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Willow’s rage focused on Maebh.
Danger… Wrong. Flee. Hurry. Fix… Clean. Last chance.The Well whispered too fast.
Someone shouted from the battlements, but he couldn’t understand what was happening—the sounds of fighting renewed with terrified screams. More dust and dirt rose, blocking Leaf’s vision. Manabeeze drifted into the air.
Nearby, a wounded Unseelie soldier stumbled from a dirt cloud. Blood covered his face. His arm hung loosely, as if dislocated. His throat was torn out, revealing tendons and vertebrae. He shouldn’t be alive.
The soldier locked eyes on Nova, sniffed, then snarled at Leaf as though he was the obstacle.
“Fuck off,” Leaf warned. “Get to a healer.”
But the soldier attacked. Leaf twisted, both protecting Nova with his body and stabbing the soldier in the torso. Confused, the soldier glanced down atReckoningand then mindlessly skewered himself on the blade, reaching for Nova. The stench of rotten breath bloomed as he snapped his teeth inches from Leaf’s face.
“He’s sick,” Leaf grunted. “Maybe the taint has infected his mind.”
He planted his boot on the soldier’s hip and then yanked his sword out. Leaf let go of Nova, pivoted, and used the full force of his weight to decapitate. His body fell and twitched on the ground while his head rolled into the dusty shadows where another wounded fae appeared, charging at Leaf. And another. And more. They were everywhere. He cut and chopped, stabbed and blocked, but all were relentless in their attack, all frenzied and mindless to get to Nova. Not just her. They leaped onto the litter, desperate to kill the Unseelie High Queen.
Tainted mana was used on the battlefield as others protected themselves from the infected. Colored light bloomed in the dust between the white glow of manabeeze. The taint created nonsense and warped things—a rainbow, then snow, and silk ribbons cascading from someone’s hand.
With each passing second, more manabeeze floated, and fewer cries were heard from wounded soldiers. More frenzied, mindless, and feral mortally wounded emerged from the dust cloud. Some had Seelie uniforms, others wore Guardian leathers.
Leaf dispatched each attack withReckoning. He shouted for the Six to help, but they ignored him. When he had a moment to look, Fox’s face held a devious grin as he stared in Willow’s direction.
This is madness.
The headless soldier on the ground moaned—or rather, the sound came from the head half-buried in the dirt. The body clambered to its feet.
“Zombies,” Nova shrieked. “They’re goddamn zombies.”
The word wasn’t familiar, but her terror was. When he questioned her with his eyes, she added, “They’re dead. Undead.”
His mind filled with pictures of stumbling, rotten corpses groaning about brains. She must have sent him the memory.
“You had these monsters in your time?” he asked.
She shook her head wildly. “Only in stories. On TV. Never in real life. I think you have to shoot their brains. And if they bite you, you become infected and become them.”
Leaf sliced his sword across the scalp of a goblin, cutting the top off like a lid. Nova vomited behind him as gray brain matter spilled out. But within seconds, the corpse twitched, and the goblin tried to rise again.
“Not these ones,” Leaf confirmed, cutting down the middle of the decapitated body as it fumbled toward him. “They can’t be killed.”
Willow’s berserker gaze flashed in his mind. She must have betrayed them despite what her parents believed. That was the only logic he could muster. Somehow, Willow had sent an army of undead, frenzied warriors to kill them.
“I’m going to have to kill her,” Leaf said, glancing at the Prime.
Pain sliced through his body before another word escaped his lips, locking his muscles. Cold fingers wrapped around Leaf’s throat as a head with dark brows, short white hair, and a skull flashing beneath the porcelain skin appeared inches away. Black tattoos on Emrys’ body writhed under his skin with ancient promises as black as his eyes.
The Sluagh trailed his nose along Leaf’s jaw, inhaling the scent of fear like a drug. His exhale sounded aroused, eager. “Try. I dare you.”
Sharp talons pricked Leaf’s neck. Behind Emrys, Maebh lifted her fist and swung her arm away. Emrys hurtled off Leaf as though pulled by an invisible string. His draconic wings flared wide, gracefully balancing him. His grin bared sharp fangs, and his wholly black eyes narrowed on Leaf, intensifying. Leaf was still frozen in place by Emrys’s invisible wraith form.
He tried to step forward, to free himself of the metaphysical shackles. Maebh’s pet burst from the shadows and attacked the Sluagh. Emrys smirked at Leaf, then flickered out of the way. Each time the demogorgon attacked, his smile stretched into something more wicked. He toyed with the monster, like a cat with a mouse.
Until more undead clambered over corpses. The hold on Leaf released in time for him to ward off the attack.
“We don’t have time to fight amongst ourselves,” Leaf growled, flicking blood off his sword.
Maebh gave him a flat but agreeable look. The madness seemed less in her eyes now. She sent her pet away from Emrys and into the unending army of corpses—ordering it to keep them away. Then she yanked on Emrys’ puppet strings, somehow jerking around the souls inside him until they buzzed with a deafening roar.
