Aurora leaps off her bike and races into the fray. I join her, the connection between us making it easy for us to wordlessly communicate. As she draws her cold iron knives, I leap muzzle-first onto the vine fae holding Jacen down and grab one of its “arms.”
The taste is revolting—like fishing old broccoli out of the back of the produce drawer and chowing down. It’s shockingly solid and muscular, but I hold on, dig my teeth in and shake my head back and forth. At the same moment, Aurora plunges one of her knives into the back of its neck, and it howls in pain.
Jacen gets the opening he needs to break free. The fae shrieks as it struggles from his grasp, whipping a second vine around and shouting in a booming voice, “You will accept this bargain, Jacen Boudreaux!”
I don’t like the sound of that. Aurora and I exchange a brief, worried glance. Then she shouts to Jacen, “Refuse him!”
Jacen looks at her like she’s crazy. Then back at the vine fae. Shrugging as if to saymight as well,he shouts half-heartedly, “I refuse you!”
The fae hisses and shrieks. Other fae in the clearing do the same. Aurora pulls her knife out of his neck and drives it back in again, twisting and digging. I feel her determination, her fear—and know instinctively that she needs me to have her back. So I get into position and take down any fae who come for her as the vine fae screams in pain and rage. Jacen shifts into his wolf form and goes for its legs, while Aurora just grits her teeth and pushes the knife further in, even as disgusting miasma sprays in her face.
“Don’t look them in the eyes!” Aurora shouts as two golden-skin glowing-eyed fae lunge for me. “Stay in wolf form! They’ll try to get you to say something they can twist with their magic!”
I don’t need to be told twice. Lunging for the two fae, I twist beneath their grasping hands and dig my teeth into flesh wherever I can find it. They reach for me with fingers that shimmer with deadly magic, making my nose tingle and settingmy hackles on edge. So I bite those fingers off and spit them in the ground.
Aurora, meanwhile, is now standing over a puddle of withered leaves and disgusting fae-goop on the ground. She whirls around and throws a cold iron dagger over her shoulder, barely looking to make sure it hits its target right in the middle of the forehead. Injured wolves cry out and howls echo in the clearing, but Aurora keeps moving, her gaze sharp and her movements deadly.
“Stay together, don’t let them isolate you!” She shouts to a pair of shifters fighting two small, feminine looking fae with sharp teeth and gossamer wings. “Take this cold iron dagger! You—use salt!”
I’m forced to drag my eyes away from her when the two golden-skinned fae come for me again, their fingers having regrown. This time I go for the throats, tearing one out and getting a scream of anger followed by apoofof magic into nothingness from the other.
That task handled, I join Aurora in the fight. Jacen is nowhere to be found now, so I keep her back as she moves from battle to battle, shouting out words of wisdom and sharing her weapons. Her daggers and knives seem to come from nowhere and everywhere, appearing in a palm and slipping through her fingers, each one taking her hair down until it’s a flowing river of gold strands at her back.
Her quick thinking and hand-to-hand combat skills save more than one pack member from a grisly fate. I watch as she talks a young shifter out of a fae’s thrall, breaking through the magic’s hold and leaving the snarling fae to vanish into nothingness, back to his unholy realm. A moment later, she’s twisting open a ring on her finger and tossing out a handful of strange-scented powder that makes a hauntingly human fae scream in pain and vanish in a puff of acrid smoke.
In the middle of it all, we move together in perfect harmony. She turns her back to an enemy with burning hands, knowing that I’ll kneecap him before he can take her out. I jerk my head in the direction of a wolf shifter being held down by fae magic, and she whips out her hand, a cold iron knife flying from her fingers. I hold down the few bodies that stick around so she can pull her weapons from them, and she shouts a single word of warning to make me whirl and take out an enemy with my teeth.
When a fae lunges at her exposed back, I’m there in an instant, my jaws closing around its exposed neck. When I’m momentarily blinded by a burst of fae light, her hand on my flank guides me out of danger until my vision returns. All the while, the bond flows between us, and my wolf sings in my head, thrilled to give in to the path fate made for him.
It’s in the middle of the deadly battle that the realization hits me like a physical blow. With mud on her skin, her eyes wide and wild, her hair loose and tangled, Aurora is the most beautiful, alluring, wonderful woman I’ve ever set my gaze on. More than that, she’s brave, brilliant, compassionate, and willing to fight with everything she has to protect her people, even though no shifter pack has ever fully accepted her.
I love her.
Not because she’s my fated mate, but because she’sAurora.My Aurora. I love the way her brow furrows in concentration as she faces down a fae twice her size, undeterred by his physical strength. I love the fierce determination in her mismatched eyes as she stands protectively over a fallen shifter. I love the quick wit and strong intelligence that allows her to outwit creatures who have lived for centuries, and the kindness that drives her to risk her life saving complete strangers who would never show her the same courtesy.
The intensity of the feeling makes me stumble as I take down another fae, their numbers dwindling fast around us. My wolfhowls inside me, a sound of triumph and longing that escapes my muzzle before I can stop it. As I tilt my head back and let the sound free, I hear it: it’s a howl of recognition, of completion. This is our mate,my mate,my wolf seems to say, and she is perfect for us.
Aurora’s eyes find mine across the mud and dirt and blood of the battlefield, concern drawing her pale brows together. For a moment I wonder if she can feel it too: the bright shining essence of our bond, an unbreakable tether between us. But she looks puzzled, so I just give a quick shake of my head, dirt and blood flying from my thick fur, and dive back into the fight.
But I can’t forget the way it feels to know that I love her. The realization colors every move I make, every thought I feel.
I’m so lost that I don’t concentrate on the battle for a moment—and a moment is all that it takes. A fae that wields darkness like a blanket of shadow engulfs me. Its cold magic seeps into my fur, under my skin, and down into my very bones. I’m lost in darkness.
In that darkness I see my father’s face. His lip is curled into a sneer, his eyes cutting, his voice emotionless as he casually cuts me down. Self-loathing and shame fills me, threatening to drown me. I can feel the earth beneath my paws as the fae’s magic tries to swallow me whole.
Bargain with me, creature with two forms.Its voice is strange and hollow, the sound echoing only in my head.I will release you from the darkness inside your heart forever.
It’s tempting to think of a world where my shame is gone, where no one can cut me down. A world where my father’s words, his disappointment and disapproval, have no effect on me at all.
But Aurora’s voice, cutting through the darkness, is far, far louder. “Kieran!” She sounds worried for me. “Don’t listen to him. Get out of there!”
At the same time, a powder rains down on the darkness engulfing me, and pinpricks of light surge through. That and Aurora’s voice are like a lifeline into the outside world. I surge forward, breaking free of the shadow fae’s grasp. Then I leap onto its very real, not-shadowy body and lunge for the exposed neck—only for the thing to disappear into shadows beneath me, leaving the smell of smoke and fae magic behind.
Curse the damn things for being able to go back to their realm whenever they want. It gives me no satisfaction to see them turn tail and hide. On the contrary, it only makes me that much more afraid that this is an impossible battle to win, since every time we get close to taking them out completely, they run to safety—only to return stronger than before.
Slowly but surely, we’ve pushed the fae back, killing them or making them leave to their own realm. The shadow fae and a few of his brethren are all that remain now, and they too run, leaving injured and exhausted shifters in the clearing. I see Jacen across from me, blood coating his muzzle, and feel a brief, strange relief that the asshole it still alive.
After all, I owe him revenge for last night’s embarrassment and this morning’s hangover. Can’t have him dying on me.
