“Beaufort?” Thorne asks.
“Fuck,” Beau mutters.
I watch the bastards coming our way, ready to transform into my wolf and rip their throats out if they come too close.
There’s no need though. Briony breaks her hands apart, splitting her magic in two, one stream of light helping us to hold back the wall of demons, the other stream plucking the free demons out of the sky one by one.
Despite the splitting of her magic like that, it seems no weaker. In fact, it appears twice as strong.
“Never seen anything like it,” I mutter to the others, very nearly losing my concentration.
Unfortunately, although our mate may be awesome, there are one hundred demons up there in the sky, pretty intent in feeding on our souls. The pressure builds and builds until our shadows and her light crack altogether and the demons come swarming through.
I step in more closely to our Kitten. I don’t give a shit about myself. Sure I wanted those years spent pleasuring her and filling her belly with pups but I know what I am. Frivolous, an asshole, more often than not a dickhead. Little Kitten on the other hand, she is special, one of a kind, worth protecting with my dying breath.
Okay that means some other dude will fill her belly with pups but …
My thoughts come to a grinding halt.
Pups? Why the hell am I thinking about pups at a time like this?
And then it dawns on me – or should I say moonrises on me! The full moon is due, and although I’m out here in the demon realm where the sun, stars, and moon are hidden, the effect is the same.
I flip back my head and howl up at the sky. A sound that has the demons halting in mid-flight for a fraction of a second.
“Dray?” Briony says in alarm, but it’s already happening. The white wolf is in control now and fuck me, I couldn’t be happier, because my wolf is deadly and he will kill anything that comes for his mate.
We tear across the landscape in the direction of the unnatural creatures and as they come hurtling down from the sky, we jump up to meet them, ripping through their sinewy flesh, and snapping them to pieces. Our shadow magic spins in angry tornados around us, destroying everything in its path and we taste the bitter tang of destruction.
“Dray!” our little mate calls to us. “Dray!”
But the need to protect her is overwhelming and all-consuming. I snap and snarl, slice and slash, snap and tear. I am a wolf of death. I will not let them touch my mate.
More come zooming down from the sky like meteorites. I dodge them. I outrun them. I yank at their legs and pull at their wings.
My bond brothers call to me as more and more of the other-worldly creatures bombard me. They rip at my flesh, biting through my fur, knocking me from my paws. I howl in pain but I fight on. It was what I was made to do. Protect, hunt, and fuck.
“Dray!!” my mate screams and this time I can’t ignore her cry. I tear and snap and slash my way through the wall of demons, breaking free and finding her racing towards me, her light shining from her as if she is the moon itself, blasting away the demons in her path. She rushes towards me, falling to her knees and I lick and slurp at her face, blood smearing across her cheeks.
Is that mine or hers?
My bond brothers join us, blasting and shooting at the demons that still terrorize us.
“You need to call the dragon,” Beaufort yells. “You need to get out of here, Briony.”
“I’m not leaving you,” she says, wrapping her arms around my neck.
“Briony!” Beaufort says. “There’s too many and we can’t hold them back. You have to go.”
“No!” she says, as Thorne’s shadows swoop over her shoulder and a demon explodes into flame mere inches from her face. “There has to be a way.”
“There isn’t,” Beaufort insists and I yap and lick at her face trying to persuade her he is right.
It doesn’t work, that unshakeable determination enters her face and before we know what she’s doing, she’s on her feet and grabbing Thorne’s gloveless hand in hers.
They both roar in pain, their bodies go rigid and then the magic that’s pounding from their bodies is not light or shadow, it’s a mixture of the two, gliding through the air in all directions, annihilating everything in its path.
I whine, trying to reach my mate, but the force of the magic propels me backwards and Beaufort tumbles to the ground beside me.
