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Aye. Magnus certainly felt foolish enough to be his younger self, that was for damned sure.

Sisters fucking save him.

—Listen though, lad. They’re eating it up⁠—

That was true. It had gone from nothing but the fiddle and drum to laughter and whistles, cheers and applause. Even if they were only engaging because he was an Imperial Son and the title alone earned him some modicum of tolerance, it was better than shocked silence.

He twirled, looking for the next willing creature to scandalize, and found Fern gaping at him from the other side of the now-empty dance floor. Wicked glee was painted across her stunning features, and that look sent a delicious sort of terror shooting straight up his spine.

She’s never letting me live this down, is she, Pet?

—Nay, Maggie. Enjoy it⁠—

Ach. Fuck it.

Magnus crossed the distance and went right up to Fern, dropped to the floor in a low crouch at her feet, buried his nose against her exposed thigh, and dragged his face up through hill and valley the whole way back to standing. Forget their bleeding drinking game—Mag was instantly half out of his mind off the smell of her.

He was so engrossed in her tempestuous scent of petrichor and teeming, sun-drenched blooms, on the way she shivered and sighed and leaned into the touch, that he never saw it coming.

Her fist plowed into his jaw, Mag’s entire body caught up in the force of the blow. When he stumbled back upright and wrenched himself around to face her again, Fern was bouncing on her feet, brows popped up in expectation, like she was waiting for something.

—Hit him again, lass. He’s not getting it⁠—

Mag barely registered Pet’s betrayal before she clobbered him again. He flew the other way and landed hard on one knee, both sides of his face throbbing as the obsidian floor cracked beneath him. Like the very first night they met, she was on him in a blur. Biting, scratching, bruising. Disappearing so he couldn’t grab her. All on her feet too, her wings still useless.

He sucked in a harsh breath and closed his eyes, calling Pet’s senses to the fore while he basked in the center of her storm. Beyond it all, he vaguely registered the rumbling of the world. The rise in power. But his focus was on her. On waiting.

Waiting….

Magnus snapped a hand out and caught her by the arm, his iron hold swinging her around and right into his own blood-streaked chest. To his endless surprise, the wild wee thing actually melted into him, the depths of her galaxy eyes locked on his.

And the room erupted.

Whether it was because of their show or the Occurrence, he didn’t know. Didn’t care. Magnus was too focused on Fern. On the rise and fall of her panting breaths. On the way her lips parted, surprised, as if she wasn’t right where she belonged.

The crowd poured in around them, celebrating, but he didn’t fucking care because he was about to devour her.

Mag mucked it up with her once already, the night before the witchling healed Brand. He’d been grumpy as all shite and not in the mood for anything other than the sweet oblivion of sleep after the absolute disaster with the Demon Gaulnir and Brand’s resulting spiral. But his mind had other ideas. He was hours into worrying that his brother might have to rot in that tower for the rest of his days when she came screeching in, battering the door down.

And then she’d kicked his sorry arse. He laid there like a mat and gladly took every pummel of her beating because he absolutely deserved it, and because there wasn’t a bone in his body that was capable of retaliating and causing her physical harm.

It was becoming a habit of theirs, it seemed. He wasn’t bothered in the least.

Magnus brought the arm he was holding up around his shoulder, plastered his hand to her back, and hiked her closer. The edges of her wings trailed like gossamer against his skin and a low, pleased hum rumbled out of him. Pinching her chin, Mag tilted her face up and used his thumb to smudge away the false rosy tint on her lips to better see her. Her colors. Her beauty.

“Aye, there you are,” he murmured when it was gone. “That’s more like it.”

Fern’s lids fluttered. “Are you going to do it or not, Wolflord?”

“I’m—”

A rowdy group of revelers bumped into them. Mag was turning, ready to verbally throttle the offenders, when the scent hit him. It went straight to the back of his throat and he gagged, the rot so strong it brought tears to his eyes. When he saw the platinum head of a lone creature bobbing against the flow of the crowd, racing away, Magnus knew.

Shapeshifter.

—Aye—

Absolute weeping arsehole that he was, Magnus broke away from Fern without a second thought, without a word—utterly single-minded as he dove into the sea of bodies. He tracked the foul fucking odor right out of the Observation Deck and into the main atrium of the Elder Halls.