Then we could haveHoly Fuck We’re Still Alivevictory sex. I might even let Vail watch.
“I can take two of them out temporarily—maybe three.” Draven uncoiled his whip.
I nodded. “Okay, Draven and Vail, with me.” If Draven could even temporarily put some of the wraiths down, then I wanted him with me—and I knew it wasn’t worth arguing with Vail. “Everyone else, get to the room. Rynn, once everyone is there, come back out and wait by the main entrance so we can follow you, since we’ll likely be coming in hot.”
“Bullshit!” Cali snapped. “I’m coming with you. Vail can go with the others.”
“Like hells—” Vail started, but I cut him off.
“You’ve been limping for the last two miles and trying to hide it, Cali. It’s more than your wings that are injured. Your magic won’t work on the wraiths anyway. Draven and Vail are the best suited for fighting them, and you know it.”
Vail was the only one who had a weapon that could hurt the wraiths in their shadow state, and Draven had experience fighting them.
Cali’s lips pressed into a flat line while her eyes glowed with rage, but she didn’t argue any further. She knew I was right.
“We’ll make this quick.” I leaned forward slightly on the balls of my feet. “The three of us will run away from the temple, just enough for you lot to get inside the entrance, then we’ll turn around and sprint back. I’ll take point since the wraiths won’t kill me.”
Hopefully. I was counting on them fearing Erendriel enough to obey his orders and deny the drive every predator had to chase down prey and slaughter it.
The kùsu-shaped wraith got too close to one that looked like a seriously fucked-up bear, and the two shrieked at each other.
“Go!” I spun around and shoved Kieran and Alaric hard. “Now!”
Without waiting to see if they obeyed, I took off in the opposite direction. Curses sounded behind me, but when I chanced a look over my shoulder, I saw everyone racing towards the temple. Two of the wraiths started to chase after them, only to stop and shake their heads violently, causing shadows to swirl through the air before twisting back in my direction. Both released pissed-off screams, then charged after me.
Well, my plan worked. Yay?
Draven’s whip cracked, and something snarled to my right. In front of us, shadows writhed on the ground before bursting upward and snapping into the form of an enormous beast with wings.
“Oh, fuck me!” I skidded to a stop, Vail and Draven doing the same next to me. “Is that a dragon? Why is it so big?”
“What the fuck is a dragon?” Vail cursed as we all tilted our heads to look at the towering monster.
“I don’t know!” I took a step away. “There was a picture of one in a book!”
The shadow dragon snaked its long neck forward until its head, adorned with spikes, was only a few feet from us. A mix of fear and adrenaline slammed into me as the other wraiths closed in behind us, leaving us nowhere to go.
Then it spoke one word in Unseelie, its voice so broken that it took me a second to understand.
“Bìrreb.” Kneel.
“Mur keb!” I screamed. Fuck you.
The dragon roared, and the other wraiths let out their own shrieks.
“Pissing them off further probably isn’t a wise move, Sam,” Draven chided even as amusement coated his words and a crazy smile lit up his face. He flipped his whip so that the length stretched across the ground before gripping the handle with both hands and then pulling them apart.
I blinked as asecondwhip peeled away from the first—made entirely of blood.
“I knew I saw you with two whips before!” The bloodred whip looked almost exactly like the first, aside from the color. I pointed one of my daggers at him. “You’re teaching me how you did that.”
Because having an endless supply of blood daggers I could throw at people who pissed me off soundedamazing.
“Maybe. If you ask me nicely.” Draven winked at me. “Get ready to run again, love.”
The wraith dragon growled and opened its maw to roar at us again, but Draven’s bloodred whip snapped forward, growing impossibly long before cutting directly through the dragon’s head. Instead of passing harmlessly through the shadows, as most weapons would, a deep red mist burst out from the whip, and the wraith reared back with a pained scream. Then thedragon shape fell apart, as if the wraith had lost control of its shadows, which were now writhing across the ground like a puddle of darkness.
Draven’s whip snapped around to the wraiths behind us, but I didn’t wait to see what would happen. I just took off running back towards the temple with Vail and Draven hot on my heels. Several wraiths were convulsing on the ground like puddles of liquid night, just like the dragon shadow had.
