Kaden was close, but I couldn’t see him — couldn’t see anything through the blinding haze of agony that held me in its grip.
And then the flames vanished. Cooling shadows wrapped around me, dousing the hellfire and soothing my scorched skin.
Shrieks of pain replaced my own cries, and I peeled my eyes open to see more tendrils of shadow lash out like whips. One twisted around the fire demon’s neck, yanking him back, while others shot out like arrows. They pierced demons’ wings and shredded their flesh, eliciting shrieks of agony.
Locking eyes with the fire demon, I surged toward him, still armored in Kaden’s shadows. I slashed with my blade, violence humming in my blood, but the demon disappeared on a wisp of smoke.
My momentum carried me forward, and I landed hard on a jagged rock. I hissed, and by the time I clambered to my feet, three more demons had me surrounded.
They attacked in spurts of fire and fury, hacking at Kaden’s protective shadows and my mental shield. I grew my vines thicker and more vicious, but the onslaught continued.
A tremor of fear rippled down the bond, and I whipped around in search of my mate.
Kaden stood in the center of a shadow storm, great plumes of darkness flowing from his outstretched hands. His eyes were black, face tense with concentration as he fought. At least a dozen demons had him surrounded, beating back his shadows as though they were nothing.
He couldn’t hold them off, I realized. Not while he was shielding me.
With a howl of fury, I summoned the same power I used to build a fortress around my mind and directed it outward. Kaden’s shadows peeled off me like a second skin, dissipating like smoke in the wind.
As if they sensed my sudden vulnerability, the demons turned and attacked.
My dagger became an extension of my body as I cut them down, ripping through the festering pits where their hearts should have been and snuffing out their existence. Demons vanished around me in wisps of smoke. Others shot back with an ear-splitting shriek before dive-bombing me once again.
I lost track of how many I killed. But for every demon I vanquished, two more took its place. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted Sorsha twirling in a lethal dance, her blades moving too fast for my eyes to follow.
My muscles burned as I made another vicious slash, my dagger finding its home in the chest of one four-legged beast. The demon exploded in a shower of mist that was quickly doused by the rain.
As the darkness cleared, I realized there were suddenly fewer demons around me. I dispatched two more and looked around, thinking that perhaps they’d fled.
But then I saw where they’d all gone, circling a dark figure who moved like Death himself.
Kaden had drawn his twin swords, though he’d cloaked them in his shadows. With every movement, ribbons of darkness shot from the tips of the blades, strangling demons and ripping them from the sky as he hacked and slashed at his other attackers.
The demons weren’t here for me. They’d come for their prince.
Fury possessed me as I threw myself into the fray, dancing to the ancient song of all the hunters who’d come before me. It thrummed in my bones like a single note resonating in the air — the call to exterminate evil with cold, sharp steel.
Inhuman sounds surged out of me with each slash of my blade, scattering the demons that surrounded Kaden.
But then a dark cloud blotted out the trees, blocking the rain as they descended. Ten or more demons moved in formation, swooping down to replace those who had fallen.
A tremor of horror skated down my spine, and fatigue sank into my limbs.
We couldn’t fight them all.
Across the clearing, I met Kaden’s pitch-black gaze, and the look on his face stole the air from my lungs.
He was afraid.
In the next breath, my prince sheathed his swords at his back and spread his hands wide. The ground beneath me gave a violent shudder, and I hit the cold, hard mud.
Waves of shadow fanned out over the clearing, obliterating everything in their wake. The canopy shook. Bark sprayed. But Kaden’s shadows shielded me and Sorsha as they shredded demon wings and flesh.
A few took to the sky, their injured wings beating against the hurricane of debris. Others fell, shrieking with pain as they plummeted into his web of shadow, which seemed to swallow them whole. A few demons with mangled wings crawled through the mud on hands and hooves, their black eyes wide as they fought to escape his incredible wrath.
There was another ominous pulse of magic, and then Kaden’s shadows went still. The rain continued to fall as they hung like wisps of smoke.
The demons were gone.
