Lucian goes for the legs, his massive jaws crushing bone like kindling. An undead guard swings a sword at him, but he’s already moving, too fast to track. He catches the guard’s arm in his teeth and rips it clean off, then spins and slams his weight into three more guards, sending them flying.
Seth fights like a demon, all teeth and claws and vicious precision. He doesn’t just disable the undead, he destroys them. Limbs fly. Bodies crumble. He moves through them like a scythe through wheat, his snarls echoing off the garden walls.
The three of them are a storm of violence, coordinated and devastating. They’ve clearly fought together before; they movelike parts of the same organism, covering each other’s flanks, setting up kills for one another.
An undead guard manages to get his sword up to block my mate, but Kieran doesn’t even slow down. He catches the blade in his jaws—I hear the metal screech—and rips it from the guard’s hands. Then, he lunges forward and crushes the corpse’s skull between his teeth.
Lucian is a whirlwind of fury. He catches an undead guard mid-lunge, his jaws closing around the thing’s spine, and shakes it so violently that I hear bones snapping like firecrackers. When he drops it, the body doesn’t even try to get up again.
Seth has three guards on him at once, yet he doesn’t back down. He spins, his teeth finding one’s throat, and as the corpse is falling he’s already launching himself at the second one, using his momentum to drive it into the third. All three go down in a tangle of limbs, and Seth tears through them with methodical brutality.
But the undead keep coming. For each one they destroy, another shuffles forward. Dead hands reach for them, swords swing wildly—and still, Celeste stands at the center of it all, her hands raised, more magic building.
I manage to throw off my attackers and shift back, stumbling toward where Astra has collapsed against the garden wall. Selene is crouched over her, hands glowing with healing magic, but her face is pale with panic.
“The baby is coming,” Selene says when I reach them. “I can’t stop it. The stress, the fear—”
“We have to get her out of here,” I say, reaching for Astra.
“How touching.” Celeste’s voice cuts through the chaos. “The whole family, together at last.”
She stands in the center of the garden, surrounded by carnage, and she looks pleased. Dark energy builds around her, so much power that the air itself seems to bend and warp. Theundead guards create a wall between her and the three wolves, forcing them to fight through the endless horde.
Kieran spots her, spots the threat, and breaks away from the undead, charging straight at her. His coat is stained with black ichor, his eyes burning with single-minded purpose.
“No!” I scream, but it’s too late.
Celeste sees him coming. Smiles. Lifts her hand.
A barb of magic forms there, black and twisted and wrong. Death magic. The kind that doesn’t just kill, it unmakes. It will rip his soul apart, scatter the pieces so thoroughly that even the Fates couldn’t put him back together.
She hurls it at Kieran.
I don’t think. Don’t hesitate. I just move.
My body crashes into the path of that dark magic, and pain explodes through me like nothing I’ve ever felt. It’s not just physical; it’s deeper than that. The magic tears through my chest, and I feel something vital shatter inside me. Something that can’t be healed.
I hit the ground, and the world goes red, then gray, then…
“Daciana!” Kieran’s voice, broken and desperate.
I try to breathe and taste blood. So much blood. I look down and see the wound in my chest, see the black veins spreading out from it like cracks in glass. The magic is eating me from the inside out.
Celeste’s laugh echoes through the garden. “How noble. How completely pointless.”
Through blurring vision, I see her walking toward me. Toward Kieran, who has shifted back to human form and is cradling me against his chest. His hands are shaking. His face is—
I can’t look at his face.
“Let me finish what I started,” Celeste says, lifting her hand again. “This time, you both die. No more resurrections. No more second chances.”
Kieran pulls me closer, as if his body can shield me from what’s coming. His hand covers the wound in my chest, trying uselessly to stop the bleeding.
“I love you,” I whisper, tasting copper. “I’m sorry. The baby…”
His eyes widen, but before he can respond, Celeste’s magic begins to coalesce.
And then, the light.
