hit.

The iron seared his split flesh clean off, revealing bone.

Another.

His bones fractured, revealing a mangled fist.

Another.

The sound of the iron cracking would have been missed by any who were not watching closely.

My spectator self rushed over in disbelief, staring down at the iron cuff that had once held me hostage. Emon had done it! Goddess above and below, the shifter had done it…the iron cracked under his broken and bloody fist with nothing more than his sheer will to free me—to free his soulmate.

A blaring alarm sounded. Emon turned snarling while chaos broke out within the room. Armed guards attacked him from all angles and he fought like a cornered savage beast but I knew how this ended.

Tearing my eyes away, I looked back down at myself in Emon’s memory, my gaze fixated on my right wrist and the split iron cuff.

A slow smile spread across my face as I stared down at myself.

There…wrapping lazily around my twitching fingers was a thin film of smokey shadows.