Stolen ki swirled through me. Just a little more… Already his heart stuttered and spit, helpless as the darkness spread.
My eyes rolled back. Ecstasy pounding through my blood.
I didn’t feel the whistle and crack of a whip, even when it snapped across my back, splitting my bark armor shirt and marking me from shoulder to hip. I waslost, drunk on ki, on the pure emotion swamping this man’s very blood. Sogood…
“Get back, beast!” A fist slammed into my ribs, stealing my breath on the heels of a startled yelp. The sound of cracking bone was secondary to the deep, masculine voice that filled my ears. “Release him, or I skin you and use your worthless hide for a bath towel!”
Heavy boots crunched the loose shale behind me as I gasped, torn from my feast with a single, mighty pull. Landing hard on my knees in the shale, I blinked, disoriented. Power singing through my veins, yet I struggled to draw breath. “What—”
“Behold the might of the serpent, vile demon!”
For a moment, I nearly laughed, so absurd was the sentiment from a voice I recognized but couldn’t place. And then something cold bit the back of my neck with a shattering, finalclickand mirth abandoned me all at once.
A terrible sound rushed into my lungs, something akin to a gasp rattling over my teeth and into the seat of my belly. Frost spiked through my spinal cord, trapping a scream in my throat. Freezing it solid as the flow of ki reversed altogether, abandoning me insecondsin spite of the power running thick in my veins.
My breath bled from my chest in a wet, rattling hiss.
Goddess,no!Not like this!
Wrenching, I forced frozen limbs into action, screeching. Staggering to a stand, I clawed at the back of my neck—heedless of rending my flesh into garish ribbons, if only I could break free! Nothing—nothing—I’d ever felt was a match tothis.To the soul-sucking bottomless void peeling the muscles from my very bones. Stripping tendons bare, and leaving nerves exposed to frigid, burning wind, leaving sinew and bone charred black.
The faceless man laughed. “Kneel, Menace. Kneel at the feet of your master!”
When a booted foot swept my feet, I tripped. Knees splitting upon impact with the loose shale.
Screaming defiance, I lashed out, claws flashing. Blinded to everything but the vortex feeding upon my tainted soul.
The whip whistled, laying open my shoulder—and that time, Ididfeel it. Felt every bloody centimeter.
“Roll over, Menace. That’s it,” the man cooed, shoving me with the tip of his boot. His face too blurred by tears to identify, though some part of me knew who it was. “Be a good little forest demon for your master.”
Breathing through a face full of dusty shale, I crawled, extending my scarred right hand toward the forest. If I could just get to the Grandmother… If I could just get to Belle and her good men…
But I couldn’t sense her… couldn’t sense Kas for the cold…
An elbow dropped across the back of my neck, followed by the weight of a full-grown man pinning me to the earth. “Don’t you fucking move!” The fool. Recovered, in part. Wrenching my arms behind my back, heedless of the wounds splitting me open. Thick fingers tangled in my knotted tresses, yanking my head up and bowing my back. “Little bitch! Jasper, look at these teeth, mate. And her nails. Fuck. I’m bleeding.Everywhere.”
Goddess,no.Jasper?Jasperhad done this to me? How?
Fancy leather boots stomped into my line of sight. “You’ll have to get a shot when we get back to the city. There’s no telling what nasty diseases the Menace has got, is there?”
Head spinning, I strained, trying to confirm his identity through the tears blurring my vision and the poison choking my ki—but all I saw was Alicia.
Swaying, left eye swollen shut, blood pouring from a crooked nose, she stood, weapon clutched in trembling fingers.
“Please,” I gasped, crimson spittle spraying from my lips. “Kill them. Kill them both!”
Blue flames leapt at her command—but her aim lefteverythingto be desired.
Going wide, she missed.
Jasper lunged, catching her elbow, he jerked her off her feet, spinning her in a wide circle.
Arms flapping, she did the only thing she could, and flung her weapon into the shield. For a single, blinding instant, both pieces of rebel technology married, joined in union against the Empire.
But it couldn’t last.
Glowing bright enough to be seen through my lids, the shield won. An explosion of ki-laced plasma belched forth, tossing enemies and allies alike into blessed unconsciousness.
