“Why would you do that?” Jacinda asked, her voice pained. When Gabriel looked up, he saw that he’d taken out her heart by mistake. It pulsed in his hand, warm and wet.
“No!” He tried frantically to put her back together, to heal her, but he couldn’t. There were too many people in the way now, a dozen new figures emerging from the shadows, circling her, blocking her from Gabriel’s reach. Tall mages in dark robes, chanting in a language whose words he didn’t recognize. He slammed his fist through the back of the closest one, ripping out his spine. When the body dropped, Gabriel saw the gray-eyed mage with one hand in Jacinda’s hair, his silver blade pressed to her throat.
The mage met his eyes. Grinned wickedly. And sliced.
Gabriel reached for her, catching her as she fell forward in a spray of blood. He gathered her against his chest, but they were no longer at the bar.
They were on the beach, running from an angry sea. Too slow. Too heavy. The wave caught them hard, knocking them down and sweeping them under, churning and churning until it finally spat them out.
They were back at Obsidian.
Now she stood before Charley, holding out her hands as if to stop Gabriel’s advance. But Gabriel didn’t want to stop. He shoved the stake into her chest. Blood coated his hands, and as she watched in horror, he licked them clean.
“I hate you, Prince,” she whispered.
The words shook something loose inside.
“Jacinda?” He reached for her again, but it was too late.
Flames gathered at her feet, rising higher, burning them both. Now, she was in hell, chained to a jagged black rock that jutted up from a desolate landscape. Gabriel wanted desperately to free her, but every time he reached for the chains, the fire surged, melting his flesh. His bones.
“I can’t save you!” he shouted. “I can’t bloody save you!”
Jacinda laughed. “I told you, Prince. I’m not your damsel.”
And then, shaking free of her chains, she stepped out of the fire, lifted her hands, and roasted him alive.
* * *
“No!” Gabriel bolted upright, still trapped in the midst of his delirium. Before him, the embers of the fire glowed, and he reached for them, so certain it was Jacinda, that she was burning, that he was losing her…
The heat of the embers shocked him fully awake, and he gasped, his body covered in sweat, every part of him trembling.
Jacinda stirred on the rug beside him, burrowing deeper beneath the comforter.
Relief flooded his chest.
He reached for her, shifting the bedding so he could touch her silver hair.
But it wasn’t silver. It was black.
“I don’t know what she did to you,” the succubus hissed, “but you can’t keep running forever, sweetness. I’ll—”
Her image flickered, and the woman at his side became Jacinda once more.
Gabriel jammed the heels of his hands into his eyes, trying to get a fucking grip.
“Jacinda,” he called out. “Wake up.Pleasewake up.”
No response.
When he lowered his hands and opened his eyes, there was no Jacinda. No succubus. Nothing but a trail of fresh blood leading out through the front door.
He followed it outside, wading into knee-deep snow, ignoring the icy burn on his bare flesh. The blood carved a ruby-red path through the pristine whiteness, ending just before a copse of evergreens a few dozen yards out.
When he reached the trees, another figure stepped out from the shadows.
Gabriel fell to his knees and wept.
