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Stay there! God, she hoped the seer understood what she needed.
Jenna pinned her wings and dove for Kru. Lucas and Gunner were tearing each other apart, but that fight was fair. Whatever was supposed to be would be with them. Kru and Cadence’s fight though? It wasn’t fair. Sure, Cadence was giving Kru absolute hell, and she wasn’t backing down an inch, but her white coat was staining red.
Jenna screeched as she slashed at his face with her talons. Kru disengaged and shook his head hard, slinging rivers of crimson from the gashes near his eyes.
Cadence moved on instinct. She bolted for the wall under Lucia’s beam and ran as far up it as she could. Fuck yes, atta girl. She knew just what Jenna needed! She just needed help getting there.
Cadence twisted in the air and leapt for the exposed beam. Lucia was reaching out as far as she could, but Cadence’s paw brushed her fingertips and missed.
It was okay! She’d done most of the work. Jenna swooped in and clutched her extended arm, contorted her body mid-air, and used Cadence’s momentum to flip her back toward the beam. Lucia caught her and grunted as she used her shifter strength to drag the tiger up. It wasn’t pretty, but Cadence scrambled up there and clung to the beam as Kru took a running leap at the wall.
Oh fuck! Time slowed. Kru used his powerful hind end to push off the wall and sailed through the air, arms extended, murder in his eyes as he aimed directly for Lucia and Cadence.
Jenna turned for him, but she was too late. Her angle was off and she wouldn’t reach them in time. No, no, no!
Lucia was screaming, and Cadence’s tiger had her lips pulled back in a hiss, her paw poised to slap at him as she clung to the beam with her other.
Jenna aimed for him, beating her wings frantically, but she wouldn’t get to him in time. She wouldn’t get there!
Kru’s claws extended to encircle Lucia, but just as he began to wrap his powerful arms around her, Kru jerked violently and then disappeared.
With a war screech, Jenna twisted and landed gripping the wall with her powerful talons, just in time to see Lucas throw the saber-toothed tiger against the stone wall.
More rocks loosed from the ceiling and crashed around them. One hit Lucas, but he shook his head and braced for the impact of Gunner, who was charging him.
Gunner was hurt. He was limping, moving like one of his front legs was broken. His fur was wet and matted with blood. Lucas gripped his neck and drove him to the wall, then roared into his face. He shoved him against the wall again and lifted his fist to finish it.
This. Was. Tragic. Jenna adored them both. She understood both of their pain. This was always their destiny—a battle of the monsters.
Gunner had lost.
She winced as Lucas’s fist connected. With her eyes tightly closed, she waited for it—waited for the breath to stop, for Gunner’s body to slump to the floor.
She waited for it to be over.
But the racing heartbeats continued, and the labored breathing still existed. When she eased her eyes open, Lucas’s fist was lodged deep into the cracked stone right beside Gunner’s massive head. Their sparking, furious gazes were on each other for three breaths.
Jenna released the stone wall and landed on the table, stunned.
Lucas hadn’t killed him. He hadn’t.
Instead, Lucas rested his forehead against Gunner’s for a moment, then pushed off him and allowed the grizzly to slump to the floor.
Lucas looked around the room—at Lucia and Cadence as they slipped to the floor from high above. At Kru’s wrecked body, where he’d Changed back into his human form and fallen below the indentation he’d made in the stone wall. Kru gritted his teeth in pain but stood slowly.
Lucas’s gorilla dragged his gaze to Gunner, and then he blinked slowly and looked to Jenna.
She didn’t understand the gorilla’s expression. His eyes were so full of…something.
He made his way to her, dragging himself to her smoothly on those powerful legs and arms. He came to a halt right in front of her, then lifted his massive hand, and slowly, slowly, he brushed a knuckle down her neck. He searched her eyes, and she could’ve sworn she understood his thoughts. His feelings. It’s done.
He turned and snatched up his clothes as he made his way to the door.
He pushed it open easily and ducked under the oversized frame, disappeared as the door swung closed.
“I told you,” Lucia murmured as she came to stand beside where Jenna was perched. “Fuckin’ Warlanders.”
Aren’t you at war? Lucia’s earlier words drifted through Jenna’s head as she watched Gunner get up and shake himself off, then limp toward the door. She watched Cadence, now shifted back to her human form and gathering her clothes. She stood and jammed a finger at Kru, who looked like he absolutely hated himself. “Fuck you,” Cadence growled out, and then walked out.
