She shouldn’t be so close to so many vampyres. Not when they were in this state.
Though, in that moment, it was hard to remember why. All she did was piss me off, push my buttons.
She rested her arms on the shoulders of a beautiful redhead woman who still had blood dripping from her lips. The woman pulled Rummy close, hands slipping up and down her body.
I watched every damn movement.
It wasn’t long before another joined in. A male this time. He ground against both women as the moon rose higher in the sky.
This was my personal form of torture.
And I wouldn’t sit around and let her play with me like this anymore.
I shoved away from the crowd, desperate for fresh air.Walk away, walk away, walk away. Do not go back into that crowd.
Goddess above, even if I wanted to, my ego would never let me. Rummy had been the object of my affections once, and I’d let her know it.
It was the biggest mistake I’d ever made.
I would never let her see that side of me again.
Even if it killed me.
A shrill scream echoed in the distance. Shouting followed. The sounds came from the edge of the city, closer to the forest.
Any thoughts about Rummy and the hands roaming her body vanished as I ran toward the noise.
I wasn’t the only one.
For two years, we’d lived in relative safety. For two years, there had been no threats to our kingdom. But with a single scream, I slipped back into the defensive role I’d held for so long. It was like being flung back into that war, remembering just how easily I could lose the things I cared about.
I wouldn’t lose Scarlata. Not today.
With my wings tucked tightly behind my shoulders, I ran faster. In the distance, at the edge of the city, a small crowd of people lingered.
“What in all hells is going on?” I asked as I approached.
Nobody answered. They were all too busy gawking at something I couldn’t yet see.
As I stepped up, I pushed through the crowd until I could set eyes on what caught their attention.
One bloody, dirty, bruised vampyre stood, though he looked as if he’d collapse at any moment. A stranger. Beneath the blood and dirt, his clothes were unlike what the citizens of Scarlata wore, and the insignias on the man’s sword wasn’t one I recognized.
I assessed him carefully, realizing then that the stranger before me wasn’t a vampyre.
He was fae.
Body tensing further, I took another step closer. “Who are you? What are you doing here?”
He lifted his dirty face. He had determined eyes and dried blood smeared down his skin.
“I need to speak to the Queen of Scarlata,” he said. “Where is the blood queen?”
“I serve the queen, so whatever you have to say, you can say to me.” There was no way in all hells I’d let him near Huntyr. Not until I knew what was going on.
“No,” he argued. “I need to see your queen. I have information she needs to hear.”
The whispering around me ceased, and an instant later, I sensed it. The change in the atmosphere. The shift in temperature. I didn’t have to turn around to know that Huntyr and Wolf were approaching.
