Nyte gritted his teeth. He pushed himself forward, but it felt as though he were fighting through viscous sludge, his body sluggish, the air itself resisting his movement. He couldn’t allow Ember to be harmed, couldn’t allow Sarnessa’s blow to connect, but he couldn’t move fast enough to intervene.
A shooting star hurtled in front of Nyte and Ember. It crashed into the succubus’s face with a blue-white flash, emitting a cloud of glittering stardust.
Ember sucked in a sharp breath.
Sarnessa’s head jerked back, and she stumbled a couple steps backward with a startled cry. Starling clawed at the succubus’s eyes and cheeks with all four hands and kicked at her mouth with both feet while biting down on the demoness’s nose. Sparkling silver flecks fell from her tiny, frantic body.
Darkness gathered around Nyte as Sarnessa’s hands dartedup to pry the sprite from her face. Starling latched on with claws and teeth, resisting the much larger demon. Finally, the demoness’s flesh tore, and she shrieked as the sprite came free.
“Feral fucking vermin!” Sarnessa hurled Starling aside, her lips peeling back to display her fangs. A chunk of her upper nose was missing, oozing black ichor, and dozens of tiny scratches marred her face. Her furious eyes were twin pools of boiling tar.
That hateful gaze jerked to Ember as Starling struck the wall and fell to the floor.
“Starling!” Ember called.
Growling, Sarnessa lunged at the witch, who flinched back.
Nyte roared. The sound was bestial, resonating from the depths of his soul. He swept his wings forward, protectively enveloping Ember in their star-filled night. Sarnessa’s claws bit into them. The flickers of pain caused by her blow could not pierce the veil of Nyte’s fury.
He wrapped his arms around Ember, tugging her against his chest, and channeled his magic through his wings as he swung them open. A wave of bristling darkness blasted Sarnessa backward. She let out a pained, furious growl as she hit the far wall.
Dozens of shadowy tendrils lashed toward her, blotting out most of the bedroom’s light, their tips hardened into solid black blades. A writhing mass of night given shape and instilled with rage.
Sarnessa’s form rippled, and she vanished in a cloud of crimson mist that dissipated when Nyte’s shadows struck it.
Keeping Ember held firmly against him, he scanned the room with all his senses, seeking any sign of her. The succubus’s scent was already fading. Moments dragged by, marked by the thumping of Ember’s heart.
Sarnessa had fled. Of course she had; everything shedid was in the service of herself, was for her own survival. She wasn’t the sort to risk everything in a head-on fight. No, she preferred to coerce and manipulate her prey. Even a nocturnus’s heart wasn’t worth her life.
“Is she gone?” Ember asked.
“Yes.” As his shadows faded, Nyte turned Ember to face him, raising her chin with a hooked finger. “Are you all right?”
Her eyes met his, steady despite the shakiness of her breaths. She flattened her hands on his chest. “Yeah. But Starling?—”
Nyte sensed the infernal pulse behind him just before Ember’s eyes rounded. He yanked his witch protectively against him as something hot as lava plunged into his back, tearing through his physical form. Searing fingers clutched his heart, his core, his very essence.
Agony pervaded him. That crushing grip held him paralyzed, sapped his strength, rendered him helpless. He knew his knees would’ve buckled were his limbs not locked by pain.
“Nyte!” Ember gasped. He’d never seen such horror and worry on her face, had never felt such pure, potent fear coming from her.
Not fear of him, but for him. She feared for his safety, for his wellbeing, for his life, and he wrapped his mind around that, clung to it, as Sarnessa’s hand squeezed. The demoness was pulling on his heart, intent on ripping it out.
Nyte growled and resisted that pull with every sliver of willpower he possessed.
“The strength this granted me the first time…it was exhilarating,” Sarnessa purred. “I felt like a goddess. And I deserve to feel that way, always and forever.”
Ember tried to pull away from Nyte, but he could only hold on to her, keeping her in place, as Sarnessa’s claws sank deeper and she pulled harder.
“No,” Ember rasped, shaking her head, fighting against Nyte’s hold. “No, please no.”
Nyte’s heart thrummed in the succubus’s grasp. He felt its tethers to the rest of his being stretching, straining, beginning to tear.
“Ah, my beautiful Nyte, your heart is brimming with… What is this?” Sarnessa chuckled, the sound dark, seductive, and sickening. “Love? Did my nocturnus learn tolove? Oh, this will be delicious.”
Ember’s brows fell, her nostrils flared, and her jaw tightened. Fear still gleamed in her enthralling blue eyes, but fury outshone it now. “I saidno!”
Her shout swept through the room on a wave of staggering power, a raw, punishing arcane burst that resonated through every mote of Nyte’s being.
