With a quick nod, Emmett steps back to organize the guards outside, while I extend my shadows to pluck Ivy away from Cade. "I need you to tend to Seraphina. Your healing abilities are needed more there than your anger is needed here."
Ivy whirls in my grasp, her eyes blazing. "What took you so long? I've been trying to break that barrier since it appeared!"
In any other situation, I might obliterate her for such insolence. But something in her fierce protection of Seraphina strikes a chord.
"Traffic was terrible," I reply dryly, then turn my full attention to Cade. "Now, would someone like to explain why my guard kidnapped my Omega mate?"
Ivy emits a sound of pure frustration. "Because it's not Cade, you oblivious shadow-twit! It's Asher! He's been possessing Cade's body since you killed him!"
Asher. The lover I tore apart in the forest. Impossible.
Yet as I look closer, I can see it now—the way Cade's body holds itself, a subtle shift in posture. And more tellingly, the flicker in his eyes as they shift between Cade's flat black and a distinctly different amber.
"Is that so?" My Alpha voice drops dangerously low. "How inconvenient for you to have died only to find yourself in my path again. It's almost as if the universe itself wants me to kill you. Twice."
"Malakai…" Seraphina begins, her voice hoarse and pained.
"Not now, Omega," I interrupt without looking at her. "First, I need to demonstrate what happens to those who touch what's mine."
Emmett returns from the perimeter. "The area is secure, my lord. No other threats detected."
"Perfect timing, Emmett. You're just in time for a fascinating anatomy lesson."
Ivy hovers over Seraphina, her small hands already glowing with healing magic as she presses them to the worst of my Omega's wounds.
"You can't have her," Cade growls, but his voice shifts midway, becoming higher, desperate—Asher's voice emerging from Cade's throat. "She never belonged to you. She loves me."
My shadows respond instantly, lashing out to wrap around his throat, lifting him from the ground.
"Loves you?" I laugh, the sound empty of humor. "A dead man? How pathetically romantic." I stalk toward him, my shadows dragging him to meet me halfway. "Tell me, did she call your name when I took her against the wall? Did she beg for you when she came apart beneath me? When she begged for my knot, my bite?"
I lean closer. "Did you watch, trapped in that stolen body, as she surrendered to me again and again? How exquisite that must have been for you."
His eyes widen with hatred and pain. My shadow hounds materialize around me, their red eyes glowing with hunger.
"You remember my friends, don't you?" I gesture to the largest hound. "They've missed you. Particularly your screams."
The hound lunges forward, massive jaws clamping around Cade's leg. But instead of tearing it off, my shadows prevent complete separation, keeping the limb attached by mere threads of sinew.
His scream splits the air—Asher's voice unmistakable now. A primal, inhuman wail that makes everyone in the room flinch. Even Emmett, hardened by centuries of Shadow Court brutality, turns his face away momentarily.
"By the twilight stars," Ivy gasps through chattering teeth, her tiny hands flying to cover her ears. "Make it stop!"
The scream continues, impossibly long. I'm modulating his body's functions, preventing him from passing out, keeping his vocal cords intact despite their strain.
"Yes," I breathe, satisfaction running through me. "There it is. The sound I've been waiting to hear again."
I flash a smile at my audience. "The acoustics in here are marvelous, don't you think?"
"The etiquette of dying," Ivy manages weakly. "Now there's a book I pray no one ever writes."
"Chapter One: When Dismembered, Stay That Way," Emmett adds dryly, though his complexion has paled considerably.
"Both of you shut up," I snap without turning. "I'm creating art here."
"If disemboweling is art, I'd hate to see his sculpture," Ivy whispers to Seraphina, who, despite everything, makes a sound that might almost be a laugh.
Another hound circles around, tearing into Cade's side, exposing ribs and pulsing organs without fully removing them. Blood sprays in elegant arcs across the cottage walls.
