She pounced, slamming a fist into the inside of his arm, the one that held the sword, ensuring he couldn’t bring it up to threaten her.He held on tightly so he wouldn’t drop it.
She whirled into him.With her ass pressed to his groin, she elbowed the hilt of the blade in his chest.
His scream startled both of them—butFuerindamn that hurt!
The cry was loud enough to bring his soldiers running.Drion would arrive faster.
It still might not be fast enough.
She was atontee.Possessed by a spirit bound for the Etherlands or the Igneuslands who’d found the way to remain behind.She must have several spirits controlling her, fueling her rage, her reactions, her speed.
Even for a sänglure, this was too much.
Too good.
When she gripped the hilt with both hands, preparing to cleave his heart in two no doubt, he sliced—right to left—along that tantalizing strip of bare skin at her waist.
Left to right, he sliced deeper.
She faltered but didn’t take her eyes off him, or her hands off her dagger.
She pressed upward on the blade, cutting through sinew and muscle, evading bone.
But her grip weakened.Alobaz shoved her backward.She stumbled, tripped on her skirts, and fell.She splayed on the ground while blood like a geyser pumped from her gut.
Careful to keep the dagger in his chest from her reach, Alobaz leaned over her so he could see through the fog.Her hands didn’t seek to staunch the wound.She had to know it was futile.There was no stopping her death.
She’d die.
And then come back to life.
Unless he drained her blood from her body and took her head too.
But it was such a beautiful head.Such a beautiful body.
She blinked as if in a daze, staring up into the mist.She wore her hair in braids, and the plaits looked like more fallen branches.Her arms and legs were sprawled out as if in a death pose.
A brilliant smile warmed her paling face.As a soldier, Alobaz recognized it.He’d seen it hundreds of times on the felled.This temptress, this wicked enchantress was leaving this world for the next, hoping never to return.
She was welcoming death.
Chapter29
The Darkness Floods In
Despite the pain radiating throughout his chest and narrowing his vision into a darkening tunnel, Alobaz couldn’t let the enchantress die.
Why he would fight to save the life of his would-be assassin, he didn’t understand.He just knew that he had to.
Drion arrived first.The magnificent stallion gave one look to the dagger protruding from Alobaz’s chest, stamped furiously, then lowered his head and knees to allow Alobaz, who usually mounted by leaping onto his tall back, an easier job of it.Drion had done this for Alobaz many times before on multiple battlefields, but it had been decades since the shädread had needed to.
“No.I’m okay.I can wait,” Alobaz said to Drion, who likely meant to whisk him quickly to the castle, where his wound could be tended to.
The creature was undoubtedly magical.He seemed to comprehend everything Alobaz ever told him; he just wasn’t able to speak back in response.
Drion scoffed, his big nostrils flaring in an obvious,Yeah.Right.He snorted again, seeming to add,You’re a fucking moron, Alobaz thought.
“I probably am being a moron,” Alobaz said.
