Falcyn, Urian, Blaise, and Brandor took positions between Medea and Brogan as the rabid dogs approached them. Medea held her breath, waiting to be overrun and swarmed the same way they’d done to poor Shadow.
There was nothing left of where he’d been.
Not even a drop of blood. It appeared as if he’d been completely devoured by them. Every last bit. Body and soul.
Louder and louder, the barking and snarling grew. Brogan reached out and took her hand. While she stood bravely with her jaw locked in silence, there was the slightest tremor in her hand to let Medea know just how frightened the woman was.
Then, just as the twisted demonic dogs reached them, the shadowed earth shot up at a right angle, forming a wall between them and the demonic beasts. They slammed into it and howled out in agony. Swirling and twisting like smoke, the ground formed a giant hand that sent the animals scattering and running off into the dark.
The Crom came in the next wave, on his eerie ghost steed. Rushing and snorting fire, the beast seemed every bit as determined to add them to its menu. Just as it would have reached their position, the hand bent around and curved up to form a huge beast of a man.
“You have no power here!” Though the voice was distorted in its inhuman growl and pitch, Medea still recognized it as Shadow’s.
The Crom pulled his horse up short, causing it to rear and paw fire at the hand. “This kerling belongs to me!” The rasping voice came from Brogan.
Medea gaped as she saw that Brogan’s eyes were now milky white with no iris or pupil whatsoever. Her skin was ice cold to touch.
The Crom had obviously taken her over completely so that he could speak through her.
Blaise growled low in his throat as he must have realized what was going on. “You’re not taking her!”
“B-b-b-b…” Brogan choked, then fell to her knees to clutch at her throat. It was obvious the Crom was commanding her to speak Blaise’s name and she was refusing to give him the power of death over the mandrake.
Throwing her head back, Brogan let out a blood-chilling screech. She pounded the ground until her fist was bloody and bruised.
“Stop it!” Blaise shifted into his dragon’s body. He let loose a blast of fire toward the Crom.
Engulfed by the fire, he laughed through Brogan’s throat. Then threw his whip of bones and skulls toward Blaise. The head at the end of it opened its mouth as if it were screaming silently at the mandrake.
Shadow caught it and threw it back toward the horse and rider. “Leave here or I will dine on you both!”
Yanking his whip free of Shadow’s grasp, the Crom snapped it in the air, shooting sparks of fire in all directions. Sulphur choked Medea and burned her throat.
“I demand my property!” He cracked his whip for Brogan.
Shadow caught it again and yanked the Crom from his horse. Faster than Medea could blink, Falcyn was on him.
He grabbed the Crom and pulled him up from the ground. “Renounce your claim on the kerling. Here and now. Give her her freedom or I will rid you of your essence for all eternity!”
The Crom struggled for several seconds until he realized that Falcyn wasn’t about to give. More than that, he came to the startling and truthful conclusion that Falcyn indeed had the means and ability to carry out his not-so-empty threat. “Very well, my lord. I give the kerling her freedom.”
No sooner did Brogan speak those words than she fell forward to lie in a heap. Blaise returned to his human form so that he could rush to her side and pull her into his arms.
“Ro?” His voice quivered from the strain of his fear. “Speak to me! Say something!”
Brandor knelt beside them. “Brogan, please don’t leave me alone!”
Still, she didn’t move. She didn’t even appear to breathe. Her face turned pale, then blue.
Fearful tears choked Medea as she feared what they did. That the Crom had freed Brogan by killing her. Though she’d just met the woman, she felt for her and didn’t want to lose her any more than the men did.
Blaise cupped her cheek and cradled her against his shoulder. “Speak to me, my lady. I cannot live knowing I caused you harm.”
When she didn’t respond, Blaise choked on a sob and lifted her up. Her head fell back while Brandor took her hand and kissed it as if it were unspeakably precious. Tears fled down his cheeks. This was pure brotherly love and it made her chest tighten in sympathy for all of them.
Medea’s gaze swam from her own unshed tears, especially when she saw the agony on Urian’s face. Without being told, she knew he was reliving the death of his own sister. And more than that, his beloved wife.
His most precious Phoebe.
That tortured look made her stomach ache for him. And it brought out the memories of her own loss. Made all those old wounds fresh and new.
For a moment, she feared she’d give in to the agony of the past and be ruined by it again.
Falcyn wrapped his arms around her and held her back to his front as her vision blurred from unshed tears. She felt his jaw tic as he whispered, “I can’t interfere in this realm. My powers won’t work here.”
“What?”
Falcyn ground his teeth. “I can’t save her from this.”
His eyes flaring at those words, Shadow swirled past them to Brogan and lightly touched her cheek.
No sooner did he withdraw his hand than her eyes fluttered open. Lost in their grief, neither Blaise nor Brandor saw it at first.
Not until Brogan pulled her hand from her brother’s grasp and sank it deep into Blaise’s pale hair. “They can take me by force and break every bone I have, but only you will ever have my heart, Blaise. For it alone is mine to give.”
Laughing and crying, he pulled her to his lips so that he could kiss her.
Brandor quickly withdrew from them. And though it was obvious he didn’t like to see his sister in the arms of another man, he didn’t say a word as he moved to stand beside Medea. Facing the opposite direction.
Like Urian.
Snorting at their ridiculous actions, Medea wiped at her eyes. She drew a ragged, grateful breath.
Urian glanced at her with Falcyn, then over to Brandor. “Don’t we feel like the odd ones out?”
Shadow manifested between them and draped his arms around their shoulders. “I feel your pain, my brothers. I’m always the oddest of the odd.” He darted his gaze around them. “So which of you assholes destroyed my rope?”
Medea let out a half laugh. “That’s your concern? Seriously?”
“I like my rope. Comes in handy for all kinds of things. And we still need to get the whole lot of you out of here. Mairee is only one of a number of treacherous bitches who can summon all manner of hell down upon us.”
That made her think of something else, other than their near miss. “She called you the prince of shadows. Why?”
He let out a long sigh. “This dimension is its own world. With its own predators. Its own rules. And as with all things in the shadow realm, the title is both one of respect and one of shame. Neither all good nor all bad. Always something between.”
She didn’t understand. “How so?”
“Because I reign here as the supreme badass, and at the same time, it’s a reminder that my mother abandoned me to the beasts who used to rule this land when I was a child, to be preyed upon.” He cut a sinister glare to Falcyn. “You had your sister and brothers to rely on. I had no one. My brothers don’t even know I exist. What actions I took during the Primus Bellum to survive, I took to protect the only family I’ve ever known. And instead of protecting me for my loyalty, they stripped my powers and sent me back here, where it took me a thousand years to regain all I’d lost in the blink of an eye. You judge me when you know nothing of who I am or what I’ve been through. And you know even less about Jared. Instead of holding grudges for what you think happened, maybe you should spend five minutes learning the truth. Open your eyes and engage the brain the gods gave you for something other than watching porn and jumping to conclusions that even a three-year-old would see were stupid lies.”
With those bitter words spoken, he turned and lifted his cowl to cover his head. His charcoal-gray armor clanked in the darkness as he strode with his hand on the hilt of his sword. “Follow me or don’t, it’s entirely up to you. But unless you wish to build home property in this hellhole, I suggest you pick up the pace.”
Falcyn fell silent as he watched Shadow moving ahead. He went to help Brogan and Blaise so that they could all follow after Shadow.
Urian and Brandor remained quietly behind them.
Medea took Falcyn’s arm. “Okay, I get that, like you, he’s older than shit and fought in the Primus Bellum. Whose side was he on?”
“His own. He started out with the demons, fighting for Noir and the Mavromino. For reasons unknown, he switched to fight with the Kalosum … until he helped Jared slaughter his army for Noir.”
“And no one knows why?”
Falcyn jerked his chin at Shadow as those words haunted him and he tried to understand them. Nothing in that war had been simple. Even less had made sense. Especially not the sides they’d each chosen to fight for. Or the reasons why. “I’m sure he knows his reasoning. Jared might know it, too.”
And yet as they walked, details of the past played through his mind. Things he’d forgotten completely.
Or perhaps the correct reality was that he’d chosen to bury them more than simply forget about them.
Shadow had come in early to speak to Caleb, who had led one of their largest bands of demons against the Mavromino. Falcyn and Adidiron, one of their Arel commanders, had stumbled into that meeting quite by accident.
To this day, he could see the sneer on Shadow’s face as he raked a cold look over Adidiron’s body, taking in his golden armor and wings.
“Watch your back, Caleb. Those who profess good too often practice evil in its name.”
“Why are you here?” Adidiron wore the same expression as someone who’d just stepped in a flaming pile of horseshit.
“Slumming.” Shadow stood slowly.
Adidiron rolled his eyes. “Go back to the whore shadows where you belong.”
Shadow had shaken his head. “Careful, Arel. Lest you learn one lesson too late.”
“And that is?”
“We are never punished for the sins we commit. Rather we are punished by them.”
Those wise words haunted Falcyn to this day. They’d never been far from his mind.
But then what had been his sin where Maddor was concerned? Seeking love? That was the only reason he’d allowed Igraine to lie and seduce him. He’d been so desperate for a kind touch that he’d ignored all common sense and reason.
And what of Medea? Her sin had been in trusting humans not to harm her child and husband.
Were those sins so great that they had to spend the rest of eternity paying for them? Seriously?
No one should have to bleed to the bone for loving or trusting another.
“Where are you, dragonfly?” Medea’s voice brought him back from the darkness of his thoughts.
Lost and cornered. At least that was what it felt like.
Still, he refused to let her know that. “I’m here.”
“You say that, but I can see in your eyes that you’re off somewhere else.”
He would tell her that he was thinking of the future. Yet why bother? He didn’t believe in a future. Didn’t believe in anything at this point. Other than misery and hell.
Betrayal. That was what the world had taught him.
Just how black the souls of the rest really were. And how often others condemned innocent people for their own misdeeds and rotten acts they couldn’t stand about themselves. Because it was easier to see them in someone else and hate them for it than it was to hate yourself and go to the effort of trying to fix it. After all, people were less likely to see it in you if their attention was being diverted by the guilty pointing the finger of distraction toward those who couldn’t defend themselves because they were innocent and couldn’t even contemplate the sins being cast upon them.
Sick, really.
But luckily, he was spared having to answer as Shadow slowed down. “We’re here.”
With his powers, he cut another hole through, into a small room from his shadow realm into that of Camelot. Shadow stayed back while they walked through. Then he joined them and sealed the rupture tightly closed.
Medea screwed her face up at his actions. “How do you do that?”
“That’s like asking me how I breathe. I don’t know. I just think it and it happens.” Shadow gave her a sarcastic grin. “It’s magick.”
Rolling her eyes at his sarcasm, she shook her head at him. “You’re a sick bastard.”
“Always.” As he stepped away, Medea frowned.
There was a smear of blood on the floor. Even though there was no color in this room where they were—everything appeared as shades of black and white, like an old movie—she knew the looks of it. The smell of it.
And it took her a few seconds to realize the source.
“You’re wounded?”
Shadow paused at her question, but didn’t answer.
Then she saw it. The huge, gaping wound in Shadow’s side that was partially concealed by his cape. “Shadow?”
His eyes rolled back into his head as his legs buckled. He would have hit the ground hard had Falcyn not caught him and lowered him slowly to the floor.
Yet no sooner did he pull back than the door opened to show a small group of Adoni who weren’t their allies.
The rasping of metal filled the air as the Adoni unsheathed their swords.
An instant later, they attacked.