One down.
Fourteen to go.
The second wolf lunged low, aiming for my legs. I dropped into a crouch and drove my dagger upward through its jaw, the blade piercing whatever passed for a brain in its spectral skull. It went limp with a shriek that made the tower stones ring like struck bells.
But while I dispatched the first two, three more flanked toward Seris.
She pressed herself against the tower wall, terror blazing in her eyes. The wolves advanced with deliberate patience, savoring her fear like fine wine. Spectral creatures fed on emotion as much as flesh, terror, rage, despair. They would drain her dry before granting death.
“Daemon!” she cried.
Something fractured in her voice.
Not just fear.
Panic.
The kind that bypassed reason.
I threw myself between her and the nearest wolf just as it lunged, taking its claws across my ribs instead of letting them reach her throat.
Pain tore through my side, hot, immediate, but the wounds were clean.
I would live.
If we survived the next few minutes.
My shadows lashed out in every direction, trying to form a perimeter around us, but there were too many wolves, and they'd learned to work together. They split into coordinated groups, some attacked from the front to hold my attention, others circled to strike from behind. Pack tactics enhanced by whatever intelligence was driving them.
A wolf materialized beside me, passing through solid stone as if it were mist. I spun to face it and felt its teeth sink into my shoulder. I drove my dagger deep into its chest, but before its lifeless body hit the ground, another wolf capitalized on my momentary distraction. Blood ran down my spine, warm and sticky, but I couldn’t afford to acknowledge the pain.
"I can't hold them all," I shouted to Seris. The wolf took advantage of that moment and slipped past my shadows. It latched its teeth into my ankle. It pulled my leg out from beneath me. I sank both blades into its ears.
While my blades were still embedded in the wolf beneath me, three more surged at once. I grabbed two by the throats with my free hands, pumping shadow-magic directly into their brains, and kicked the third before it hit solid ground. The creature convulsed and retreated, but the damage was done.
I was starting to feel the effects of my wounds, my left arm hanging limp as I pulled myself up and erected a barrier between the wolves and Seris.
"Daemon, behind you!"
I spun just in time to see a massive wolf, easily twice the size of the others, bearing down on me from my blind spot, jaws wide enough to take my head off. No time to dodge. No room to maneuver. I raised my dagger, preparing to take the creature with me.
Before I met my end, the world unmade itself in a storm.
Power erupted from Seris like a dam bursting, raw, wild, and furious. It washed over me in a wave of sensation that feltlike drowning in starlight, every nerve in my body suddenly overloaded with magic that wasn’t mine but somehow felt familiar.
The massive wolf simply ceased to exist. Not killed, not wounded, erased.
Two more wolves tried to flee, making perhaps three steps before the magic reached them. They dissolved into component atoms, their forms unable to maintain cohesion against the assault of pure Veil-touched power.
But the magic didn’t stop there.
It kept expanding, building like wildfire, turning the very air into something bright and dangerous. I felt it wash over me, through me, burning pathways in my nervous system that had never been meant to carry that kind of load.
My shadows writhed, trying to hold back her power, to find some way to channel or contain the force threatening to tear reality apart. Instead, they were swept up in the torrent, amplifying it, feeding it, making it stronger and more chaotic with every passing second. Seris turned her back to me, attempting to control her powers and redirect them, but it was no use. I was going to be disintegrated along with the wolves.
"Seris!" I lunged forward, wrapping my arms around her from behind, trying to ground her through physical contact. "You have to stop! You’re going to kill us both!"
She was beyond hearing. Her eyes had rolled back until only the whites showed. Power poured off her in visible waves, distorting the air, making the ancient stones of the tower groan under pressure they’d never been designed to withstand.
