The semelee paused.You wish to twist fate? But you’re not?—
No, I don’t want to twist fate. I just need more power. Yours. Join me, for just a moment.
Yes, my princess.
My soul slammed back into my body, and somebody gasped.
I opened my eyes to see the semelee’s inky shadow body coiling around me, lifting my hair and igniting my skin with its power. Its huge serpentine form swirled in the hallway, staying close to my side. Its head’s width was easily the length of my arm, and its long body would have stretched all the way to the kitchen if it lay flat.
“What in the realm...” Lars’s eyes grew wide.
The others inched back, only Jax staying put.
“Subdue the half-breed male,” I commanded the semelee. “Make him sleep.”
The shadow creature swirled forward, like inky mist in the fae lands—both see-through yet whole. Its serpentine body glided through the air, defying gravity, and the outline of its silver eyes and razor-sharp fangs were apparent in the morning light.
“Dear Gods,” Phillen muttered and surged back even more.
Jax leaped out of the way just as the shadow creature reached his brother. Bastian pushed to a stand, his dead eyes still staring at nothing. He swung toward the door and took a step toward it, but the semelee swirled around him, encompassing Bastian with its godlike power.
All it took was one squeeze from the ever-powerful semelee.
Bastian slumped to the floor, his eyes closed, his body asleep.
The semelee hissed, its body still wrapped around Jax’s brother.
“Release him. Come to me.” Magic bled out of me, and pants lifted my chest. It’d been so long since I’d commanded a semelee like this.
A slight sting came from my collar, and I staggered. The semelee swirled around Bastian again, then glanced toward Jax and his friends. Venom dripped from one of its fangs, and its mouth opened.
“No. Come to me!” I said in a more forceful tone.
Slowly, as though reluctantly, the semelee released Bastian once more, then drifted to my side.
It wrapped around me, its power humming with mine. I had just enough stamina left to tether it to my soul before I shot us through the galaxy.
The Veiled Between’s mist parted slowly, and it took every drop of my concentration to return the semelee to the plane between planes.
With every second that passed, I grew more fatigued and sluggish, but I had enough power left to release the shadow creature before I shot back to the fae lands.
My breath sucked in when I returned to my body, and when I opened my eyes again, it was to see Bastian unconscious on the floor and Jax and all of his friends staring at me with slackened jaws.
Relief hit me momentarily.
I’d done it, and I was still standing, still alive. And I hadn’t killed anybody this time.
But then my vision tunneled. Darkness pressed in. The realm spun, and I crashed to the floor.
I awoketo the feel of someone draping a cool cloth over my forehead.
Twitching, I moved my head from side to side.
The cool cloth lifted. “Elowen?” Jax said.
I opened my eyes to bright sunlight streaming into our bed chambers. My mate sat beside me, and a heavy dose of worry pulsed in his aura.
“Hi.”
