The remaining wolves tried to scatter, but her magic hunted them down like a living thing. It caught them one by one, unmaking them with surgical precision, revealing an intelligence behind the chaos. Not random destruction, but the targeted annihilation of everything she perceived as a threat.
To my growing horror, I realized I was next.
The power wrapped around my body like chains, testing my defenses, probing for weaknesses. My shadows rose to meet it, but they were overwhelmed almost instantly. She was too strong, too wild, too raw in her unleashed fury.
This was how I died. Not from the curse eating away at my life force, not from an assassin’s blade or a rival’s poison. Killed by the very person I’d risked everything to save, burned alive by magic that recognized me as just another predator to eliminate.
The irony was almost perfect, and I knew I deserved it.
As the power began to eat through my shields, I felt something else beneath the chaos: pain. Fear. The desperate need to protect something precious. She wasn’t trying to kill me, she was trying to save me. The magic was responding to her terror at seeing me hurt, lashing out at anything that posed a threat.
I was collateral damage in her attempt at rescue.
"Seris," I said again, gentler this time. "I’m safe. You saved me. You can let go now."
The assault paused, the power fluctuating like a candle flame in the wind. She was listening, somewhere deep inside the maelstrom of unleashed magic.
"The wolves are dead," I continued, my voice steady despite the fact that her power was literally cooking me from the inside out. "All of them. You killed them all. I’m not in danger anymore."
The magic began to recede, slowly at first, then faster as she regained some measure of control. The pressure around my chest eased, allowing me to breathe properly for the first time in what felt like hours.
Seris collapsed.
I caught her before she could hit the ground, her body limp and unresponsive in my arms. She was unconscious but breathing, her skin fever-hot from magical exhaustion.
That’s when I felt the wounds in full force. Not just the bites and scratches from the wolves, but the curse itself. My hand shook again. I removed the glove and found it festering with black spots.
Her magic had accelerated the process. Whatever she’d done to save my life had also pushed me closer to the edge I’d been walking for twenty-eight years.
I looked down at her unconscious form, this girl who’d nearly killed me trying to protect me, who carried enough power to reshape the world or destroy it entirely. She was beautiful in the moonlight, peaceful in a way she never was while awake. Young. Innocent, despite everything she’d endured.
And she was going to be the death of me.
But not tonight. Tonight, we’d both survived something that should have killed us. That was victory enough. I knew I would die sooner rather than later, but if I was going to die, I would make use of the time I had. I would make amends for all the pain and suffering my family had caused over the centuries, as best as I could.
I lifted her carefully, mindful of her injuries, and carried her toward the tower’s entrance. Whatever was inside couldn’t be worse than what we’d left outside. Could it?
Blood decorated the steps as I climbed the ancient stairs, each drop a reminder that time was running out faster than I’d planned.
But the girl in my arms held the key to breaking the curse, if I could figure out how to use her power without letting it consume us both.
If I could keep her alive long enough to matter.
If I could keep myself alive long enough to see it through.
A lot of ifs. But they were still all I had.
CHAPTER 7
DAEMON
The tower’s interior was a tomb of forgotten purposes.
Dust motes danced in shafts of moonlight filtering through cracked windows, and every surface was covered in a layer of grime thick enough to write in. But it was defensible, with thick stone walls and only one entrance.
Seris hadn’t woken since the magical explosion. I’d carried her up three flights of narrow stairs to what had once been the watchtower’s main chamber, her body limp in my arms, her breathing shallow but steady. Now she lay on my cloak beside the cold hearth while I tried to pretend I wasn’t at my breaking point. I had suffered worse wounds, but the curse was worse than it had ever been.
I felt her magic like a second heartbeat in my chest, a phantom rhythm that echoed my own. Her magic called to mine even in sleep. It wasn’t natural. This kind of soul-deep awareness took years to develop, if it developed at all. But somehow, in the space of a few hours, we’d become linked in ways I didn’t understand.
