For a while, we sit here, her breath slow, and my hand moving through her hair in a rhythm that feels older than memory.
The mountain outside hums low, alive and watchful.
Then a piercing, harrowing scream tears through the clubhouse. Thorn yells, a sound like trees being ripped from the earth by their roots, and the forest itself begins to die.
I hoist Roxy off my lap, and I’m out of my chair before the sound fully registers, fire and ice detonating across my skin in equal measure as we sprint for the main club room. Scar materializes beside me in a blur of supernatural speed, fangs already descended, red eyes blazing with the kind of fury that comes from seeing family threatened. Behind us, boots thunder against stone as the rest of the brothers converge, weapons appearing in hands with the practiced ease of men who sleep armed and awake, ready for war.
Thorn collapses against the doorframe, bark-like skin splitting open in deep fissures that weep sap instead of blood. His eyes, usually the deep brown of rich earth, have gone white with agony. Thorns erupt from his shoulders and spine in violent bursts, growing wild and uncontrolled as his connection to the forest fractures.
“They’re killing the trees…” He gasps, each word scraped raw from a throat never meant for human speech. “Burning them. Poisoning the roots. The forest is screaming, Prez. It won’t stop screaming!”
“How many?” I demand, already knowing the answer will be bad.
Thorn’s body shudders, more thorns sprouting as the forest’s death throes translate through his flesh. “All of them. The entire Seelie Court is forcing its way here. Led by the prince himself.”
The words hang in the air for one crystalline moment.
Then the windows explode inward in a shower of glass and fae magic.
The first wave hits like a tsunami of violence and impossible beauty. Fae warriors pour through every opening, their ethereal features twisted with battle lust, armor that seems woven from moonlight and malice, gleaming as they flow into the clubhouse with predatory grace. They move like water, like silk, like nothing human or earthbound, and their magic carries the scent of pale lilies and the clean, metallic sweetness of old enchantment, beautiful enough to be trusted, wrong enough to raise every instinct I possess.
Not all of them rush blindly.
A seelie knight raises a hand, and the air fractures into geometric sigils, silver lines slicing through space like drawn blades. Magic slams into the floor and erupts upward in spears of crystallized light, forcing Maul and Coil to break formation as stone explodes beneath them. Another fae moves like a shadowcast backward, dragging a ribbon of twilight behind him that devours Thorn’s vines wherever it touches, turning living wood brittle and gray.
Scar doesn’t wait for orders. The vampire launches himself at the nearest cluster of fae with a snarl that belongs to something far older than civilization. His speed renders him nearly invisible, a blur of violence that leaves shredded bodies in his wake. Blood sprays in arterial arcs across ancient stone as he rips through fae flesh with claws and fangs, his centuries of existence distilled into pure, lethal efficiency.
A fae warrior tries to hit him with a blast of silver light. Scar simply isn’t there anymore, displaced to a new position before the magic can connect, already tearing into another target with vicious precision.
“Not fast enough,” he taunts, voice carrying over the chaos with dark amusement. “You’re gonna have to do better than that.”
A fae captain pivots mid-air, cloak unfurling into wings of living glamour. He lets Scar close the distance, then detonates mirrored illusions that fracture the vampire’s trajectory. Silver chains of light snap tight around Scar’s arm, burning where they touch. Scar hisses, ripping free with brute strength before launching forward again, fury sharpened by the sting.
Wreck materializes in the center of a cluster of fae, his gaunt frame wreathed in shadows that seem to devour light. The wendigo doesn’t fight with weapons or claws… he feeds. The fae warriors’ expressions shift from battle rage to dawning horror as Wreck inhales deeply, his hollow chest expanding impossibly wide, and their fear rips free of their bodies in visible tendrils of psychic energy.
They scream.
All of them scream.
But one steps forward, eyes glowing with ancient runes, voice rising in a song older than memory. The melody wraps around the others like armor, slowing the drain, forcing Wreck to push harder. Shadows tear violently around him as he crushes through the resistance and devours their terror anyway.
When he exhales, frost patterns race across the floor in spiraling fractals, and the temperature drops twenty degrees in as many seconds.
“More,” Wreck whispers, hunger saturating every syllable. “Give. Me. More!”
Coil strikes from the shadows, his basilisk form already fully manifested, scales gleaming bronze and black in the flickering light. A fae warrior turns just in time to see massive jaws unhinge, revealing fangs that drip with venom caustic enough to melt through enchanted armor like tissue paper. The fae tries to raise a defensive shield, magic crackling to life around him in layers of protective energy.
The shield fractures, but not before a blade of condensed starlight lashes across Coil’s flank. Sparks sizzle where enchanted metal meets scale. Coil recoils with a hiss, eyes flaring brighter as rage sharpens his focus.
It doesn’t matter.
His venom eats through the shields in seconds, dissolving magic and flesh with equal efficiency. The fae’s scream cuts off abruptly when his throat melts, skin sloughing away to reveal bone that immediately begins to corrode. Within heartbeats, there’s nothing left but a puddle of steaming organic matter that smells like burning flowers.
Coil’s hypnotic eyes find another target, gold irises spinning in patterns that trap unwary gazes and hold them prisoner while venom does its brutal work.
Maul’s transformation completes in a spray of shredded clothing and primal fury. The werewolf that emerges standseight feet tall, all corded muscle and dark fur, with claws like curved daggers and a maw filled with teeth designed to tear meat from bone. He hits the fae line like a battering ram made of rage and hunger, scattering warriors in every direction as he rips through their formation with savage efficiency.
Two fae weave a binding spell together, threads of pale light wrapping around Maul’s legs like living wire. For a heartbeat, he stumbles, muscles locking as magic tries to drag him down. He roars, tearing free, but the delay gives another warrior time to drive a spear into his shoulder, enchanted metal flaring white before snapping under his grip.
