“We’re getting ahead of ourselves,” Brand said, pressing two fingers into his temple.
“Indeed.” Alwyn rounded a sofa and dragged their mother to it, urging her to sit down beside him. “Perhaps we should start again. This time, I want to hear every last, tiny, seemingly insignificant detail from the time you sent Baldrir to the Keep at Fanghold, to this exact moment.”
“No, no.” Vann waved his hand in encouragement. “I want to know how Luna saved three Imperials trained in warfare from the day they’d been born, and whyshedoesn’t even know she did it.”
Another flip of his heart, her confusion bleeding into something else.
Mag laughed, ignoring their father’s request. “It was epic. I’m lying there, losing my mind and skewered all the way through from two different directions. Blood everywhere.”
His mother loosed a strangled squeak, snowflakes falling around her.
“Ach, Mam, it’s fine. You see, Brand was holding the beast back. Sorcha dragged me away, and then Lunara ripped the talons out and healed me.” He parted his robe, flashing the smooth skin on his sides and abdomen. “Good as fucking new, too. She even saved my battle markings.”
Everyone leaned in, gaping. Amun hardly ever looked surprised by anything, and even Araxis had left his corner to have a closer look, eyes darting back and forth between Luna and Mag.
“There was a bit of overlap. See, she was still mending me when the wee shite over there got himself snared by the dreadbeast’s tongue and was being strangled to death. Had to be at least five yards long.”
“Sisters, spare me,” his mother mumbled, dropping her head into her hands.
Brand pressed a fist to his chest, his own remembered terror from that moment bubbling up to mix with whatever horrified anticipation Luna was dumping into the bond.
“The witchling went fucking feral. Brand suspected, I think, but that was the first I thought they might be mates myself.” Mag looked at her, his gratitude shining. “She snatched up one of the talons she’d taken from me and misted over there, saving his life. If she hadn’t done that and given me ideas, we may never have slain it.”
Luna froze beside him, the world tilting around Brand. He couldn’t breath through the onslaught of her devouring dread, the wrenching twist of his stomach.
“What did you just say?” Araxis’s voice mirrored the feelings roiling within him.
“I didn’t mist.” Her fingertips dug into the tops of her thighs. “I can’t mist.”
“Ach, you can and you did,” Mag snorted. “I watched it with my own two eyes. One second, you’re kneeling over me. The next, you’re standing beside Brand, screeching and stabbing, like that.” Mag snapped his fingers, the sound echoing around the room.
Luna shook her head slowly, every shallow breath cracking like a whip in the heavy silence.
Brand gritted his teeth, sucking in a lungful of air as two realizations hit him. “You can,” he forced out. “You got to Hedda before anyone else and stopped her jumping into the chasm, too. And in the washroom after… When we were…” Shite. Right before they’d sealed their bond and he’d spent hours and hours buried in her. “You can.”
“No. I can’t,” she whispered, wide eyes fixed a million miles inward. “Almost no one can.”
Brand felt the tiniest breeze pass through the room, ruffling his hair. The others tensed when it happened, all breath but Luna’s held still as the magical current moved between them.
“You’re both absolutely certain you saw her do that?”
Brand’s lips peeled back at his younger brother’s calm question—in direct opposition to the tense aggression in his body. “Why are you holding your blade, Araxis?”
“Because there are only two Sorcerit with the ability to mist at any given time. So I need you to be really fucking sure that’s what she did.”
Another gust swirled, even stronger.
“What?”Brand growled.“Since when?”
Araxis’s jaw ticked. “Since fucking always.”
“Well…” Vann called his own power up for some reason, vines twining around his wrist. “That’s news.”
Pounding started up on the outer door, Amal’s panicked voice shouting on the other side. Amun rose to reassure her, but Brand couldn’t be bothered to give a shite.
“No, no, no, no, no…” Luna’s chest was heaving. “This isn’t happening. Not real. Not real. I can’t mist. I can’t.”
Araxis crossed the room towards them, clear reluctance in every dutiful step. “Brother, you should move away from her.”
