Titan roared and sprang back, aiming again. “You’re not getting your filthy hands on them!”
He fired. The wizard smacked both Titan and his bullet out of the way. Titan hit the asphalt and rolled to his feet, aiming—
Valberdon was moving his lips as he reached for Jannie and the cart.
Mathlin yelled, lunging out of the back door. Titan’s stomach clenched.No!
But Mathlin held up a spell sheet and aimed it at Valberdon. White light blasted from the tiny scrap of paper, smacking into Valberdon and throwing him back by a few yards.
Huh,Titan thought. Sothatwas how the spells were meant to be used.
Valberdon roared and leaped to his feet, raising his hands in a low chant.
“Math, get back in there!” Titan snapped.
“You need to use the spells,” Mathlin yelled back.
Titan grabbed Wildcart and shoved it through the backdoor. Now Jannie and the cart were safe. “Stay in there,” he ordered.
Then he turned to Mathlin, who was shooting fireballs at Valberdon with another spell sheet.
Valberdon cursed, pausing his chant to deflect the fireballs.
“Set up something defensive. We need to make him aim away from Twin Buns,” Titan muttered, pulling out the spell sheets that he had stuffed into his pocket. “I’ll cover you.”
He cut his thumb on a fang, two seconds away from activating a spell.
Valberdon was faster. He fired a spell at them—not at Titan, but at Mathlin.
Titan’s heart stopped. He threw himself in front of Mathlin, barely hearing Mathlin’s distressed cry as the blunt force hit him in the chest.
It sent him flying backward. Titan crashed into Mathlin, both of them landing on the ground and skidding, Titan on top of Mathlin. Mathlin took the brunt of the impact.
Titan smelled blood.
Fuck!Panicking, he scrambled off his omega. “Math! Fuck, Math, are you okay?”
Mathlin winced and shoved the stack of spells at Titan. “I’ll heal. Use these.”
Titan took the spell sheets, fear gripping his lungs. Mathlin was pregnant. And he was hurt.
Despite all logic, despite the fact that wolves weren’t equipped to face off against magic users, Titan’s instincts kicked in.
He howled for help. For someone to get Mathlin somewhere safe.
Then he leaped to his feet and smeared his blood on the spell sheets, one after another.
There was no way to describe the urgency in his movements, the sheer desperation.
Mathlin was... Mathlin would be fine.
He had to be.
Titan roared, holding up one spell after another as fireballs and laser beams blasted out of them. Valberdon swore, summoning a shield to defend himself. Titan kept activating the spells anyway. Each of them hammered against Valberdon’s shield, striking so hard that the wizard gritted his teeth.
“Who gave you those spells?!” Valberdon cried. From this distance, Titan could faintly make out beads of sweat on the wizard’s face. Uriel’s spells were powerful enough that Valberdon was forced to focus on his shield, instead of weaving a complex attack spell.
“None of your concern,” Titan snarled. “You held Mathlin against his will for years, and now you’re back to haunt him? I was going to let you live if you stayedaway.”
