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She waited. And waited.
“Fucking…fuck.”
The curse was still reverberating through the room when she left it, the chamber door slamming behind her as she took to the air. “Lunara, you’ve got as long as it takes me to get to the tower to show yourself before I start wreaking havoc,” she bellowed down the corridor. “No? Suit yourself.”
Glass and stone whizzed by on the edges of her vision, the twists and turns bringing life to her bones. If Lunara hadn’t found her and healed every particle in her body, every broken fragment and mangled gash in her wings, she would’ve lost this feeling. Lost the rightness of weightlessness.
No way Fern was letting anything happen to her.
Thank the Sisters no one was awake and she could fly. Demon horns were wicked sharp and dodging them in full-speed flight was more difficult than it should’ve been because her wings still weren’t what they used to be.
They’d been spectacular once upon a time. She knew it with an innate certainty that came from her soul, no memory needed. The aches and pains plaguing her were something she planned on mentioning later, when Lunara didn’t have so much on her plate.
Which wouldn’t happen if the pixie-tit went and got herself fucking hurt.
“Lunara!”
She reached the base of Brand’s tower, one hand on the central column of stone running up the spiral staircase to steady her. Her wings worked to spin her higher and higher, and she hit the landing with a thud, swinging her mace at the same time.
The creepy fucking door didn’t enjoy the pummeling even a little bit. After the way they found Gaulnir, though, she certainly did.
As usual when the right person wasn’t with her, whipping vines shot out from the surface like angry snakes, lashing at her.
“Magnus! Wake up!” Splinters and sawdust rained down as she countered its attacks, banging the door in the lulls between. “Open this cunting door right now!”
Fine. If he wasn’t going to do it, she’d beat it down herself. She drew back to double her efforts and—
The door swung wide, the vines snapping back to their rightful place and revealing one very naked Wolflord.
Shitting, fucking seasons, Magnus aht Bordoroth was fit.
The blackest ink followed the lines of his colossal body, Pet staring out at her from within the artwork and telling stories she understood without speaking the language of their people. Mussed, flaxen hair begged for someone to run their hands through it. And even with rest and a beard softening his features, his face was all hard angles. The silver rings he decorated himself with only added to the effect.
Fern had never seen anything like him, and the certainty of it irritated the piss out of her.
She saw the exact moment sleep dissipated and awareness came, his eyes flashing like gold coins. He sank into a fighting stance, his muscles straining, the wolf’s features morphing over his own.
“What’s happened?”
—Let me out, Maggie—
At least she wasn’t surprised when that impossibly deep and disembodied voice rumbled around her anymore—the first thing she heard after Lunara sprang her from the Veil. What she had yet to figure out was whether it was normal.
Something clamored at the wall in her mind, pain hovering right behind it, but she shook it away. Fern knew that dark agony would level her if she so much as stole a glance.
“Fern,” Magnus snarled. “Where’s the witchling?”
Shit. Lunara. What a fucking time to get distracted.
She threw her shoulders back, standing a little taller. “Can’t believe I’m saying this, but I think we need to find Araxis. Now.”
“That makes no sense, answers exactly none of my questions, and I’m two seconds from losing my control and my mind,” he said, lips peeling back and exposing his sharp canines. “What happened, and where is Lunara?”
—Be nice, lad. She won’t talk if you’re rude—
Magnus should take Pet’s advice. Fern was already losing her patience and they hadn’t been speaking for more than a minute. Fucking arsehole made her want to tear her own hair out.
“I don’t know where she fucking is. That’s the problem.”
