“Rynn,” she croaked. Then her eyes widened. Before she could say another word, I felt the sharp cut of a dagger against my throat.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Rynn
I froze along with everyone in the room. Except Lucian. That asshole just got up and started fixing himself a drink. “Sloppy security around here.” He poured a dark amber liquid into a glass. “Thought I was paying for top-notch protection.”
“You’re not paying for anything,” Alexis snarled next to my ear. “The only thing you’re doing is buying yourself time until my uncle gives me the okay to rip your spine out.”
“Oh good.” Lucian sipped his drink. “I was worried you’d mess up my face. I’d prefer to be as stunning in death as I was in life.”
“Let her go,” Bastian said flatly. “Rynn is a member of the Alpha pack. If you harm her, it means war.”
“Point of fact,” Lucian drawled, “when the Furie did her scary mind thing, the two Alphas moved to protect each other—not Rynn. I’m fairly certain the blond one is fucking her—or at least he wants to—but I’ve seen how pack ties work, and what they have going on isn’t that.”
“Is that true? Are you not a real member of their pack?” Alexis’ warm breath brushed against my face and I tried to recoil, only for him to dig the blade in deeper.
Shadows pulsed in the room.
“Ah-ah,” Alexis warned. “You’re fast, Furie, but I promise you’re not faster than my dagger. And I’ll take her head clean fucking off before you can do anything about it.”
Cali’s eyes looked like molten gold, but she held her shadows back. Both Warrick and Bastian were too far away to do anything either, although they’d both managed to draw their weapons.
“Someone care to explain what the Alphas and a Furie are doing snooping around in Fervis territory?” Alexis asked lightly.
I held in the relieved breath that wanted to escape. Wherever Nyx was, they hadn’t been discovered.
“Sure,” Bastian drawled. “Right after you explain that.” He pointed his dagger at Lucian.
“You’ll have to take that up with my uncle.” Alexis chuckled. “Politics are his thing.”
“Well, this is exciting.” Lucian clapped. “Here I was, all set for a boring night.”
A whip made of pure shadow flew through the bars and slammed into the Moroi, sending him crashing into the wall. Head first.
He dropped to the floor like a broken doll. Still alive, unfortunately. It would take more than a broken neck and fractured skull to kill a Moroi.
Warrick and Bastian glanced at Cali.
“I was getting tired of hearing his voice,” she said smoothly before giving me a pointed look.
Fuck. This was going to hurt. I’d need to wait for an opportunity to grab Alexis’ hand to keep him from cutting me too deep.
“Never thought I’d thank a Furie, but that was probably the highlight of my evening,” Alexis admitted. The hand not holding the dagger drifted down my arm to the crest. “What’s this? Stealing from us too?”
He tugged at the crest, and I reluctantly let it go. “It’s nothing,” I said. “Just picked it up while I was browsing and then we got distracted by the Moroi literally everyone is searching for, who you just happen to have in your possession.”
“No.” Alexis let out a raspy laugh. “See, I know you think I’m just a dumb brute, Rynn. But that’s because you don’t understand me. I, however, know what makes you tick quite well. It’s why I knew you were up to something when you left the party. Because there is no way you would travel all this way and barely visit Remy and Marie just to sneak off for a quick fuck. You came here for a reason. And if you’d known about the Moroi, you would have brought more people. No.” He held up the crest. “You came here for this.”
Moonsdamn it all.
I met Cali’s stare again, and her shadows writhed behind her. Just as I was about to make a grab for Alexis’ wrist, he grunted and his grip on me loosened. I spun forward just in time to see him fall, his head slamming into the ground and the knife lodged through his throat jostling, spilling more blood onto the floor.
“Don’t kill him yet,” Bastian said mildly. “I’d prefer to avoid an outright war with the Fervis Order. If that’s even possible at this point,” he muttered.
I stared at Ryker. “You came.”
“You needed me,” he said simply.
