“You lie to yourself as you lied to her.” I shove my fist through the seeker between us and grip Eraldon’s cloak.
He bursts into flames, the pure daylight eating away at his skin and ravaging him. Letting out an agonizing cry, he falls back. “Kill him. Bring him down!”
The seekers rush me even more furiously, their claws reaching and blades seeking my throat. They snap their fangs and run at me, but I use what precious daylight I have left to burn a wide circle around me.
“Whoa!” Selene sits up as ash falls around her in a plume, her arm covering her eyes. “Bright.”
“The stone?” I back to her as my flames start to dissipate and the horde moves closer.
“Stone?”
“The ember stone!” I back up until I hit the marble pillar.
She looks around. “It was right here.”
“Selene!” I yell and burn a smaller circle, my flames withering and dying, my magic almost spent.
Eraldon rips the throat out of one of his own and drains its blood, then tosses the corpse aside. His bones still show through his scorched skin, but he’s coming for me. I have to stop him. For Emma. For my realm.
I hold one hand in front of me, the flame burning low, and put my other palm out, hoping Selene doesn’t find it convenient to cross me yet again.
“For this, I will keep Emma and use her as a brood mare. She will never be queen. She will live chained to my bed for eternity, and I will tell her that you are the one who put her there.” With a flourish of his blade, he comes straight for me.
I send a silent prayer to the Ancestors for Emma, then push the rest of my magic into the fireball in my palm.
Eraldon doesn’t stop, even as his face begins to blacken and the seekers around him turn to dust.
“Goodnight, king of day.” He lunges forward, his blade aimed for my heart.
26
Emma
The world goes white and orange, an explosion that sears through my eyelids and etches a supernova into my pupils.
“Go!” a familiar voice yells, and I’m lifted.
I try to curl into a ball, but I can’t move. The world is dark again, my skin aching, my body cut and broken. I smell burning flesh, and I wonder if I’m the one roasting in the light of day. Maybe it’s better that way. I think it is. I let Eraldon twist me into something vile and wrong, let him control my heart and mind.
“Emma!” I’m jostled, and then I sense him. My love. My mate. I’m in his arms.
“Emma, wake up, love.” He’s so warm.
I press against him, taking his heat, even though I don’t deserve it. My betrayal looms in the back of my mind, but I push it down for now. For now, I breathe him in. He smells like blue skies and light winds.
My fangs lengthen. The hunger within me demands I take what I want, that I rip into him and drink.
I don’t.
Iwon’t.
* * *
“—can heal from something like that.” Solano’s voice is low as he strokes my forehead.
“She can, but you shouldn’t offer her your blood.” Charen growls. “Allow one of us to—”
“No.” His voice rises. “My mate will drink from me. She is mine to care for.”
