“Not another dead forest,” Jaden groaned.
“Then stay here,” I said flatly.
“Yes, splitting the group sounds like an excellent plan… For the demons,” Nate shuddered.
“Can’t we walk around the forest?” Jaden muttered.
“And waste even more time?” I snapped, turning towards him, my eyes burrowing into his. “Every second we hesitate, is another second they torture her.”
Jaden’s jaw tightened, before he averted his gaze.
Lionel placed a hand on my shoulder. “We’ll save her.”
I shrugged him off, anger building inside of me, raw and unruly.
“You’re feeling guilty.”
My eyes slid towards the voice, landing on the wind mage.
Faelin flinched but held my gaze. “It’s not your fault.”
Ashley’s voice joined, soft, I barely caught it. “She was on watch, Malakai, none of us heard a thing.”
“I know.” My jaw locked.“And I’ll make them pay with their lives, anything less is unacceptable.”
I turned and continued walking, the others following right behind me.
For a while, only the crunch of boots and the faint hum of distant magic filled the air.
“If the Demon King has her…” Faelin broke the silence.
I stopped for a brief moment, every nerve in my body on edge. “He does.”
No one spoke after that.
There was something inside my chest throbbing faintly, a heat I couldn’t reach. It had grown, ever since that first time I tasted her blood, like an invisible thread that linked us together. I didn’t know if it was her pain or her fire, but it was enough.
She was calling for me, and I had no intention of making her wait.
“We can make plans later,” I said, voice low. “We keep moving, punch every demon face we see until they bring us to the Demon King… We can rest once we’re dead.”
Ashley cracked her knuckles. “Finally something I can agree with.”
Lionel hesitated, then nodded once. “Fine. We rescue her, and then we fall back, that’s the smartest move. We can’t face a huge demon army and their King all by ourselves.”
Eve gave a quiet laugh from above. “Since when has Malakai ever done something smart when she’s involved?”
“Since never,” Jaden muttered bitterly.
Maybe they were right—maybe I was already half gone.
But as the wind shifted, I caught it again; her scent, the sweetness laced with the smell of newly sparked embers. Every part of me that was human clung to it. And every part of me that was demon wanted to devour it.
The forest changed before the horizon did. The air thickened, shadows deepening between the trees until they no longer looked like absence of light but living things waiting to move.
Eve’s voice came sharp from the ridge. “Movement, three o’clock.”
Before I could answer, something jumped out of the fog. Its shape flickered, first human, then smoke, then the pale reflection ofher. The realization that they had seen her, enough to mimic her made my blood turn cold and my body reacted before my mind. Blood threads snapped from my fingers, slicing through the illusion. The thing screamed, body shredded into black mist.
