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Dead.
“Naia.” Ronin gripped her harder. “Nai?—”
The shadow barreling towards them drowned out all sounds.
A protective instinct heaved up in Naia, and she shoved Ronin back by his chest.
At the last second, he caught her by the wrist and forced her down with him. His back hit the gravel, and she rolled off his chest.
Naia lifted her head as Marina’s heel plunged into Ronin’s stomach. He sputtered out a cough.
Naia shrieked.
Ronin’s arm shot up and gripped her covered ankle. An explicit sign of bravery. Marina cocked her head down at him.
Naia lunged for her sister, but a spearhead of glass swiped inches from her nose and pierced through Marina’s wrist. She slung back by its force. Like a nail, it bound her to the exterior of the warehouse. Another penetrated through her leg. Another in her arm.
Not glass.
Ice.
Theon’s alabaster strands peeked through a haze as he materialized, dropping at Ronin’s side. He wasted no time tearing apart Ronin’s shirt to staunch the bleeding. “Avi!” he boomed.
Naia’s hands shook, gaping down at the wound pooling blood on Ronin’s abdomen.
How was Marina able to harm him?
Grimacing, Ronin lifted himself to a sitting position, his eyes never leaving Marina.
Avi emerged from the warehouse, already uncorking a potion. He crouched at Ronin’s other side. “Lay back down!”
“Watch out!” someone yelled.
Naia’s muscles tensed. She whipped her head around to see flames blasting through the air. Theon sprung up. Naia took a step to follow his lead as the inferno crashed into him.
Solaris’s figure took form from the crackling body of fire, locking Theon in a chokehold. The blood on Theon sizzled as quickly as it made contact with Solaris’s skin.
In a skillful motion, Solaris rotated Theon in his hold, using his boot against his tailbone to force him onto his stomach, and pinning his arms behind his back.
Naia was submerged by a familiar sense of helplessness.
She looked down at Ronin. He held a hand over his wound.
Give up.
Marina ripped her wrists free from the ice spears, so quick her wounds were like pinpricks. She attacked at a speed no mortal eye could follow, kicking Avi back with her boot to his chest, and gathered a handful of Ronin’s hair. Her gloves protected her hands from the residue of his blood, collected in his strands, streaking down his face. She forced his head back, revealing a deadly look torching in his eyes.
A velvety laugh left her mouth, a scornful sound of mockery. She came closer to his face, taunting him. “You can try your little magic tricks on me, witch, but they won’t work.”
Naia’s heart boomed in her ears, thumping wildly in her throat. He was trying to manipulate her blood, same as the times he’d done with Vex and Malik. Only, it wasn’t working.
She needed to do something. Now. Before—before he?—
“Marina, don’t hurt him!” Naia shouted, lifting her shaking hand. “I will do whatever you wish. Please! Stop this!”
Marina brought her head up to Naia, victory glinting in her dark eyes. “Marry Solaris right here, right now, and I will spare him.”
Naia assessed Ronin’s ashen complexion, the rainbow of blues and purples splotching around his eyes. He had lost too much blood, and if he didn’t get help, he would die.
