Two man lengths away, held captive by some invisible force, Ellysetta stood glued to the shimmering veil of water. Her head was flung back, her spine was arched in visible agony, and she was screaming as if her very soul were being torn asunder.
“Get her away from the mirror!” Hawksheart cried. “She cannot free herself!”
Bel sprang into action. With no hint of his usual devoted care, he launched his body through the air, slammed into Ellysetta’s slender form, and tackled her to the ground.
They landed with a teeth-rattling jolt on the floor of the hollow, and Bel’s only concession to alu’tan’s regard was a last-moment twist of his body so that he—not she—took the brunt of their hard landing.
The instant they hit, Ellysetta went wild. Screaming and roaring, she struck at him with clawed hands, raking burning furrows across his face, ripping through his leathers to score his chest. He tried to block her blows and fend off her attacks without hurting her, but that care was his undoing.
Fast-growing roots shot up from the floor of the Sentinel’s hollow and lashed Bel’s arms and legs into place, pinning him to the floor. He spun Fire to burn the roots and free himself, but the threads of his magic dissolved the instant they formed, absorbed into the fierce aura of power surrounding Ellysetta.
“Ellysetta!” he protested. Streamers of ice raced through his veins, and a sudden, drugging weakness sapped his strength and left him light-headed.
Ellysetta reared back and Bel got his first glimpse of her face. Her eyes were pure black, lit by lurid red stars, her teeth bared in a snarl of primal savagery. The aura of magic about her was like none he’d ever seen. Like the Great Sun in full eclipse, a dark shadow surrounded her, its edges rimmed by an undulating ring of bright, golden light.
She passed a hand across her leathers, and her palm blazed with green Earth. One of the steel studs in her armor melted and re-formed as a razor-sharp black Fey’cha that she slammed towards him.
Rooted to the ground, his power pouring into her like light feeding the endless hunger of a dark star, he couldn’t lift a finger in his defense. He couldn’t even move to dodge the blow.
He could only whisper, “Ellysetta,nei!”as the knife plunged towards his chest.
Deep in the black heart of Boura Fell, Shan howled as the feel of a knife sinking into an unprotected chest reverberated through his soul.
The connection with his daughter shattered.
CHAPTERNINETEEN
Elvia ~ Navahele
Ellysetta watched Bel’s eyes go wide and heard his breath leave his lungs on a stunned gasp.
The face before her had been Vadim Maur’s. She was certain of it. Only it had changed at the last moment to Bel’s.
She shrieked in horror and denial, feeling the dagger tear through skin and bone to pierce the beating heart beneath as if the blade had ripped through her own chest.
In the same instant, a wall of heat and stone slammed into her side and swept her off her feet. The black Fey’cha flew from her hand and went skittering across the glossy, timeworn surface of the chamber floor. Behind her, the veil of suspended water abruptly splashed back into the mirror pool like a lead curtain suddenly released from its anchors. The spray of chilly droplets spattered across Ellysetta’s face.
She was screaming…screaming…screaming. Death crouched at the periphery of her senses, grinning with malice while voices howled in a savage chorus of fear and agony.
Burn! Destroy! Scorch the world! Flame them all!
Yes! Yes!A terrible, dark, hungry part of Ellysetta’s soul howled with dreadful eagerness. She’d killed before. She knew the taste of blood and death, remembered the searing thrill of slaughtering a hated enemy. When Mama died, the ones who’d killed her had paid in blood and screams, and their dying wails had sung through Ellysetta’s veins like a visceral symphony.
Ellysetta.
Something held her captive, pinned to the floor. Her arms flailed, fingers curving into claws. The power rose inside her with wild demand, burning, boiling, tearing at her body with brutal hands until she shrieked with pain and madness.
Ellysetta!
The force inside her was too great for her body to contain. The need to rend and destroy clamored for freedom. Why else had she been born with such power if not to rain death and destruction upon the ones who’d hurt those she loved?
“Ellysetta!”«Shei’tani!» In voice and in Spirit and through the powerful bond threads that even now tied so much of her soul to Rain’s, the sound of his call broke through her madness.
Those were his arms wrapped around her, his body pressed tight against hers, pinning her to the ground, yes, but covering her with a mate’s protective care as well. His hair, smelling like spring rain and shared secrets, fell across her face in warm, silky streamers as his cheek pressed against hers and his lips murmured entreaties of peace and love against her skin.
Sanity returned in a rush. Her eyes flew open and she dragged air into her lungs on a sob.
“Rain?” Shaking hands traced the familiar curve of his head and spine. Fingers dug into the beloved bulwark of strong shoulders, clinging with desperate fear. “Oh, Rain.” Tears gathered, hot and burning, and her throat closed up as if clutched in the strangling grip of a tight fist. «Oh, Rain…what have I done? Bel…»
