Far too slowly, I lifted my head, my gut already churning with dread.
Draven stood facing me, his head cocked like he could sense the fear flooding through our bond. And still, it wasn’t enough. I couldn’t form the words, couldn’t figure out how to shape them to warn him.
Behind him, rising from a fissure in the ice like some fresh, new, hellish nightmare dredged from the deep, a second Korythid silently unfolded its massive limbs. Its cluster of crimson eyes locked onto Draven with predatory precision.
Its tail was already arched high, poised to strike, the deadly black venom already dripping from the tip of its stinger.
Batty shrieked again, her wings flaring against my collarbone.
No.
No, no, no.
“Draven—”
But there was no time. The creature was already moving… and something inside of me broke loose.
Shadows surged outward in an instinctive and violent rush. Ice flashed like lightning beneath my skin. The two collided in my chest and roared through my veins. I felt my mana tear free of me, wild and desperate as it raced toward my husband right before the world went quiet, and much, much too dark.
Chapter 36
Draven
My ring burned with a sudden, biting cold—an unmistakable warning that struck before my mind could form a single coherent thought. Dread followed through the bond, sharp enough to coil around my ribs and clamp down on my heart and lungs.
Everly was in danger.
I barely had time to think the words before shadows erupted from her in a violent storm, spiraling across the field with explosive force. Ice followed in jagged, crystalline spikes, fracturing the ground beneath her as her mana surged outward in a wave so heavy and uncontrolled it made the very air shudder.
The force of it tore past me, the shadows colliding with a second Korythid as the creature lunged from behind a broken pillar of ice. I hadn’t even had time to register its presence before Everly’s power seized it mid-strike.
Tendrils of darkness wrapped around the monster’s limbs, anchoring them with such force that the Korythid’s momentum halted mid-lunge. Ice darted upward through the cracks inthe shadows, spearing its joints and tendons in perfect, savage precision.
The beast let out a horrendous scream from its gaping jaws, and the sound vibrated throughout the Frost Grave.
Venom hissed as it dripped from the Korythid’s tail, eating through ice and dirt wherever it splashed to the ground. I hadn’t even sensed it approaching. Hadn’t even known it was at my back until it was nearly too late…
Fury roared within my veins, an explosion of mana bursting free from my fists to slam into the monster.
Let go, Morta Mea.I shouted at her through the bond, but her shadows kept writhing and growing.
Kaelen shouted for his warriors, leading them in through the shadows as the Korythid writhed helplessly beneath them. Skaldwing blades found exposed gaps, and the creature began to collapse under the combined assault.
But my focus was fixed entirely on the female whose power had held death at bay. I was moving through the ice as her knees buckled, reappearing at her side to catch her before she could hit the ground.
Shadows and ice receded as her mana went quiet. Her wings had ripped free from her cloak, and her claws gleamed against the blood-stained tips of her fingers.
But she wasn’t moving. Was barely breathing.
Batty hovered frantically over Everly’s chest, emitting high, keening chirps as she tried to shock her mana back into submission.
Still nothing.
Blood ran from her nose, from her ears, streaking stark red against her pale skin. Her eyes remained open but unfocused, the veins bright red and broken beneath the surface.
White lightning flickered off her limbs in unstable bursts. Snow flurries rose from her as though gravity itself hesitated to touch her.
Pure, unrelenting fury flared in my chest. At her recklessness, at myself for not siphoning it from her sooner, at the bond for delivering the shards-damned warning too shards-damned late.
