“Fuck,” Sophie said, but before we could do anything, another howl ripped across the loch and a wolf peeled off from the pack, thundering down the road to meet the Kelpies.
The water horses reared, finding a new perceived threat, and changed direction, meeting the wolf head-on in the street.
“No,” I breathed, terror racing through me. “He helped me. That night. He helped. We can’t let him?—”
The wolf snarled and leapt onto the back of one horse, claws raking down its kelp-slicked hide. The creature screamed—an unearthly, watery shriek that rattled thewindows behind us—and twisted, trying to buck him off. The other Kelpies swarmed, hooves pounding the tarmac like war drums.
The wolf was a blur of muscle and instinct. He moved with terrifying precision, lunging low to tear at tendons, springing up to latch his jaws onto throats that should’ve been made of flesh but looked more like shifting seaweed and bone.
Sophie grabbed my hand. “We have to help him.”
“I don’t know how!” I cried, heart pounding, watching as he clawed his way across the flank of one Kelpie, blood—black as ink—spurting from the gash. The beast screamed, staggering, and the wolf launched from its back to meet the next head-on.
There were three of them. Maybe more. It was hard to see under the light of the moon and with the blur of motion. Each one a monstrous blend of horse and nightmare, their bodies dripping with lakeweed and rot, their mouths full of jagged, mismatched teeth.
The wolf didn’t hesitate. He threw himself into their midst, biting and tearing, fur flying as they reared and slammed hooves down with the force of boulders. A hoof caught his side and sent him flying. He landed hard, rolling across the ground in a blur of fur and dirt before he staggered to his feet again, breath heaving, blood soaking his flank.
“No!” I screamed, but he charged again.
One Kelpie tried to retreat into the loch. He chased it, snarling, forcing it back, but the others converged—two at once slamming into him. There was a crunching snap—a sound I’ll never forget. And then a scream—his this time—cut short as one Kelpie bit down on his hind leg andpulled.
The rip of flesh was sickening.
He collapsed, howling in agony, dragging himself forward with only his forelegs, blood pooling beneath him in a thick, dark smear. He turned his head, snarling through the pain, baring his teeth even as one Kelpie lifted a hoof?—
Sophie stepped forward.
“No more,” she said, voice shaking with something deeper than fear. Her hands lifted, fingers splayed wide. “Stop, at once. You weren’t summoned, and I banish you back to the deep.”
The wind shifted. The loch behind us churned, and the air itself seemed to tighten as she spoke.
“Return to the water,” she cried, louder now, voice ringing like a bell. “Return to the depths that bore you!”
The Kelpies faltered. One screamed, a high, distorted wail as it whipped its head toward her. But Sophie stood firm, her whole body trembling with something ancient and electric.
Other voices rose at our backs.
The Order.
They were here now, circling us, voices raised to the Kelpies.
“Back to the depths.Now.”
And they went.
Not all at once—but like the tide pulling back. They shrieked, they thrashed, but their forms began to unravel, seawater spilling from their eyes and mouths as their shapes twisted, collapsed, and finally scattered like smoke across the surface ofthe loch.
Silence fell.
Holy fuck. Oh God, that was terrifying.The Kelpies?—
“What—”
“Faelan—”
I turned, heart clenching, as the wolf lay trembling in the road. His body convulsed once, then again—and then began toshift.
A gasp.
