Easy to let her think that, if it meant saving her life or someone else’s.
She gripped the front of his tunic and tried to shove him, her respect gone. “Fuck safe, Brand. That’s mytwin!”Her fist was flying and connecting before he could blink.
Brand’s head snapped back, every concern legitimized with that single action. In the more than eighty years they’d known each other, her destiny as his Second secured from the start, she had never struck him in anger.
If Brand were any of the Imperial Demons that had come before him, she would’ve just earned herself a swift death for treason.
“Look at yourself!” he hissed, running a hand across his split lip. “Wouldyoulet you go down there?”
She looked mildly horrified, but didn’t let up. “I would do whatever it took to get him back.”
“So would I,” he growled. “You’re a danger to yourself and those you’d be protecting. You’re a liability. Now gohome,Second, before you do something I can’t overlook.”
“You hear that, Sorcerit?I’mthe liability now.” Hedda’s laugh was unhinged as she locked eyes on Lunara. “Think he’d let me go ifIwas the one sucking his cock?”
Lunara’s gasp was like flint to kindling, igniting his fury.
Hedda turned on him again, fist flying as she shrieked. “Is that all I have to do, Brand?”Slam,into his chest. “Be related or get on my knees, and you’ll let me do whatever I want?”Slam,into his stomach. “No matter how fucking idiotic it is?”
Brand was glued to the spot, enduring every hammering blow and fighting to control the rage overtaking him. He’d been rendered speechless, blood roiling, seething to his statued marrow.
“Hedda, lass.”
She spun to Magnus, gripping her hair with white knuckles, tearing at the strands. “Is this what I’m reduced to? A messenger?”
“There’s no shame in it,” Mag answered.
“No shame in leaving my brother to the mercy of a chasm?” She staggered. “H-he would never… Faldir would’ve been halfway down by now, if it were me. But… you want me to leave and gethelp?”
All Brand could manage was, “Your Imperial Son commands it.”
Hedda loosed a savage scream to the open sky, tears flowing down her cheeks when she faced him again. “I swore an oath to the Sisters,with Faldir,never to leave your side exposed.”
Sisters above. Crying? If Faldir wasn’t in dangerright now,he’d be doing everything in his power to figure out what in the fuck was happening to her.
“This is an exception. You are not yourself, and I can’t risk it.”
“No!” she wailed. “No, no, no. I won’t do it. I won’t.” Her eyes darted, unfocused, and she started to back away. “He would have been halfway down…”
“Hedda—”
She turned and bolted, clumsily dodging Mag’s grasp and heading straight for Lunara.
No, not Lunara—the chasm drop.
Mingled shouts filled the air as Brand barreled after her, Lunara the only thing standing between his Second and a deadly drop into nothing.
She threw herself in front of Hedda at the last possible instant, faster than any of them would have guessed her capable of. The two collided with dual grunts, Hedda wrapped in the vice of Lunara’s unyielding arms as they toppled to the ground amidst a blinding flash of light.
His Second was out cold by the time Brand made it to the spot.
“Forgive me,” Lunara was murmuring, clearing wine-red strands of hair from Hedda’s face.
It happened so quickly, mere feet from the edge.
Lunara looked up, a slight tremble in her lip. “It seemed a mercy to put her to sleep. I swear, it will only last as long as you wish it. Give the word and I wake her.”
“That was…” Mag raked a hand through his hair, staring at Hedda’s crumpled form. “Shite. You just saved her damned life, witchling.”
