Oh, goddess. The Shadow can’t be more than thirty seconds away now, but that won’t save me if this throw goes badly.
Time stretches, pulls thin. The knife sails from the troll’s stubby fingers. Metal flashes, end over end, and I know long before it arrives that it will hit me right in the eye.
I turn my head, seeking Amriel. I just want to see him one last time, one last?—
But he isn’t there. Light flares, too much of it, blazing from my bracelet, exploding right in front of me.
The air splits with a resounding crack. Magic floods my senses, thick enough to taste, copper and ozone and winter berries, a scent I thought I’d never smell again.
Because Amriel is here. Standing between me and the knife, his whole body a shield.
For one frozen instant, I take him in—the slant of his shoulders, the hair framing his face, the blaze of those golden eyes. His smile. Goddess, his smile, with those dimples on full display.
Then the blade punches into his back with a wet, meaty pop.
And I scream.
Chapter 17
Amriel pitches forward, his gyre falling from his hand as he catches himself against the wheel with both palms. A grunt tears from his chest, thick with pain but also rich with satisfaction.
My scream carves itself out of me, starting from my toes and rushing upward, a torrent of fire and razorblades that pours from my throat. These trolls hurt him. Theystabbedhim. And there’s a fifty percent chance he’s going to die in the next few seconds, right before my eyes.
“No, no, no,” I gibber. “You weren’t supposed to come, you were supposed to let the Shadow do it, you were supposed to juststaythere and?—”
“Princess.” He raises his head, a wince contorting his features. “It’s fine. All right? I’m fine.”
“But you’re not.” Frantic words bubble out of me, beyond my control. “You’re stabbed. And what if you die? What if you explode? I can’t watch. I can’t stand it. I can’t bear it, I’ll never be okay again, I’ll?—”
“Princess.” His mouth slides up at one corner. Somehow, that wry twist takes the edge off my hysteria, so casual, so familiar. “I’mfine. If I were going to die, I would’ve done it already.”
I pause.Princess. He only ever calls me that when things aren’t dire. When he’s fully in control. “You’re not going to explode?”
“No.” His golden eyes move over me, drinking me up, stealing away my panic, soothing the rhythm of my heart. “At least, not this time.”
“But… But…you’re stabbed.”
“This is hardly the first time,” he says. “And it’s only in my shoulder blade, not my lung. Not fatal in the slightest.”
My stomach twists at the sight of the hilt jutting from his shoulder. “But doesn’t it hurt?”
“Oh, Princess.” Again with that croon. He closes his eyes, breathes me in like he always does, like he’s drawing sustenance from my smell. Like he didn’t just take a dagger to the back to protect me. “A little pain never hurt anyone.”
Soundless sobs quake inside my ribcage. But the way his breath feathers across my cheek, the way he leans into me, so solid, so certain, so terribly, horribly, wonderfullyalive, sends a paroxysm of laughter up my throat, instead.
“Touch me.” I can’t tell whether that’s mirth thickening my voice, or tears, or both, but goddess, I’ve never beheld anything so magnificent, never had relief lay me out like this, strip me bare and rip every last scrap of logic right from my hands. “Touch me so you won’t hurt anymore. Anything. Whatever you need.”
He makes a thick sound and aims his face toward my neck, just like he did last night. “I didn’t think I’d see you again,” he murmurs. “Smellyou again. I thought you were gone.”
I angle my head toward his, even while some distant part of me registers what’s happening behind him. The trolls mill in confusion, one frowning as if he can’t understand how this giant fae brute appeared from thin air. Another plucks Amriel’s gyre from the grass and turns it over and over.
“You might want to close your eyes now,” Amriel says as another roar splits the evening. Not distant this time, buthere, so close the ground shakes.
I don’t close my eyes. I peer past his shoulder to where the earth trembles and trees crash.
The Shadow bursts from the forest, a blur of indigo muscle andgleaming claws. He streaks across the clearing, incandescent, blazing like a meteor.
The trolls don’t even have time to scream before the Shadow barrels into them. Three bodies go flying, the Shadow’s claws ripping into the fourth like he’s made of paper. Dark green blood spurts in every direction. A second later, something wet splats against the ground.
