Then suddenly his arms rise and clamp against my fist, yanking my hand away. “Briony,” he says in that booming voice of his. “Briony, you can’t be here. You have to go.”
“We’ve come to rescue you, Fox,” I say. “We’ve come all this way. Look – here’s Blaze. We’re going to get you to safety.”
“No,” he says. “It’s too dangerous. You should never have come.” His eyes jolt around his sockets and then land on Beaufort. “Why did you bring her?”
“To save you,” I repeat.
“You should have left me. You should never have come here.”
I shake my head desperately. “Don’t be silly, Fox. What choice did I have? I had to come.”
“No,” he repeats, “and now you have to go.”
“Go? We’ve been searching for you out here in the demon wastelands.”
“Briony, you’ve already risked too much coming here. You need to go now before …” He trails off, then his brow forms into a frown. “Briony, get out of here.”
“Not without you!”
“If I go with you, she’ll come after us, she’ll send the creatures after us. I won’t risk that Briony. I won’t risk you being hurt.”
“So you want me to just leave you in her hands,” I shake my head with frustration, “to torture you, to starve you, to kill you, Fox!”
“Yes,” he says firmly.
I slam my hands on his bony shoulders, leaning over him and staring into those glowing eyes. “We are not leaving without you, Fox.”
He stares into my eyes and I don’t flinch away from his penetrating gaze.
He knows I won’t leave without him – he must read it in my eyes.
His resolve falters.
“Okay then,” he says. “But we have to go. We have to go now before she returns.”
I nod and attempt to help him sit up. It’s useless – he’s too weak. The color may have returned to his face and his eyes may be brighter, but his body won’t obey. Beaufort kneels beside us, healing my hand quickly before sliding an arm under Fox’s shoulders and trying to lift him with me.
We drag him toward the dragon and my heart breaks a little more. Fox has always been so strong, so resilient. Nothing has ever hurt Fox Tudor like this. I can barely look at him. I dare not imagine what he’s been through, what she’s done to him.
Somehow we make it to Blaze, but no further – because the air whips around us, the swirling mist turns ominously black, and I know what’s going to happen next.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Briony
“Veronica,” Fox whispers, and I already knew it would be her. The air grows sour, as if I can taste the evil. Then she’s there in front of us, that self-satisfied, smug smile on her lips. The mist has morphed to black – not with night or smoke or ordinary magic; it’s become dense and thick with circling demons.
“I had a feeling you’d come eventually,” she says. She’s not as glamorous as usual: dust and grime streak her hair, there’s a smudge across her cheek, her lipstick is smeared, and her eyeliner isn’t its usual precise line. Her dress and cloak are crinkled; there’s a ladder in her stockings and several of her long nails are broken.
Not that I can talk – I probably look no better.
“I only wonder what took you so long. Poor Fox has been suffering without you,” she says, feigning a sympathetic pout. “The question is, of course: have you come to rescue him, or have you come to arrest me?”
“Both,” I tell her.
“Such a foolish girl.” She sighs, her attention sliding toward Beaufort at my side. “I’m not surprised, but I thought you, Beaufort Lincoln – I thought you had more sense. And yet here you are, deep in the demon realm. Perhaps it’s impressive you reached this far.” Her eyes flick to the dragon. “And you brought the beast too.”
The dragon growls; sparks flare at his nostrils.
