She laughs, dark blue trickling from the corners of her mouth. “You can rot in Tula’s pit!”
I don’t understand the reference but squeeze her neck more tightly anyway, leaning in close enough for her panting breaths to hit my face. “Whereare the shifters?”
Her fingers close around my wrists, talons pricking my skin. I dig my knee in harder, and she screams, her neck arching with the pain. “There is aship,” she says finally, her body growing fatigued beneath mine. I catch a glimpse of the blue blood now gathered in a pool beneath her.“You’ll die today. Either by the claws of my sisters or those of thebeasts.”
Growling, I release her and stand, swiping my spear from the ground as I brush my curls away from my face. I stiffen when the wind carries with it a resonant melody that sends a shiver down my spine. The logical part of me knows that I should go back to the palace—that I should ensure my family is safe. But there is a part of me guided by my heart, andthatidiot pushes me towards the beach.
Like the fool that I am, I listen, leaving behind a wheezing siren to die.
Chapter One Hundred and Thirty-Two: Bahira
Withinahandfulofminutes, I traverse the thickest parts of the forest and reach a more sparse area. And even if I hadn’t spotted the shifter ship floating just off the coast, I would have seen the animals as they fight the sirens still emerging from the water. The scent of blood mixes with the salty air blowing in from the sea, and as I carefully make my way closer, runningfrom tree to tree, I look for a familiar large wolf, his fur a rich dark brown with matching eyes ringed in gold. I hadn’t even seen him more than twice in his wolf form, and there’s a chance he could be a different animal, the result of whatever his father had done to his mother while she was pregnant with him giving him the unique ability.
Bodies litter the sand, a mix between the obvious sirens and shifters killed in their animal forms and mortal bodies indistinguishable between shifter or mage. I spot a gorilla, perhaps the same one whose toes I had stepped on my first day on the ship, holding a siren by her ankle before brutally flinging her to the ground and sending sand flying. Pausing behind a tree to catch my breath, I watch through the iridescence of the Spell as predators not already engaged in a fight prowl the shoreline, running after the sirens who exit as they bolt towards the forest.
A siren with light purple hair stands from the water, her thin braids giving way to loose curls as she makes her way forward. Wearing armor and holding a silver spear, her muscles flex as she fights against the lapping waves, her eyes set on the black bear that paces the beach in front of her. It lets out a warning growl, the rumble skating over my skin and waking up that instinct within me that tells me I should run. Instead, I move a little closer, my palm scraping against bark while my heart beats loudly in my ears. The siren lowers her upper body as she holds her spear out, staying just within the water so that it washes up to her ankles. Hissing at the bear, she dares it to come closer, laughing when it lets out frustrated rumbles.
“Pathetic creature!” she shouts, taking a step forward while flashing white teeth. “You think you can killme? Have you any idea the beasts that I’ve fought? Ones much larger thanyou!” The bear lowers, paws digging into the sand as its muscles flex beneath black fur. I work a swallow down, sweat beading over my spine despite the cold temperature, and wait for them tocollide. I’m so enthralled by the interaction, by the loud rhythm of my quickly beating heart, that I don’t notice a presence behind me until it’s too late.
A twig breaks, and then I’m shoved forward, my feet tangling in the underbrush as I stumble and crash into the ground. The first kick blurs my vision as pain bursts to life in my side, but I force myself to roll, avoiding a second hit. Leaping to my feet, I immediately throw my spear up to block the swing of the siren’s own weapon. She hisses at me, red eyes feral and canines gleaming as she keeps her movements quick, already withdrawing to come at me again.
Backing up, I angle the sharp tip of my spear in her direction. But she keeps her attacks quick, darting forward to jab at my chest and hips, my training forcing me to counter her movesjustfast enough to avoid getting cut. My breaths turn labored as we move in circles on the main pathway to the palace, but the siren with short red hair keeps coming at me, her movements so fluid and graceful that I can only imagine just how much of a terror she must be beneath the surface. Still, I hold my own against her, every bit her equal as we battle back and forth to be the one to gain the upper hand. I feint left, drawing her guard before I snap my spear to the right and drag the jagged edge across the outside of her arm. She doesn’t scream, barely making a noise to acknowledge the hit at all, and wastes no time countering my attack. She raises her spear and brings it down in a sweeping arc, rivulets of blood pouring from the cut on her arm. The reverberation when her spear collides with mine is strong enough to make me falter, but I recover quickly and push away from her, creating space for me to swing my own weapon.
Air stirs as I slice my spear through it, aiming for her ribs only to be blocked, metal on metal ringing out. But it isn’t the red-haired siren who stops me, it’s the purple-haired one I spotted earlier. I glance at the blood that coats her dark skin,then shoot a look to the beach, lips parting on a breath at the dead bear lying in the sand.
“Why, aren’t you a pretty one?” Purple eyes as dark as Nox’s magic meet mine, and the siren licks her lips as if she is tasting the blood of her bested opponent.Fuck, she probably is. “Do you know where Princess Rhea is?”
“No, but I know where you’re going to die.”
She smiles wide, the presence of it almost grotesque before she slides her spear down the body of my own, snapping it to the left and just barely grazing my front with its sharpened edge. A dull pain blooms over my chest, but I force myself to stay at the ready. No other words are spoken as the two sirens attack me at once, jabbing their weapons forward and then alternating their swings. I grunt with each hit my spear takes, my muscles fatigued already from how many I’ve fought before them. Dancing in circles, I keep us moving, but the sirens are freshly entering this fight, and I’m tired and slower than I was. The red-haired siren leaps forward, her spear nothing but a flash of silver that meets mine with a harshclang. I kick out at the glint of purple that moves to my side, but she’s quick to skit past my attempt as she moves behind me.Fuck. I shout as I push the first siren back, turning around to just barely block the downward swing of the purple one’s spear.
She smiles just before she rotates her weapon too quickly and sends it cracking into my jaw. I bite my tongue from the impact as tears flood my eyes. My leg buckles beneath the weight of her next kick, dropping me to my knees. Holding my spear above my head, warmth tingles over my palms as my shoulders dip from their next power-laden blows. I spin on my knees to keep both sirens in view, working to stand, only for a burning sensation to light up my leg when a third siren shreds into my flesh.
I howl as I fight to push myself up. Dark blue eyes gleam in delight from my newest opponent, and all I can do is try to turnaway from the next swipe of her claws. But they connect with my side this time as hands grip my shoulders and force my back to the ground. I raise my spear in time to stop the next swing of a weapon, but the sound they make when they collide is deafening, like lightning cracking the sky overhead. Except, as air is forced from my lungs and skin slices open on my chest, I realize it wasn’t lightning at all.
My spearbroke.
Time slows as I struggle against the blue-haired siren that keeps me pinned to the ground, the other two standing over me with their spears raised, preparing to impale me. I try to kick at their legs, but they dodge me easily, each planting a foot on one of my ankles as the siren who grips my shoulders sends her talons into the skin. I scream as they pierce muscle, my vision blurring with flares of white while my labored breaths burn in my chest. Tears leak from my eyes as I continue to struggle, a sinking realization wrapping tightly around my throat that I very well mightdiehere at their hands.
When I look up at them through tear-stained eyes, there is no kindness or pity. Instead, a wild and raging glee glares down at me, all three of them smiling in utter delight at my demise. They raise their spears higher, my shoulders burning as the claws there dig deeper and I attempt to cross the two halves of my spear over my chest. A roar, mightier than I’ve ever heard, shakes the ground, startling us all, and I watch as sword impales the siren with red hair, splattering her blood over my face and body. The glinting metal retreats, and she collapses, dark blue pumping from the hole in her chest as her spear hits the ground next to her. The purple-haired siren stares down at her dead friend in shock, her eyes wide, and she doesn’t have time to react to the small blade that appears in front of her neck, slicing across the delicate skin in a matter of seconds. Blood sprays from the wound, and I’m forced to shut my eyes as it rains down on me.
Still clutching the two halves of my spear, I scream at the pain that scorches my shoulders, but then the siren behind me disappears, and the unmistakable sound of blood gurgling forces me to roll quickly to my side in the hopes that I will avoid the same fate as these sirens. My ears ring as a shadow falls over me, and I scramble to my feet, arm already swinging towards this new opponent when I turn around and stop.
I simplystopat the sight of the male before me.
He holds a hand to his chest, the other gripping his blood-coated dagger so tightly his knuckles are white. But his eyes… They hold mine, and though pain pinches the harsh features of his face, his gaze only softens the longer he stares at me. I think I say his name, the word caught between a plea and a cry, but then he’s collapsing, blade falling from his hand to join the sword on the ground as he bellows out in pain.
“Kai!” I cry out, taking a step before I fall to my knees, my injuries forcing me to crawl towards him. But beyond the pain, icy terror fills my veins as I watch Kai writhe on the ground. As I reconcile where he is in regards to the beach. “Youidiot, you crossed the Spell!” I frame his face with my hands when I reach his side, his gold-ringed eyes flicking to mine in agony.
“Hello, Princess,” he grunts out between jagged breaths, a grimace contracting every muscle of his face.
“Why did you do that?Why?” I shout, holding him close as I lean over him. He crossed the Spell. And he’sdying.
Trembling fingers reach up to my face before touching the curls dampened with blood hanging by my cheek. Tears line his eyes, and for all the pain I know he must be feeling, for the way his body is tense with it, he just stares at me. Like he can’t believeI’mthe one that’s here. ThatI’mreal.
“Kai,” I whisper, wetness tracking down my cheeks and past my chin, a horrified scream bubbling up my throat.He crossed the Spell.
“I’ve missed you,” he says through gritted teeth, his eyes growing wide enough to see the whites surrounding them before they abruptly fall closed. Then, Kai Vaea, king of the shifters and the only male I have ever loved, falls limp in my arms.
